Changes in Morality - How can society replace religious morality as religious influence wanes?

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*Conclusion*

The control of society by the religious institutions of the Christian religion rose slowly over a period of three hundred years as it organized itself, settled its doctrines and struggled for survival. With the conversion of Constantine, and his establishment of the RCC as the official religion of the remaining Roman Empire assured its survival and ensured its final victory. Even so, the tenacity of the losing religions were such that while control was mostly complete by the seventh century, there were pockets of resistance as late as the 16th century as far north as England and Scotland.

As the Renaissance blossomed in the 13th century, church control began a very slow slide into the modern day, where its social influence is very limited compared to its heyday in the Middle Ages. Statistics on church attendance in Western society shows a slow decline such that Christianity will be a small minority in actual practice by the end of the 21st century.

Its decline is further slowed by the lack of organization and education by any possible replacement to its social institutions, as society struggles to identify its cultural imperatives and possible ethical choices. Whether this decline will continue or reverse is not assured in any way at this point in history, as outside conflicts and influences affect that struggle.

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*Moral Confusion*

So with such a confusing morass of ethical systems competing for attention, is there any wonder society is in confusion? With the social control of society by religious organizations waning with the increased education levels and greater sophistication of western society, the main brake on the tendency towards a more secular belief system is that no single, organized competition exists. Religions are still controlled by the same traditional systems, devoted to the same traditional theocracies, and have the advantage of systems of organized education within their houses of worship.

Secular systems, as noted above, each have their adherents, but the wider social milieu is mostly ignorant of the differences or basic similarities of each system, and often even of the systems themselves. The widest known appellation given to those who have abandoned the religious belief systems is that of "atheist", comprising the letter 'a-' indicating "not" coupled with the word "theist", resulting in a word that means "not a theist". It has been proposed within that population that its use is counter-productive, as it is used as a pejorative by the religious community, and provides a handy target for scorn and attack. It is increasingly realized among secular groups that the lack of organization and opportunities for educating the public about alternatives to religious ethics is the greatest weakness in their attempts to increase their numbers.

Indeed, there are several reasons why the decline in religious control of society is slower than its rise. Christianity had, in the conversion of Constantine, the power of the State behind its actions, and the social norms of the day did not preclude violence in the use of that power. As the Roman Empire used its power to destroy the old religious institutions, the already organized doctrines, existing organization and institutions of the new religion gave society a ready replacement to fill the resulting vacuum that destruction left behind, mandated by the State. Also, the decline in influence is not, to the current losing religious system, a desirable thing. It will naturally struggle to maintain its supremacy. Indeed, for centuries after the beginning of the Renaissance, the church fought back with much the same tenacity with which it first obtained that power. However, its loss of influence is not due to an organization that it can target for destruction, but social pressures that it cannot fight with traditional tools.

And last, the slow pace of waning influence is due to the same reasons it took Christianity three centuries after Constantine to seize control: social inertia. Individuals are not easily convinced to change or drop beliefs that they were taught from birth to recognize, and will always try to teach their children those same beliefs. As the data from Theamericanchurch.org show, while there appears to be a trend away from active church participation, it is a very slow process, fueled mainly by generational change, and not direct education. The lack of State power to mandate change eliminates a powerful tool as well.

The situation is not helped by the looming conflict with Islam, a newer religion whose basic tenets do not preclude violence, and which has scripture mandating world domination and control. Such outside pressures can slow the movement from religion, as the threatened population seeks comfort and solace, which it cannot find in current alternatives lacking organization. How this conflict will affect the trend away from religion is unknown. It could slow the progress, as noted, or accelerate it as individuals are lead away from Islam's negative example of religious extremism.

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Immanuel Kant

On ethics, Kant wrote works that both described the nature of universal principles and also sought to demonstrate the procedure of their application. Kant maintained that only a "good will" is morally praiseworthy, so that doing what appears to be ethical for the wrong reasons is not a morally good act. Kant's emphasis on one's intent or reasons for acting is usually contrasted with the utilitarian tenet that the goodness of an action is to be judged by its results. Utilitarianism is a hypothetical imperative, if one wants _____ , they must do ______. Contrast this with the Kantian ethic of the categorical imperative, where the moral act is done for its own sake, and is framed: One must do ______ or alternatively, one must not do ______.

For instance, under Kantian ethics, if a person were to give money to charity because it was their religious duty (and failure to do so would result in some sort of punishment from a God or Supreme Being) then the charitable donation would not be a morally good act.

John Stuart Mill

Utilitarianism (from the Latin utilis, useful) is a theory of ethics that prescribes the quantitative maximization of good consequences for a population. It is a form of consequentialism. This good to be maximized is usually happiness, pleasure, or preference satisfaction. Though some utilitarian theories might seek to maximize other consequences, these consequences generally have something to do with the welfare of people (or of people and nonhuman animals). For this reason, utilitarianism is often associated with the term welfarist consequentialism.

It is worth mentioning that Utilitarianism is compatible with both secular and religious ethics, since under Utilitarianism it is the "end result" which is fundamental (as opposed to Kantian ethics discussed above). Thus using the same scenario as above, it would be irrelevant whether the person giving money to charity was doing so out of personal or religious conviction, the mere fact that the charitable donation is being is made is sufficient for it to be classified as morally good.

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So what does that have to do with morality and the social struggles in the US today?

Plenty.

One hears a lot of complaints about the moral degeneration of the US in the last hundred years from Christian groups. The subject of sex is usually a major point of contention, so let's focus on that.

How did the RCC view the old Roman and Greek moral character? What were the differences?

The Roman and Greek classical religions (not the mysteries, they were different) were not particularly religions of moral theology. Their gods were very human in character: vain, selfish, mercurial and prone to jealousy. The religious authorities were, in the main, charged with obtaining the favor of the gods through worship and sacrifice. One could be singled out by the gods through simple bad luck, so sacrifice and worship to head off such was the reason one paid attention to these rituals. One could obtain good luck by paying particular attention to a particular god for a specific purpose, but in the main, one simply tried to appease the gods to get through life without too much bad luck.

There wasn't a clear, revealed moral code to live by that resulted in a happy afterlife. Everybody ended up in the same place, so morality was something that the ancients found through philosophy, not religion.

Old way religions, including the classics, regarded sex as something to be glorified as befitting something that propagated the human race. It was recognized by the ancients as important to the society, because from sex came the next generation. Every ancient religion had its female and male aspects and their gods reflected that duality.

But another aspect of sex was that many religions regarded human sexuality as representing another kind of fertility - that of the earth from which their food came. Some ancient rites included sexual intercourse as a symbolic ritual to invoke or transfer that fertility to the earth for the purpose of having a plentiful harvest, upon which the group's future survival depended.

The doctrines of Christianity, however, saw sex differently as their theology developed. It is looked at as sinful outside of the procreative process. (I know that is different in some Protestant denominations, but we're talking centuries 1-4 here.) There is no symbolic fertility rite.

So as the RCC gained power and influence, it demonized sex outside of that process, and made it sinful.

Sound familiar? It should be, it is the same thing we hear from Christian churches now. Sex outside of procreation, much less marriage, is sinful. Some small fundamental denominations even look at sex inside of marriage as inherently sinful. True, most moderate to liberal denominations don't carry it that far, but they still look at sex with a jaundiced eye, even sometimes in marriage. Somehow, sex has become evil.

But in the 20th century, things have changed. With the increased education levels and sophistication of the general population has come a loosening of those values. The divorce rate has climbed to over 50 percent, rates of cohabitation have skyrocketed - even some retired couples cohabit today - for tax purposes! The number of single parents, never married, is higher than ever before.

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