Morality is the degree to which something is right and good; it describes ones belief of what the right behavior is, and then how one fulfills this belief. It has been argued that religion is the base from which one forms their sense of morality. The belief that there is no God, or atheism, is a belief that is shared by an ever increasing amount of people. Such a belief can be traced back to the sixth century BCE in areas like China, India, and Greece. Many of the flawed and outdated ideology of the world religions have caused wars and divisions between races and peoples throughout human history. The idea that morality cannot exist without religion, or a higher authority, is inaccurate not only in that morality is an innate and evolutionary idea that has grown and developed over thousands of years and countless generations, but also because of the idea held by some religious persons that one who is without God must also without a moral standard, an idea which is immoral itself.

Religion cannot be a basis for morality due to the immoral beliefs that many of these world religions preach and many of their followers hold to be true, in conjunction with the destructive impact it has had on humanity. From the perspective of equality, freedom, and improving the human condition, it is easy to say that religious laws are highly immoral, and thus are a detriment to the development of our society. An example of this is the thousands of years that religions had to address longstanding issues like slavery, race and gender equality, and sanctity of life, all of which it has failed to do. Even today, in Kashmir and other Islamic nations, women are forced to wear burkas from head to toe. This is only one on a long list of Islamic laws that subdue women, a list which includes ideas such as women cannot marry without male guardian’s permission, they cannot travel outside of her home town without a male chaperone who is a close relative, and perhaps the most frightening, a women’s witness is worth half that of a man’s. One can even go as far as to say that the fact that in the Catholic Church women cannot be priests also shows a lack of respect towards women. It isn’t only women who have been lowered in status by the religious world, but also homosexuals. In the article, “Atheism Teaches Morality and Ethics”, Paul Kurtz recognizes that “Some conservative religious moralists seek to enact a constitutional amendment that would prohibit it. They insist that marriage must be between one man and one woman, as is divinely sanctified by the Bible; further, they believe that heterosexual marriage is threatened by gay marriage”(5 ). These outdated ideas are stripping a group of people from their basic rights as human beings based on their sexuality, which makes such actions comparable to racism. Richard Dawkins, a highly regarded evolutionary biologist and former Professor for Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University, and author of “The God Delusion” brings attention to the attitude of many religious people towards homosexuality. Dawkins notes that their attitude is a true reflection of their religious absolutism, as he quotes the Reverend Jerry Falwell, founder of Liberty University: “AIDS is not just God's punishment for homosexuals; it is God's punishment for the society that tolerates homosexuals” (289). Attitudes towards homosexuality, and such provocative statements as made by Reverend Falwell, reveal much about the nature of morality that is encouraged and inspired by religious faith, with equally informative and enlightening examples being the position held by the church concerning capital punishment and the sanctity of human life.

Apart from the degrading ideas of many world religions, the number of wars fought in the name of religion have caused widespread fighting and massive death tolls, and thus are not viable bases for morality. It can be argued that where we see religious fundamentalism, violence ensues because the most fervent and devout followers are often the most dangerous. This is evident by the analysis of religious wars like the Crusades between 1095 C.E. and 1272 C.E, to more modern acts of violence like the acts of terrorism by Islamic fundamentalists towards the West. These horrific events in human history are a result of faith, which Julie Carnegie defines in the article “Agnosticism and Atheism” as a “belief and trust in God, accompanied by a sense of loyalty to the traditional doctrines, or principles, of religion” (2). This loyalty to such traditional ideas are what have kept ideas like gender equality and sexual freedom from truly advancing. Christopher Hitchens notes in his novel, “God is Not Great”, that Pope John Paul II, upon his death, was praised for many things, amonst was a list apologies which he made for the Catholic Church. This list included an “apology to the Jews for the centuries of Christian anti-Semitism, an apology to the Muslim world for the Crusades, an apology to Eastern Orthodox Christians for the many persecutions that Rome had inflicted upon them, too, and some general contrition about the Inquisition as well” (Hitchens 66). With this, it appears that the Church was wrong more often than not. They have been erroneous and often even criminal in the past, which makes it incomprehensible as to how the Catholic Church and other religions can be considered an adequate model for one’s moral standard.

Morality is a human characteristic that has been developed over thousands of years, and is not a result of religious teachings or belief in a god. Morality is not a product of religion, rather it is something outside of any religious belief. Richard Dawkins brings Harvard biologist Marc Hauser’s words into light when he paraphrases the biologist: “Driving our moral judgments is a universal moral grammar, a faculty of the mind that evolved over millions of years to include a set of principles for building a range of possible moral systems” (223). This means that morality is something that has been built and constructed as a human idea that can be learned; however, like language, these principles are not known or apparent to us. From Hauser’s idea, we can conclude that “ethical behavior—regardless of who the practitioner may be—results always from the same causes and is regulated by the same forces, and has nothing to do with the presence or absence of religious belief”(Zindler 1). It can be said that one cannot be moral with God. Religious individuals would find themselves in a state of being which requires them to do good, not because it’s the right thing, not because they want to help, but rather because they feel themselves being observed by their omnipresent, omniscient God. It is rooted in fear that people, when they consider this higher power, move away from morality, and closer to the immoral behavior of looking for reward.

Because morality is something which predates religion, it is something that is shared in all humans, including atheists. Many theists argue that, without religion, or a higher authority, that there is nothing stopping someone from committing the most heinous of crimes. However, the behavior of atheists is subject to the same rules that govern and restrict all members of the human race, including religionists who claim the contrary, as in their minds they are governed by the power of God. Despite such protestations by the religious, it is just as easily asserted that when theists practice ethical behavior, it isn't really due to their fear of eternal damnation, or their lust of life in Heaven. And if one were to only perform good deeds in fear of punishment and in hope of reward, than it is not morality at all, rather it is immoral in every way. The idea of morality is to do good for the sake of doing good, not to avoid eternal damnation or in hope of reserving a place in God’s kingdom.

Morality exists outside of religion; in fact, it predates the development of religions and beliefs in a god. They are not mutually exclusive and a nonbeliever can be just as moral, if not more moral, than any theist, and vice versa. Through analysis of religious wars and religious ideas throughout human history, it is evident that religion has not only negatively impacted and contorted the human concept of morality, but also stirred a violence within the species, something which may not have occurred without such distortion of morality.