This question was raised on ex-Christian.net.
I wrote the following two responses for that thread.

I have a theory as to why Christians believe that humans are depraved--it is so that Jesus' death has meaning.

I nearly felt sick when that insight hit me but I can't get around it. My profs say Jesus' followers tried to make sense of Jesus' death when they thought he was the Messiah. They realized that he was God's Pascal Lamb to pay the price for the sin of the world once and for all. It had to be this way to show what kind of God the Christian God was--he was a God who was not embarrassed to be found dead on a cross, whereas the Roman and Greek Gods were aristocrats hell-bent on the honor system.

This Christian God tossed the honor system out of the way because Jesus paid the price by death on the cross. He was the highest and died as the lowest, so I guess he bridged the gap between the full spectrum of the honor system from highest god to lowest slave.

Whew! I never "got" it before. I'm sure this is the depths of the "mysteries" of God. And it's totally empty. Humans should be able to do this with or without religion. But the feudal system with its lords and slaves has long since gone out of style so modern theologians have had to reinterpret things and instituted morality for the honor system. That is what I think. Where as people were of less value than God, in a democratic society all humans are equal so something had to be made of the matter. Out goes basic value; in comes morality/ethics. That's my idea.

Now if one of my profs hadn't slipped up on me I might not have gotten this idea. I mentioned the feudal idea about people having to grovel before their lord for a favor. Prof said that interpretation has not been used for a long time. I thought HUH?!? Okay. How do you prove that one? The moment passed and I was left with my own thoughts. Until now. The idea is in all the songs, in the Psalms. I am not sure what is in the liberal church hymn books and literugy but I don't think they have rewritten the Bible. After studying with these people for all these years I am not convinced that they have reinterpretted things as much as he thinks they have. Not to my satisfaction.

They still have totally depraved humanity outside of God. He told me that "we know that if we didn't have guidelines for right and wrong we'd be pretty messed up humanity." Not his exact words but he definitely used the word "we." And it grated on my nerves. I had forgotten how strong their theology was in that line. These are not fundamentalists.

You know what kind of answers I get when I point out that good deeds are done by nonreligious people? I was still a Christian when I did this.

-God moves in mysterious ways. (said with a sickly sweet smile by a missionary who just got done expounding on the wonders of God's outpouring in her and her husband's work in the UK)

-Maybe it's not about being good. (I have no idea what that was supposed to mean.)

-What kind of values have they got?! (said with utmost contempt; I suspect the people being referred to were Christians but I wouldn't know; they were not as "Christian" as we)

-*shrug*

-*dismiss*

-*pretend not to hear*

But why shouldn't good deeds be done by non-religious people?

You seem to have come across a very strange lot of Christians, RSM.

I believe that the love shown from one person to another comes from God, but I do not say that one has to believe as I do in orger to demonstrate that Love.

Marti

You fit the bill, Marti. You, like the Christians referred to in the OP, believe that morals (love) come from God. Why do you believe that?

I agree with you that it seems very strange. Do you consider yourself to be a strange Christian???

But when the vast majority of Christians believe this way, it can hardly be considered strange. It's just the way Christians are.

I look forward to your answer as to why you believe that all love and good deeds come from God. Hopefully your answer will be better than the ones given by the Christians in the second post of this thread.

The problem with the statement that love and good deeds come from God is that it denies that humans are inherently good. It declares that humans are inherently depraved. And that, my friend, goes against all empirical observation and evidence.

I'm not sure who said it first, but one atheist is credited for saying: When I do good I feel good. When I do bad, I feel bad. That is my religion.

I would add that humans naturally seek that which makes them feel good. Intense socialization begins in the womb and continues throughout life. The child raised in a religious home is often alienated from its Self by the age of three to such an extent that he or she has no will of her/his own. All that is left is an angry tantrum thrower that must be tamed and subdued. When, as a teenager, this person finally submits to the church, a sense of peace is experienced because the fight has been relinquished. This false sense of peace is mistaken for the inner peace of God. It becomes the basis for the further perpetuation of a religion that robs human beings of their Selves and the peace and humanity that is their rightful heritage as human beings. This is what "God" does to people.

Why do you say that all love comes from "God"?

I'm sure I know the so-called to the above question but, as will be shown, it's not a real answer in any sense of the word.

Christians often run with the idea that the "natural mind" is totally inferior to the "spiritual mind." This is based on scripture passages such as the following:



Paul does not provide any evidence or basis for his arguments. Nor do the Christians of our day. They assume that the Bible is inerrant and therefore it must be so.

When nonreligious people disagree with them and find their statements of faith incomprehensible, they think this is rock-solid evidence that the the natural mind cannot understand the things of the spirit.

They won't look at how nonreligious people live. They only look at passages like what Paul says in Romans 1:29-31:

29 Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, 30 Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, 31 Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful

Nonreligious people do not live like this!

Therefore, Paul's statement is blatantly false, like it or not.

QUESTION: If Paul is wrong about THAT could he also be wrong about the natural mind and spiritual mind?