Could the fall of morals from the 1960s to now have been avoided?

[Hazelelponi]

I have no time or any desire for ignorance instead of actual discussion, so I bid everyone good day. I said my piece.

 

[RDKirk]

Madalyn Murray O'Hair (née Mays; April 13, 1919 – September 29, 1995)[1] was an American activist supporting atheism and separation of church and state. In 1963 she founded American Atheists and served as its president to 1986, after which her son Jon Garth Murray succeeded her. She created the first issues of American Atheist Magazine.

O'Hair is best known for the Murray v. Curlett lawsuit, which challenged the policy of mandatory prayers and Bible reading in Baltimore public schools, in which she named her first son William J. Murray as plaintiff. Consolidated with Abington School District v. Schempp (1963), it was heard by the United States Supreme Court, which ruled that official Bible-reading in American public schools was unconstitutional. The Supreme Court had prohibited officially sponsored prayer in schools in Engel v. Vitale (1962) on similar grounds. Through American Atheists, O'Hair filed numerous other suits on issues of separation of church and state.

You didn't mention that O'Hair's son William--the child at the center of the case that removed prayer from schools--later became a Christian himself.

The Holy Spirit ain't worried about all that.

 

[RDKirk]

Making it illegal to read the Bible and pray in school is NOT an improvement in morals.

It's what likely began the decline in the country, as the overal decline began at that same time period.

I'm coming from a more non-Christian viewpoint, because I've not been saved very long..

But, for most people's in this country reading a Bible verse that says to honor mother or father or that there's a God who loves us and will forgive us isn't harmful to society, and it's not specifically immoral.

If no one is forcing you to follow the edicts thereof, or asking you to do more than bow your heads for a minute of quiet while others pray, there's nothing wrong with it, even if it happens in school.

Voddie Baucham did a sermon on the difference between secular humanism versus the Supremacy of Christ and Truth and what kind of an impact secular humanism actually has on society or youth.. it's actually good to sit and listen to

There was prayer in our schools when I was a child, and it still did not result in desegregation where black Christian children and white Christian children could pray in school together.

And at the time, those white Christians who loved prayer in schools still didn't have any qualms about murdering black Christian children without consequences.

Sorry, but no, there is nothing moral about a society where children can be murdered without consequence.

 

[ViaCrucis]

Making it illegal to read the Bible and pray in school is NOT an improvement in morals.

It's not illegal to read the Bible and pray in school.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[caerlerion]

Making it illegal to read the Bible and pray in school is NOT an improvement in morals.

This never happened.

 

[Tinker Grey]

God is the standard.

I have no time or any desire for ignorance instead of actual discussion, so I bid everyone good day. I said my piece.

Does God's standard include snark?

 

[timothyu]

I have no romantic notions of my youth to pull from, but I do think there's been a decline in morals that seems commiserate with the rise of atheism and the removal of religious practices like prayer from the public sphere.

The sixties were probably the last decade where true belief in the agape love God promoted was a driving force among youth. Certainly there were those who viewed it carnally but for the most part as the song goes, 'All You Need is love" reflected the will of God. What happened after that was decline in agape yet a rise in evangelical political aggression at the end of the 70's. The tables had turned.

Now here is the point. The concept of morals is different between secular and true Christianity. One is based on loving neighbour as self, the other is predominately about self. So Christians putting the will of God ahead of their own, would see with the demise of agape that morals were declining, while the secular world would see improvement as self serving rights and opportunities rose at the cost of responsibility. The troubling part is if the Christian community is still as large as it claims, why are they taking the secular viewpoint now and worse yet following, not the difference between Kingdom and world of man, but political division within the world of man? So many Christians, so little agape.

If morality based upon agape is to make a comeback then Christianity needs to rise above the world once again rather than join it. Christians need to unite the world (ironically against itself) and remind it that the agape of the Kingdom will overrule the self serving world one of these days, so they might as well get with the program and switch allegiance now.

 

[Hazelelponi]

Does God's standard include snark?

No but like you, I'm human.

 

[Hazelelponi]

There was prayer in our schools when I was a child, and it still did not result in desegregation where black Christian children and white Christian children could pray in school together.

And at the time, those white Christians who loved prayer in schools still didn't have any qualms about murdering black Christian children without consequences.

Sorry, but no, there is nothing moral about a society where children can be murdered without consequence.

You may be quite a bit older than me, but I've never seen racism or segregation in America.

I think people need to stop living in a past, that most of us (65% of the population in the united states are under the age of 50) have never once seen or experienced.

I was born here and my parents are immigrants! Are we responsible for things we never even saw?

Is my husband responsible ffor what he never did or engaged in..

you people are ridiculous, start living in the present day. Christians fixed their own selves. change takes time and they changed.

just stop. I'm so sick of the poor poor pitiful me game when this country is one step this side of heaven... you people are some of the luckiest people on earth and you don't even care to appreciate what you have and work on a better life for yourself and your children.

It's here man. Right in front of you..poor poor pitiful me, white Christians are evil doesn't cut it because it's not even real.

As much as you want it to be real, it just plain isn't.

 

[quatona]

Do you think the relative freefall of morality that started around the 1960s could have been avoided?

Could you possibly be a bit more specific when it comes to the freefall of morality that you are talking about?

 

[hedrick]

Now here is the point. The concept of morals is different between secular and true Christianity. One is based on loving neighbour as self, the other is predominately about self.

Right, but which is which? My non-Christians friends generally care about others, and consider morals to be about how we show that. The Christians I read in CF seem to be about personal purity, and have various justifications about why we don't need to care about others, because they could fix their problems if they wanted to.

So I agree about your two orientations, but I see the Christians as more about self and the non-Christians more about loving their neighbor.

This wasn't so true on the 50s and 60s, so it may actually be the case that Christian morals have gotten worse since then.

 

[timothyu]

So I agree about your two orientations, but I see the Christians as more about self and the non-Christians more about loving their neighbor.

Labels tend to get in the way of actions.

 

[RDKirk]

You may be quite a bit older than me, but I've never seen racism or segregation in America.

I think people need to stop living in a past, that most of us (65% of the population in the united states are under the age of 50) have never once seen or experienced.

Those of us born in the past are still running the nation.

What is hard for younger people in America to fully grasp is that we American Boomers were born on a different planet than you were born on, a different planet than this one.

It's hard to grasp how dominating racial segregation was in America if you weren't there. I, personally, was in middle school before I ever knew a white kid by name. Most Boomers older than I were in the working world before they ever knew someone of the other race by name...if then.

There were three movie theaters where I lived. One was for blacks only, one was for whites only, and in one blacks could sit in the balcony. We had separate swimming pools, separate schools, separate play ares in the park.

Go to YouTube and watch some television programs prior to 1964. No black people in those programs, particularly not in any children or family programming. There were no black people on The Jetsons or on The Flintstones. There were no black people in Leave it to Beaver or Ozzie and Harriet. There were no black people in The Andy Griffith Show or Bewitched or I Dream of Jeannie. There were no black people in commercials and no black people in the backgrounds of the sets.

The vast majority of white kids growing up in the late 50s and early 60s grew up in a segregated world. He didn't see black people in his daily life, he didn't interact with other black kids. He didn't even see black people on television. The idea that it was okay for black people to be around him isn't what he was taught as a child.

"As the sapling is bent, so grows the tree."

"Raise up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it."

And those kids are the adults still running America today. Those are still the people controlling industry, media, law, and politics. When John Lewis looks across the aisle, he's looking at the same individuals who were opposed to him in 1963.

Now, for sure, many of them have overcome their childhood teaching--when they have determined themselves to do it. But that's not most people.

We Boomers were the last generation raised in racial apartheid. It was inculcated into us as children. We are locked into an unending combat that began on an entirely different planet like Autobots and Decepticons. The racial situation in the US is not going to change until we Boomers are dead.

We just have to die, because clearly we haven't changed as a generation, and we're going to stay in control, influencing younger generations, until we are dead. After we are dead, there will be a chance.

 

[hedrick]

Those of us born in the past are still running the nation.

What is hard for younger people in America to fully grasp is that we American Boomers were born on a different planet than you were born on, a different planet than this one.

And we're doing our best to get back. I agree with you that it's going to take demographic changes before the US can start looking again at what Jesus would want us to do. Unfortunately our children are going to inherit a huge debt and a climate disaster that's nearly impossible to fix.

 

[stevil]

Adam & Eve to have rejected the Forbidden Fruit.

But they weren't to know it was wrong to eat the fruit. They had no knowledge of right and wrong.
Sure god said not to, but they weren't to know it was wrong to do the opposite of what god says.

 

[stevil]

Do you think the relative freefall of morality that started around the 1960s could have been avoided? How in what kind of way?

The only way to stop a "freefall" of morality is to create an authority of morality, to document and promote that morality and to viciously punish people who do not conform.

 

[timothyu]

The only way to stop a "freefall" of morality is to create an authority of morality, to document and promote that morality and to viciously punish people who do not conform.

Like the Westboro Baptist Church does?

 

[stevil]

Like the Westboro Baptist Church does?

Like anyone that wants to maintain a "moral" standard on the populous does.

Most countries respect personal freedom over enforcement of a moral standard, thankfully.
We don't need a moral society, we just need a safe and thriving one.

 

[timothyu]

I do miss carhops.

 

[Go Braves]

Do you think the relative freefall of morality that started around the 1960s could have been avoided? How in what kind of way?

I also don't believe we should go back to before the 1960s in all ways, but I believe the traditionalists and conservatives have a point sometimes.

I think maybe for white Protestant men the 1960s were preferable than today. Catholics, Jews, Muslims, black folks, Hispanic folks, Asian folks, folks with a uterus, I doubt many of them could say the same.