(I am taking the liberty of posting my Easter sermon, and all in one go. The bible reading to go with it is John. 20. 1-18, which is the story of Mary Magdalene meeting the risen Christ after having gone early to attend to Jesus’ body for proper burial)

Christianity is the most realistic and transformative faith we could possibly have. Our faith is the supreme gift of the God of love to us, each and everyone of us, and to the whole world, as the way of finding life in all its fullness.

Let’s begin with a lesson for resurrection life that we learn from today’s passage.

Perhaps counter-intuitively, the lesson is faithfulness in death. “Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary of Magdala came to the tomb”. Mary went to attend to the messy, gruesome business of caring for the body of her Lord and master and friend. No expectation of a happy ending. All hope gone. Yet still there are jobs to be done.

Christianity is the most realistic faith we could possibly have because we accept the reality of the world we live in, and of human nature, including our own. We understand that Christ was put to death because he challenged the authority and position of those who held power – whether it be the religious authorities hating to be upstaged by a common, wandering preacher who rejected the religious orthodoxy, or the Romans, always ready to stamp on any threat of disorder. We understand that in this wonderful, beautiful, bountiful world, every single one of us will suffer, sometimes terribly. And around the world, so often, that suffering is because of the stupid, violent hatred of men seeking power.

And in response to our own weakness in combatting the suffering and evil poured into the world through the abuse of power, what do we do? We continue in faith and love to deal with caring for those we love who are in need and trying our best to clean their wounds – in whatever way our situation requires. For Mary, that meant going, as soon as she possibly could, to clean away the blood of her dear Lord and treat his dead body with reverence.

Because this is who we are, or rather, because this is the way that God in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ has made us, we do not realise how shockingly unusual this is. The normal human response is hatred, fear and anger, hitting back at those who hurt us, and sometimes getting our attack in first just because we are afraid of what might happen. But I am jumping ahead to the transformative power of our faith in Christ.

We also accept the reality of our own failures and loss and despair. It seems to me that the modern secular world is so lost precisely because people cannot bear to think that they are not exactly as they should be, and living their best possible life. In contrast, we know that we are sinners, and sometimes we feel that very keenly indeed – wretched sinners that we are. But we are redeemed sinners! We accept the reality of the gift that God has given us, what God has made possible. To be forgiven, redeemed, purified, healed, restored, empowered, enfolded in the love of God, in communion with him and in the fellowship of our brothers and sisters all round the world and through all eternity. Our faith has enabled us to see that this is the ultimate reality, the pearl of great price, worth giving up everything else in order to have that privilege to come before God and say, “Yes Lord, here I am”.

So, we also accept the reality of our hopes, and we dare to believe. Mary – like all of us – had put her hope in Jesus, except, unlike us, she had done so with no inkling that the resurrection of Jesus was possible, or that life in the Spirit, in full communion with God was the mission for which the Father had sent his Son. But, again, unlike us, when Mary put her trust in Jesus she had no inkling that he would be put to death with such horrific violence and hatred and humiliation. She, who saw and listened to Jesus, could not possibly believe that his message of God’s forgiveness and acceptance of all people would be rejected.

So, Mary and we are alike in our faith and love for Jesus, but we approach from different ends of the story – she not knowing how that story would finish, but we not being in on the beginning when all was hope and excitement and joy. But we are also alike in our faithfulness in death and in our acceptance of the reality of our own humanity, with its glorious possibilities for reaching out in compassion, and our capacity for selfishness, fear and greed – which we never lose sight of, but of which we are not afraid, because we have complete trust that it is the grace of God which will triumph in us.

Christianity is also the most transformative faith we could possibly have. Mary was still in the garden crying. One of the great mysteries of the resurrection accounts is that the closest friends of Jesus did not initially recognise him. What might we take from this? On that first Easter Sunday morning, Mary was already in the presence of Jesus, but she didn’t yet know it. Seeing Jesus in the garden, hearing his voice, did not have any effect, but when he called her name, she knew him instantly. Similarly with the two on the road to Emmaus, they saw and talked with him for ages without knowing him, and then in the instant Jesus broke and blessed the bread for them, they knew it was him.

I think there is a deep truth about the Christian life here. Not so much about the way we become Christians, for some of us can tell you the exact moment of our conversion, while others can only say that they came to faith sometime between – and then they quote one time when then did not believe and another when they did. Rather, I think it tells us about how we become aware of the presence of the Lord. God is always with us, but we are sometimes unaware of it. What is it, what does it take to bring about the breakthrough? I am not grasping for some unrealistic, miraculous, mystical experience. Notice how Mary took completely in her stride an encounter with two angels – her focus is simply on serving Jesus – she simply says to the angels that her Lord has been taken away and she wants to find him. When she is actually in the presence of Jesus, she does not immediately have a wonderful emotional experience; she simply asks Jesus, if it was him who removed the body, please tell her so she can go to him.

Then there is the moment of recognition. It is in recognising the presence of the risen Christ that she is transformed. It is not resolution for her grief she seeks, not some guarantee of well-being, not some gift of everlasting peace: she wants her Lord. And this is her message when she rushes back to tell the disciples. She doesn’t even say, “Jesus is alive!” – though this is the inescapable truth behind what she does say. What she says is, “I have seen the Lord!”.

This is what makes Christianity the supremely transformative faith. Modern secular ideology, in the corruption and futility of its thinking, mistakes the reality of the physical creation and the work of human hands as the only reality that there is, but the ultimate reality is the presence of God. When we see him, then everything we look at is transformed.

In human reality, the cross is the place where those in power imposed their will to destroy Jesus. They thought that they were destroying him, humiliating him, proving that Jesus was a liar and that God supported their way of thinking. It is a symbol of the fear of change, fear of losing control, fear of the challenge if we change our values. It’s a symbol of hatred – hatred of Jesus’s message of forgiveness of sins. It’s a rejection of the hope that God will come to us.

But in God’s hands, the cross becomes the place where his mission to redeem humanity succeeds. It is a symbol of the triumph of love and life. It is the door opening up between God and humankind to enable us to live in communion with him and in justice and compassion with one another.

The cross should be a symbol of revulsion which all good people should reject. How can the messiah, the saviour sent by God, possibly be hanging in powerless humiliation, dying the death of a common criminal? But so transformative is the grace of God that when we see the cross, we see God! Our eyes are opened, and we exclaim, “Ah! This is what God is really like. I see it now”. He loves us so much that he gives his very self unto death in order that we might be set free from the dominion of sin and evil and death. All worldly values are upended. It is not power that is the supreme value in the world but love. It is in service to others that we are made whole. We see that on the cross, Jesus is not being defeated by evil and hatred and fear, he is winning the victory of our salvation. We see exactly how much God loves us. How could we have ever grasped this if God had not done this for us? He who is Lord came not to be served but to serve, and in loving us, and all people, he loved us to the end and on the cross he wins the victory of our redemption.

Our life now is simply a life of living out the grace that God has given to us, to love and serve him, to rejoice in the faith by which we are redeemed.

Christ is risen! Alleluia!

The strange distortions of secular ideology: My best possible life!

Part 5: The mystery of God’s peace

I believe that God has a way of putting everything right. However, I no longer see this as something that is done in heaven – and we will have to wait till then. I believe that the fulfilment that comes from knowing the presence of God has the extraordinary power to put everything right, now. I realise that this is counter-intuitive, potentially ridiculous when you look at the suffering of the world, and that it will be condemned as false and wicked by secularists. I am not saying that our faith in God is some escape from reality – rather my entire message is that it is secular ideology that seeks to escape from reality. I call on us to strive with all our might to make the world into the kingdom of God and not to rest till there is justice and peace and well-being for all. People who are suffering terribly will not feel that God has put everything right. The point I’m searching for is that we do not have to wait on circumstances to receive God’s perfect fulfilment – that makes us the prisoner of chance over which we have no control. We are not demanding that everything must be perfect and that I must be my perfect (or at least my best) self before I can feel whole. Wholeness is God’s gift to us, and he is in charge of that. And the wholeness that God offers – despite the manifest lack of wholeness in the world and in our lives – is complete and perfect. To know God is perfect bliss, and nothing has the power to get in the way of that – certainly nothing can stop God reaching out to embrace us, and if we will stay open to him, then nothing can prevent us from being embraced.

It is the extraordinary testimony of ordinary but grace-filled people that not even their suffering has been able to separate them from the love of Christ. I hope that I am never tested as they are. For now, I will not say more about the intense problem that suffering presents – to everyone of course, but given our focus today, particularly for those of faith who – along with Jesus – are sometimes compelled to cry out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me!?”. Yet, somehow, by grace meeting faith, it is the testimony of so many people that God carried them through to where they hold all the weight of their pain and loss, looking steadfastly at it, yet they also hold themselves to be fully embraced in the love of God, and gazing at him, they still find life in all its wholeness. “In Christ, my all in all, I find peace”.

The strange distortions of secular ideology: My best possible life!

Part 4: We already have what we long for

My answer to this, is (even if my hope of heaven is false) that the purpose of being a Christian is to enter into fullness of life now, in our current mortal life. The gifts received now make it all worthwhile – and, who knows, the reward of heaven might be real too. This is made so much easier once we acquire a little bit of wise awareness and realise that God does not ask us to give up good things – as some sort of test: “Let’s see if you’re willing to do this for me!”. Instead, he asks us to give up things that – though they may seem superficially attractive – are not really good for us, in order to embrace a way of life that is truly fulfilling. So, God has not set arbitrary rules to deny us truly good things in order to test our self-discipline, as though God is in need: “You must show me that you love me more than these other things”, and then that he will bribe us, “And if you do this, then I will reward you 100 times over for what you gave up for me”. Instead, God is our guide into the life of perfect fulfilment. His love for us is complete and he needs nothing in return – though he takes delight when we do love him back. God simply wants the best for us – and, interestingly, this takes us back to our original point when I noted the modern tendency to be terrified of not living our best possible life. It is in responding to God’s love that we find fulfilment, but this is not grasped at, not clung onto fearfully, not snatched at in a competitive race against others, not demanded as our right, not created by our own powers. It is received as a gift of love, from the God of love, who knows us better than we know ourselves, and who, in his constant self-giving, strives to bring us to completion. Our response is of vital importance; we are called to try with all our heart and mind and soul and strength to live in communion with God. However, we do not have to fear failure, we do not have to deny our flaws and our weaknesses, and the challenges we face, for we know, and admitted to ourselves and to the Lord, that we accept the truth about ourselves and about the world in which we live. Yet we do not have to wait for some future consummation. We do not live in anxiety: “What if heaven is not real? What if I should prove unworthy? What if I should fail and never reach the finish line?”. All these fears are calmed by the presence of God and dealt with in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and gently blown away by the Holy Spirit’s breath. We are not waiting for fulfilment, even as a gift, in the distant future. We receive it as a gift now. This is the full measure of the grace of God. He does not leave us on tenterhooks, hoping for the best. Once we know him, and receive his love, we have the assurance of his love. It is this assurance that is the perfect fulfilment that we desire and need, and in the grace of God, all our needs are met.

The strange distortions of secular ideology: My best possible life!

Part 3: Can we manage without heaven?

Once we have an inkling of grace, we, though still very weak in the weakness of our human nature, have at least some resources to cope with injustice and to forgive others. Living on planet reality, we have accepted our own flaws and we have accepted that we live in an unjust world. It has certainly been a long-standing source of anguish to religious people: how can it be that the omnipotent God of goodness and love does not end all suffering and injustice. There are some excellent theodicies (explanations for this) available, and I will return to address them directly on another occasion. All I will say for now is that – counter-intuitively perhaps – once you start to consider in detail exactly what you’d like God to do, life becomes ridiculous and impossible – and probably not holding much worth, if we demand that he must end all suffering.

However, we can focus on our earlier point that the Christian has resources to understand why the world is full of evil, and why so many people act so badly. Accepting our own flaws, we may have some chance of forgiving the injustices that others inflict on us. It is the Christian hope that God does have ways of providing justice ultimately, of recompensing people for their suffering, of putting right things that have gone wrong, of transforming situations that are, in worldly terms simply wicked and horrible, into occasions of grace and healing.

We need to consider heaven as a point of special interest. Traditionally, this is understood as receiving an eternal, spiritual life in the spiritual dimension of heaven, where everything will be made whole, and put right. We will, as it were, cast off everything that is unworthy of God so that, in the life of heaven, we can enjoy unalloyed communion with him, without ever having the pain of letting him down, or straying from him. We will, in fact, finally succeed in living the life that we longed to live here on planet earth, but continually failed to sustain because of our human weakness. (Quite how this could be probably deserves another article on another occasion).

I hope very much that the life of heaven is a reality. If God is God as I believe him to be, it seems entirely reasonable that he will make the life of heaven open to us. However, my concern is with secular thinkers, and they are quite right to discount heaven as unverified speculation. So, how are we to continue the Christian hope if we don’t rely on heaven? I once had a work colleague who was deeply drawn to his Catholic upbringing, but he was also deeply drawn to the attractions of adultery – and the latter regularly overcame the former. His attitude was that he would really like to live a Christian life, if only it didn’t involve having to give up so much. He regarded heaven as a wonderful reward, but only for those who keep the rules, and the rules were far too strict for him to keep. Now, if you hold that view, then the slightest doubt that heaven is not a reality is likely to undermine your resolve. You really would kick yourself if you gave up hugely pleasurable activities on earth, in order to get into heaven, only to discover that it was all for nothing, if heaven is not real.

The strange distortions of secular ideology: My best possible life!

Part 2: The assurance of God’s love enables us to accept the truth

The religious attitude is completely different. Life is understood as a journey with God as our companion. For Christians, this is understood in threefold form. The love of the Father over-shadows and surrounds us; everything we do and are is under his fatherly care and enfolded in his loving presence. The risen Lord Jesus is gloriously present in resurrection life, the promise to us that the powers of sin, evil and death have already been fundamentally defeated, and this victory will one day be complete. The Holy Spirit, mysterious advocate and comforter, our strength and guide, is within us and beside us. Thus, we are surrounded by the presence of God. We know ourselves to be utterly loved, with an everlasting, invincible love. God will never forsake us. Nothing can challenge him. He is Lord. He is perfect love. He is with us, now and forever. Such unconditional, never-ending love constantly reassures us that we have access to his presence where we will find forgiveness, peace, new life, reconciliation, hope and guidance, all tied together into a sense of coherent wholeness as we take our place as followers of Christ, and so have a share in the glorious mission of God, expressed in his universal, worldwide Church, to make the world into the kingdom of his Son. Within this over-arching mission, each individual Christian can discover their own sense of mission as they discern how they can express their gifts and goals within the larger mission of God’s kingdom.

As we pursue our personal journey through life – in company with God – we have a wise self-awareness of reality. Firstly, we know ourselves to be seriously flawed: we are sinners! But this is never cause for despair, because we are forgiven and redeemed sinners. This enables us to accept that there is a lot about ourselves that needs to be changed – without ever doubting that we are loved, that we have the supreme dignity of being children of God. Thus, we are completely free to accept that, of course, we are far, far from being the people we could, and indeed should, be, but this does not in any way detract from our sense of being completely whole. In common parlance, we have not the slightest doubt that “we are worthy”. However, I hesitated and would choose not to say this, for the whole point is that we are not worthy – we receive God’s love as a gift; we don’t need to be worthy in order to rejoice in the freedom of the children of God; we simply need to come to our senses and realise the truth about ourselves. So, of course, in worldly terms we have no doubt that we are worthy, but in our understanding of God’s grace we do not claim or assert “our rights” to be recognised as worthy. Instead, we humbly and joyfully accept the freely-given gifts of God’s grace.

(A theological reflection in 5 parts)

The strange distortions of secular ideology: My best possible life!

Part 1: Our best possible life

Many people today, especially in the younger generation, seem to have little hope or optimism. It seems to be part of a general malaise in a significant part of Western society at the moment. However, one thing that I notice in particular is that for many people, however they happen to be, down to the smallest detail, must be regarded as though it was ordained by a higher authority from all eternity. This is most peculiar for a secular ideology to adopt such an attitude.

I think the motive for this is that, for such people, it is unbearable for them to think that they are not living their best possible life. So, every detail, no matter how contingent, in that things did turn out that way, but they could easily have worked out differently, must be regarded as absolutely necessary – it could not possibly have been otherwise. This attitude, though bizarre, and clearly false, is, nevertheless, completely understandable in a secular age.

Those without God have no-one to forgive them if any failure to live “their best possible life” is down to themselves. They have no-one to give hope of ultimate justice if lives are negatively affected by the injustice of others. They have no hope of ultimate fulfilment and ongoing life if they have written off the possibility of the life of heaven. They have no means of things that have gone wrong ever being put right, let alone any hope of perfect fulfilment, if they deny the existence of the one in whose presence we find such life in all its fullness.

Secular peoples’ anxiety, anger, fear and resentment make perfect sense. If you are clear in your own mind that this mortal life is all we have and then we’re finished; if you come to awareness that, despite the wonderful possibility that we in the UK will have a long, healthy, prosperous life in which we will have many opportunities to pursue our goals, our life could be blighted, or suddenly cut short, through illness, sudden disaster, or the stupid selfish violence and greed of others; if you realise that, no matter how many years you assume you have ahead of you, you are on a countdown to certain death, then this can easily cast a shadow over even the sunniest prospects for life. Taking refuge in a hedonistic consumerist ideology of life is a distraction rather than a solution. If we are subconsciously fearfully simply trying to maximise our collection of good experiences before we turn up our toes, then I suggest that we have missed the whole point of living, even while we appear to be engaging with relish in life.

Assurance for the modern age

Part 12: The two ways have drawn so close, and travel in parallel – cannot the final cross-over be made? No matter, you have enough, but long for more.

I think we should examine this sense of encounter with God further, for, earlier, I suggested that the (very best) of secular and religious ideologies are very similar – except that religion adds a sense of relationship with God, which overcomes any sense of aloneness. We should now consider this much more positively, for the religious claim is that we can encounter the living God! This is so much more than the psychological benefit of not feeling alone – vital as that is. I said that my relationship with God is what I cherish most of all, but this hardly does justice to the wonder of the relationship that is on offer. It is impossible to do justice to this, and the best way to get close as an analogy –  if you don’t have experience of meeting with God – is probably through the effect of art, music and poetry.

I can allude to what the encounter with God is like. Vitally important, utterly profound statements can be made: meeting with God is being caught up with the eternal and the absolute; it is mixing our contingent, temporary frailty with what is absolute, infinite and perfect. It is the means of overlapping our particular expression of life with universal life in all its fullness, so that the two run concurrently, and, in a great mystery, the specifics of our mortal life become one with the all-embracing, fully-comprehensive life of the divine. In God, we touch the rock and plumb the deepest depths; we reach sublime heights and see all from the mountain top, no longer obscured, or veiled, or partial. Springs of living water well up within us, cleansing and healing us from all that we regret and from all wounds. We are made whole, filled with joy and peace, enveloped in the love of God, which in its perfection and fullness is both eternal and timeless – to be embraced for one moment is to enter into an eternity of bliss – or, rather, as we are still in time, we experience such joy for only a few moments, yet that moment is so precious as to be worth more than all the rest of life put together.

Such images are the tip of the ice-berg as we people of faith struggle to express the fullness of life that God imparts. No matter how inspiring the principles, values, mission and achievement that a secular ideology might bring us – along with the precious human relationships that enrich life beyond measure – I still do not see how it can possibly match the gift that God gives us, when, unexpected or longed for, we hear his voice, “Here I am; you are with me”.

We started off thinking about how secular-minded people might find assurance in the modern age. I have not explored the difficulties enough, for instead I was led to consider the positives of how a secular ideology might bring fulfilment and hope. In doing so, I think we can see the challenging mission that lies before secular people – but I say this as a positive. Yes, the challenge is enormous because the difficulties and dangers are so very great, but, “Thank God!” – sorry, “Thank goodness!” – this challenge exists in order to give people today a path to fullness of life. It is a challenge every bit as great as that faced in the classic religious and spiritual challenge to find salvation. I believe we can see the immense overlap between the secular mission I have outlined and the religious one.

In my view, there is therefore every reason for both principled secularists and religious believers to regard each other as allies and to work together for the common good. There are so many dangers from the forces of evil, and on either side we also have the corrupt versions of religion and the selfish, stupid hedonism of destructive secularism. So, much to do! I do think that I have also shown that the way of religious faith adds an additional wonderful dimension and I would love for secularists to see this, so that they too can revel in the joy and peace that God brings us. Of course, secularists will tend to disagree and think that they are not missing anything. On reflection, I don’t think that this is a case of the religious person offering a gift to the secular person and they reply that they simply don’t want it – perhaps because they don’t value it as a gift; they may even think of it as a negative. Rather, I think it is a case of the secularist “just not seeing it”. As though, even if they decided they wanted the gift, they just “cannot get it” – the religious person says, “Look, there it is; pick it up”, and the secularist says, “Where? I don’t see anything”. This is certainly a mystery. Why do some people have faith and some don’t? I don’t know! I think there is great scope to explore in the idea that faith is not something that you see, but the way that you look – but this is still not getting us beyond the mystery. Why should a secularist look in a certain way if they can see nothing to look at?

What I do feel sure of is that the spiritual life of faith brings assurance – a deep, down stability, trust, hope, optimism, energy, confidence, mission and love. I would love for secularists to discover this for themselves. Yet if, for some mysterious reason, this is beyond reach for them, I hope that they will reach for the assurance that a principled way of life, held entirely within secular values, that I have outlined here, offers.

Assurance for the modern age

Part 11: We have a sufficient foundation for life when we have found a plan that meets human needs

I feel, albeit with me striving hard to argue on secularists’ behalf, that we have found a secular ideology that is worthy of humanity, thoroughly profound and good. If everyone followed it, it would have a wonderful effect on the well-being of society, and countless individuals would find meaning and purpose in life, as well as peace and joy. My assessment is that this secular ideology is indistinguishable from my faith-based ideology – certainly in respect of how we could tally off so many items that appear in both. We still have to decide whether there are any extra good elements that the religious world-view has that the secular one doesn’t. Secularists will also want to argue that they have their own unique good elements and have managed to avoid the negatives of religion. However, my response is that we simply need good religion – rather than to ditch religion. Of course, religion is capable of being corrupted into a force for evil – just as everything is, no matter how intrinsically good, but religion certainly matches the best that secularism has to offer, and, as I say, I will argue, adds extra good elements that secularism is, on a point of principle, incapable of delivering. Secular ideology, we know, is very often corrupted, so we have no difference between religion and secularism on this point.

So, let us accept that there is huge overlap between the best of religious and secular ideologies. Why should this be so? Surely it is because the human condition, our needs and desires, our fears and weaknesses, all point in the same direction as to what solutions we need to be happy.

Does this mean that religion is simply “a cunning plan” to achieve human wholeness? Quite possibly. It would be no surprise, and surely we should expect it, that the universal adoption of religion (till modern times) was enabled by the fact that it met human needs for wholeness. This returns us to the issue of the peculiar way that faith works, whereby, if we aim directly for our goal we seem to miss it, but if we aim for God in all sincerity, then we hit our goals. The moment we come to believe that faith is just an instrument for human wholeness, rather than a genuine relationship with the God of love, then the power of our faith to do good evaporates. So, if religion is a clever way of self-deception in order to create benefits that are truly wonderful, then religion is a very clever plan indeed! The religious understanding is that we believe in God because he is real and we have encountered him.

Assurance for the modern age

Part 10: Is this enough?

As a religious person, I can live with this way of life. It is noble, profound, good, making a beneficial impact on the world. It is not for me to say it is not fulfilling if wise, good people say that it is. This secular way of life is, of course, rare, just as those who live a devoted and good religious life are much rarer than they should be. I want to say that the secular person is still missing out on something though, and that’s because the thing I treasure most of all about my life of faith is precisely that sense of sharing it with the God of love. Perhaps that is my selfishness coming out? The list of principles and values above is so profound and good that you might feel it is wrong to say that there is anything more to living a good life. Surely that is enough? Yet for me – perhaps because of my weakness – I have no chance at all of even attempting this wonderful list except the love of God I experience in my inner life keeps prodding me onwards. Yet more than this, I want to say that our inner relationship with God is supremely precious. If I was somehow extremely limited in life, maybe by ill health or even imprisonment, I would still be able to access my relationship with God, and this can bring enormous joy and fulfilment, even if your external impact on the world is slight.

There is the crucial issue of whether the secular person is alone. Of course, they may be very active in the world, surrounded by friends, cherished by loved ones. When alone, they will be able to look inwards and cherish the fact that they are loved and cared for by others. They may feel enormous strength as they review their own values and mission. And no God is required! Yet I have to say again that what I cherish most of all (as well as what fuels my sense of mission) is precisely my relationship with God.

Assurance for the modern age

Part 9: A new “Ten Commandments” for the secular atheist?

So, we are trying to envisage a secular inner life that is truly healthy – in every possible way. We could begin by accepting the reality of our human experience. We are so made by evolution that we have the capacity to do both good and evil. We have to choose. And sometimes we get it wrong. We can be truly kind to ourselves and understand our weakness – without using that as an excuse to condone our failures, or trying to do anything to reduce them. If we understand both our powerlessness and our power, we can acquire wisdom to work for good, acknowledging what we have the power to achieve and what we don’t. This is all sounding good – and my only concern is that for this to work as a secular ideology it must be embraced with the same level of commitment and devotion that a religious believer brings to their faith. What else could we say?

We can adopt principles and values that strike us as utterly commendable:-

• The oneness of humanity. Our interconnectedness, Respect and care for all.

• The mutual dependence of humanity and all life on the well-being of the earth.

• A commitment to core principles of justice and compassion.

• Our personal commitment to play our part through adopting our personal mission as our contribution to the common good.

• Offering of forgiveness and second chances to those who have failed in some way.

• Acting with deep wisdom, using reason to weigh up all factors, rather than emotional, shallow, selfish or tribal impulses.

• Restraining self-interest under principles of valuing the common good and altruism.

• Striving for peace, to make friends and win people over, rather than striving for victory by destroying our opponents.

• Rejoicing in the wonder of life and making creative use of our abilities to express who we are and help others

• Use wise self-awareness and compassion to restrain our selfishness so that my life is about more than my personal enjoyment