By ArchonMagnus [CC BY-SA 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)]

                                                                          (credit: Wikimedia Commons) 

One way to ease into the moral relativism versus moral realism debate is to explain how I came to be obsessed with it.

When I was in Grade 9, I was fortunate enough to have had a fine teacher for Science. He liked his subject, he liked kids, and he liked bringing the two together, which is all a good teacher ever really has to do. He impressed the thinking technique called the scientific method deeply into my mind. You get an idea or you imagine a model of how some part of the world around you works—how event A connects to event B. You think of a practical, real-world way to test the idea. You set up the apparatus you need, then you do the test. All the while, you keep careful records of what you observe.

Next, you analyze the data to see whether patterns exist that tend to support this theory or model of yours. You then develop further ideas for subtler theories, models, or tests, and you keep on researching. Sometimes you find a way to use your new insights about how the universe works to create technologies that enable humans to live in better health and happiness or in a little less pain. Once in a while, you find a way to formulate one of the basic laws of this universe.

I could see that by using this method, sharing their findings, and continuing their research, scientists had expanded human knowledge, created so many helpful technologies, and cured diseases—all in a steady march of progress. They had brought most of my way of life to its current state—one that was far safer, more comfortable, and more interesting than that known to any of my ancestors. Even at fourteen, I was filled with a rush of emotion each time I realized not only what had been accomplished but what might be still to come. It seemed to me then, and it seems to me now, that we are destined for the stars.

On the other hand, between the ages of six and eleven, I had spent most of my Sunday mornings attending Sunday school at St. Stephen’s United Church. I felt similar profound emotions when I learned about the Being who had created this universe and who loved everything in it. My six-year-old heart ached when I thought about how so many human beings had lost their relationship with God. The evidence was easy to see for myself. Humans are not very moral or even logical most of the time. Even as a boy, I could see this truth in events all around me, from the schoolyard to the Cold War.

But I was uplifted when I was told of one man who had explained to humans how they might strike a new deal: if they could learn to truly love one another—to follow his example—then they could regain their relationships with one another and, ultimately, their relationship with God. The key concept to grasp was that following Jesus’s way was what mattered, not whether he really was some kind of “divine“ being, and not whether the people I met belonged to one particular group or sect. Get to the practical. Love one another. Really love one another. Then peace, progress, and prosperity will all come. All of this was six-year-old naïveté, I admit. But as I look back even now, it seems more profound than the beliefs of many adults because it was clear, heartfelt, and unabashed.