Moral relativism is the idea that morality is relative to each individual person. There is no ultimate standard or truth, but rather people can make up the rules as they go along. It sounds good in principle, but it doesn’t actually work in practice. As a matter of fact, the words “moral” and “relative” are a complete contradiction in terms.
At the premise of morality is a standard. Morality makes no sense if there is no absolute truth. Think about it. We embrace morality because we believe that there are things that are absolutely wrong. Anyone with any kind of conscience at all will see murder, robbery, rape, among other things, as absolutely wrong. If you don’t want to believe that then that’s fine, but you are not practicing relative morality. You are practicing no morality at all.
To go further, truth only means anything if we believe that truth exists. This ties together perfectly with morality. Morality only makes sense if we believe that there is a code or a standard that we should be following. To define morality as “relative” completely misses the point of what morality itself is. Morality is defined as “the principles concerning the distinction between right and wrong.” There is no space in that definition for relativity.
My generation is obsessed with taking the words “right”, “wrong”, and “truth” out of everything. Instead, people want to make the statement that something is “right for you but not for me.” Again, this is a critical error in logic, and there are devastating effects. Logic tells us that there must be a set standard of right and wrong, or the world in which we live, and have lived for thousands of years, makes no sense at all.
Take this for example. The moral relativist claims that there is no absolute truth. The irony and fallacy here is that that statement is an absolute truth statement in itself! We simply can’t get away from it. Morality and truth are hardwired within us, and living as humans makes no sense without them. Without truth and morality, we are heading towards becoming animals, and that is exactly the direction this generation is headed. One wonders how we can think of ourselves as so much smarter than previous generations, and yet not see the critical error in logic within our thinking.
Moral relativism not only makes no sense logically, but it also has horrible societal ramifications. If I can set my own standard of morality, then why is it wrong for me to murder someone else or take their stuff? If morality is left up to the individual, then why have court systems at all? Justice makes no sense without morality and truth, and moral relativism leads us to a path of societal destruction and self-annihilation.
On the other hand, the Word of God says that there is absolute truth. Truth is not left up to the individual, it is ordained by God Himself. The reason that we believe in truth and morality is because God has created us to think that way, and that’s exactly why moral relativists fight against it so vehemently. To admit morality and absolute truth is to admit that there is a God who administers both of those principles. And if my generation doesn’t like anything its being told what they can and cannot do.
The problem with moral relativism is that it provides a world without God, and a world that makes no sense at all. It causes us to rebel against everything that makes us human in the first place. The agenda of moral relativists is to essentially equate humans with the rest of the animal kingdom. We have no purpose or reason for being here, so we might as well live however we want. That thinking is on full display in our world right now, and we can see its effects in the news and in our everyday lives. As the world continues to spiral out of control, the Christian must hold firmly to the morality and truth found in the word of God.
