Why cant we legislate morality?

[Lifelong_sinner]

This has been a common phrase used for decades, and i think its wrong. Every law that our govt has made has been in the spirit of being morally right. Im not saying govt always gets it right, but what if they did try to legislate morality? Would it really be so bad??
I think the problem with that would be, freedom only works with moral people. And America is anything but moral or free.

 

[MatthewG]

That would lead to communism, fascism, nazism. Wouldn’t it? @Lifelong_sinner ?

 

[Lifelong_sinner]

That would lead to communism, fascism, nazism. Wouldn’t it? @Lifelong_sinner ?

wait….. what?? So when Jesus comes back and rules for 1000 yrs, you think He’ll be a commie, fascist or nazi?????

 

[ChristisGod]

This has been a common phrase used for decades, and i think its wrong. Every law that our govt has made has been in the spirit of being morally right. Im not saying govt always gets it right, but what if they did try to legislate morality? Would it really be so bad??
I think the problem with that would be, freedom only works with moral people. And America is anything but moral or free.

God tried that with the Jews in the OT-

NEWSFLASH- it didn't work with them either.

 

[lforrest]

wait….. what?? So when Jesus comes back and rules for 1000 yrs, you think He’ll be a commie, fascist or nazi?????

There is one aspect these regimes have in common with Christ's future reign, they are authoritarian. He is going to rule with an iron scepter.

The idea of legislating morality is to try and create a moral culture by imposing certain laws.

It Has some limited effect to slow the decline of accepted morality if the people are willing to aid in enforcement.

But for the most part I believe it is ineffective because it treats the symptom not the cause. With laws there is a letter and a spirit, man can enforce the letter but loopholes will mean the spirit of the law is still violated. Like with Jesus' admonishment for those hating their brother having murdered them in their heart. The division this hatred causes is the root of the problem, and it is not addressed by a law againat murder.

 

[Bob Estey]

This has been a common phrase used for decades, and i think its wrong. Every law that our govt has made has been in the spirit of being morally right. Im not saying govt always gets it right, but what if they did try to legislate morality? Would it really be so bad??
I think the problem with that would be, freedom only works with moral people. And America is anything but moral or free.

We have to legislate morality to a certain extent to protect ourselves, but when you have a group of people setting themselves up as God and telling us what we can do and can't do, you have a problem, I think. I read this morning that women in Afghanistan now have to cover everything but their eyes when they are in public. That would be rather uncomfortable in a warm climate.

 

[stunnedbygrace]

There is one aspect these regimes have in common with Christ's future reign, they are authoritarian. He is going to rule with an iron scepter.

The idea of legislating morality is to try and create a moral culture by imposing certain laws.

It Has some limited effect to slow the decline of accepted morality if the people are willing to aid in enforcement.

But for the most part I believe it is ineffective because it treats the symptom not the cause. With laws there is a letter and a spirit, man can enforce the letter but loopholes will mean the spirit of the law is still violated. Like with Jesus' admonishment for those hating their brother having murdered them in their heart. The division this hatred causes is the root of the problem, and it is not addressed by a law againat murder.

Very, very excellent!

 

[Mantis]

I am starting to go back to my libertarian mindset because you can’t legislate morality. But then I remember “everyone did what was right in their own eyes” and that didn’t work well for Israel. So I don’t know. Without Jesus in your heart you cannot do right anyway.

 

[Cristo Rei]

This has been a common phrase used for decades, and i think its wrong. Every law that our govt has made has been in the spirit of being morally right. Im not saying govt always gets it right, but what if they did try to legislate morality? Would it really be so bad??
I think the problem with that would be, freedom only works with moral people. And America is anything but moral or free.

I don't believe every law has been in that spirit. I believe many laws are driven by political and corporate interests.

Morality to you and I is the Word of God.
But for a godless person morality is whatever suits them. It's whatever they feel is right. Adultery, abortion, promiscuity, LGBTISM, and such.

So I would ask who is making the law. If it's coming from godless atheists then this is what we get and there is no way I'm going to adhere to godless laws.

But even as Christians we often can't even agree on what is right and wrong. At the moment many think that persecuting and discriminating against the unvaxed is right while I have always believe that discrimination against innocent people is wrong.

So to your question about legislating morality I would say no because morality is subjective, unless the moral issue being questioned is agreed upon by all. Eg, murder is wrong

 

[Josho]

This has been a common phrase used for decades, and i think its wrong. Every law that our govt has made has been in the spirit of being morally right. Im not saying govt always gets it right, but what if they did try to legislate morality? Would it really be so bad??
I think the problem with that would be, freedom only works with moral people. And America is anything but moral or free.

The only way you can legislate morality, is if a country has a strong Christian strong majority like Vanuatu, if we want morality for our countries, a whole lot more people need to turn to God.

As people turn away from God, the morals decline and we can't really entirely blame government and law makers for that, the people of the country need to change first.

I don't know about USA, but in our situation, what can you do when the majority of Aussies on social media are for abortion, that's pretty much the majority has spoken and have gotten what they wanted.

 

[Cassandra]

Separation of church and state.

 

[dev553344]

This has been a common phrase used for decades, and i think its wrong. Every law that our govt has made has been in the spirit of being morally right. Im not saying govt always gets it right, but what if they did try to legislate morality? Would it really be so bad??
I think the problem with that would be, freedom only works with moral people. And America is anything but moral or free.

Morality is legislated. It is against the law to cheat on spouse, steal, murder, abuse people, incest or pedophilia, and even business practices are legislated with morality. But the problem is that people get what they want and that morality is starting to decline as the politicians want votes. And since the politicians want votes the democrats saw that there is a large voter base in the immoral area, so they went for it and provide immoral laws for these voters in an attempt to gain power over the USA. They use these voters like fools.

 

[Enoch111]

Morality is legislated.

Agreed. There are all kinds of laws which in fact legislate morality and ethics. And all professionals are held to a standard of ethics which boils down to morality. Even the Hippocratic Oath taken by doctors is a form of morality which was violated recently by many because of the COVID Scamdemic. Whether or not the laws are applied properly is a different issue. Even sodomy was a crime at one point.

 

[Desire Of All Nations]

Morality is legislated. It is against the law to cheat on spouse, steal, murder, abuse people, incest or pedophilia, and even business practices are legislated with morality. But the problem is that people get what they want and that morality is starting to decline as the politicians want votes. And since the politicians want votes the democrats saw that there is a large voter base in the immoral area, so they went for it and provide immoral laws for these voters in an attempt to gain power over the USA. They use these voters like fools.

Morality as the bible defines it is not really being legislated.

The fact that everyone in the States is allowed to practice whatever religion they want, no matter how perverse or destructive it is, speaks a lot about how much morality is actually being legislated.

We can complain all day about how Democrats caused morality to decline in America, but the inconvenient truth for "conservatives" is that the Republican helped make this decline in American morality happen. They went from producing a president who believed in the sovereign authority of God and looking to God for help to producing an openly pro-LGBT president who likes people treating him like he's God.

If you think Dems are the only party who views voters as suckers, you are either naive or biased. Only a fool would buy into the "we're the good guys, they're the bad guys" belief because neither party are the good guys in this story. The fact is that the modern Rep party is a long way from where it was when Lincoln was POTUS, both in principle and practice.

 

[Enoch111]

...neither party are the good guys in this story...

Only a fool would believe such nonsense. Regardless of how feckless the RINOs are, they are definitely not Marxist/Communist/Fascist/Anarchist/Racist, which describes the so-called Democratic Party today.

 

[MatthewG]

I am starting to go back to my libertarian mindset because you can’t legislate morality. But then I remember “everyone did what was right in their own eyes” and that didn’t work well for Israel. So I don’t know. Without Jesus in your heart you cannot do right anyway.

He did say least you abide in me you can do nothing.

 

[Brakelite]

Yes! While we're at it, let's legislate and enforce anything else that encourages good morals and righteous character. Such as church attendance. Restrict immigration only to approved religions. Have social security only for those compliant to the popular trends in religion. Have corporations cooperate by hiring only approved individuals. I could go on. Oh, and have penalties that mirror the seriousness of the offenses. Like the death penalty for all who think independently with regards such heretical ideas like freedom of conscience and religious liberty.

 

[marks]

I am starting to go back to my libertarian mindset because you can’t legislate morality. But then I remember “everyone did what was right in their own eyes” and that didn’t work well for Israel. So I don’t know. Without Jesus in your heart you cannot do right anyway.

Laws don't make an immoral person into a moral person, but good laws can help preserve people by detering some of the immoral people. Not always, but some.

And those immoral people may be helped by being preserved by those laws (detered from their crimes either being incarcerated, or by threat of incarceration) until they can come to know Jesus Christ.

Much love!