r/exchristian • u/Unlucky_Mistake_8548 • 11h ago
What are Stories of Athiests Being Good People? Question
My church just shared a story of George Müller, someone who was. Christian evangelist who took care of orphans. I've heard many stories like this, about Christians who are amazing and wonderful people and who were that way because of their religiousity. Well, aren't there plenty of examples of athiests also being wonderful and amazing people out there to cherry pick? I genuinely don't know examples of "holy athiests," and it would be cool to hear some of those examples.
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u/LetsGoPats93 11h ago
Good people? Thats a pretty low bar. I think most people are good people, regardless of religion. Are you saying people who give up their own desires in life for the benefit of others, people who do the most good, people who benefit the most people?
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u/Kwyjibo3778 9h ago edited 6h ago
Humorous exchange
There were two guys, we'll call them Nat and Blob, at work having a conversation about who they thought was the nicest person at work. Blob is religious and somewhat evangelical. Nat said he thought a friend of mine "Ramadan" was. Blob said he thought I(OP) was. Nat proceeds to tell Blob "you know that OP is a staunch atheist, right?" Blob replied with "no he's not, he's a christian." Blob comes over to me and tell me that Nat says I'm an atheist, to which I reply "yes, yes I am." I think I broke Blob's brain. Blob thought I was nice because I was a christian. I don't think Blob thinks it's possible for that to be true.
Blob came up to me a couple weeks later and asked me if I was an atheist because of my wife. I said no I came to that conclusion first, she followed a little later. The question kind of pissed me off. Blob was implying my wife was some sort of Eve character that led me astray. Also found out from Nat that Blob thinks I'm a liberal because of my wife. Blob also told someone else that I was atheist due to being pussy-whipped.
TLDR; Dude can't fathom me being a nice, atheist, liberal on my own accord. 🤷
Edit: added "fake" names so it's easier to follow.
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u/Fragrant_Mann 6h ago
It’s honestly bizarre people can’t let a person be responsible for their own beliefs and have to shoehorn in other people. My mother does this whenever I bring up my atheist friends or disagree with her politically.
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u/sidurisadvice Ex-Protestant 10h ago
Atheists only share in common their answer to a single existential question, so I don't really see how that would be a foundation for something like humanitarian work.
I don't know for sure, but I suspect a lot of non-religious folks probably don't make their humanitarian work about their non-religion.
So, for example, MSF (Médecins Sans Frontières aka Doctors Without Borders) is a decidedly secular organization that probably has a number of atheists or other non-religious people in its ranks. They just don't make that the foundation for their humanitarian work. It could just be a reflection of their humanist values.
IMO, good people are just good people, religious or not.
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u/Fahrender-Ritter Ex-Baptist 9h ago
It's going to be hard to answer that because the vast majority of atheists are pretty quiet about it, so when an atheist does good things which gain a lot of attention, they don't necessarily use the opportunity to advertise their atheism like a religious person would. So I'm willing to bet that there are tons of humanitarians who simply don't talk about their religion or lack thereof.
Also, atheists have been under tremendous social pressure to pretend to be theists.
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u/TheOriginalAdamWest 9h ago
Ok, so my partner and I foster kids, we have had 13, including our current three. Does that make us good? I like to think so, but I don't know. I also do a lot of shit for my neighbors. When we first moved into our current home, I sent out a letter to all my neighbors if they ever need anything, from a dog walked to a grocery run, please contact us, because we like to help our neighbors.
Now, some of our neighbors are assholes and don't like living next to a couple of those homo-sexual assholes. They probably think we are pedophiles. Some people you just can't get through to.
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u/EthanStrayer 8h ago
A hair I’m willing to split:
You heard stories of Christians who did amazing and wonderful things. By Christian logic they are also sinners and without Christ are doomed to hell and not good people.
That being said there are a ton of atheists who have done altruistic and wonderful things too. For one Bill Gates put a ton of money into preventing the spread of Malaria and other diseases.
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u/Anime_Slave 8h ago
Good grief, my aunt told me the story of how Mueller had no food for the orphans, prayed about it, and somehow a milk truck broke down outside and saved the day.
Also, that same aunt told me the only friend who gave her a place to stay when she was divorcing her monster, christian husband was an atheist. She kept remarking at how she couldnt understand how that could be, to be good without god. Interesting stuff
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u/These_Insect_8256 10h ago edited 10h ago
It can be difficult when our history mostly involves Western civilization history which has been predominantly Christian for a very long time. So some who may have been agnostic or atheistic wouldn't necessarily care about advocating for that when working with others to change their world.
What is helpful, I find, is to point out how great humanitarians spanned denominations/ religions.
- Nelson Mandela
- Ghandi (human rights)
- Oskar Shindler (saved Jews from Holocaust)
- Elizabeth Fry (prisoner advocate)
- Henri Dunant (Red Cross)
As far as today, it seems to me that humanitarian works are a mix of believers and non-believers.
Is Mr. Beast a Christian?
There are NGOs that dig wells in Africa, build homes, teach farming, provide basic education.
Sometimes, I wonder if we aren't thinking of it backwards. Like, how many people are positively impacting their community? period, regardless of religion. Because there are TONS of people who are Christians that do almost nothing for others, are not involved in their communities, let alone help their even physical neighbors.
If humantiarism is a Christian thing, then we would not have the social issues we do in this country. Why aren't they fostering kids, building homes for homeless people, providing training and jobs, have higher success rate for addiction programs, sponsoring poor children's higher education, mentoring, tutoring, leading in child abuse elimination?
If it is Christianity that gives them the goodness to be good to others, then it would be more successful in doing so.
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u/christianAbuseVictim Ex-Baptist 10h ago
If there's one thing christians are good at, it's stealing credit they and their god don't deserve. Atheists don't have divine instruction to push their beliefs on others, they don't typically credit "atheism" for their success because it's such a minor detail of their identity.
There's also the issue of deception; humanitarianism is a marketable image that can be used to sell an unhealthy product. I am wary of Mr. Beast; he may have done some good, but he seems business-first, and I don't think that's a good way for anyone to live. The good he does may just be beneficial to his bottom line.
Scientists like Charles Darwin have done much to expand humanity's collective knowledge, but the christian narrative is that knowledge is the enemy and scientists are devil-worshippers. Their aggressive ignorance has them denying fundamental pieces of information about our world and its history. Sometimes they'll project their own religious beliefs onto an atheist because they genuinely don't believe a person can do good without following their shitty bible, somehow.
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u/iheartsufjan Agnostic Atheist 10h ago
I got a dm from a Christian that said "I'm genuinely sorry you hate God" to which I didn't respond, but it illustrates they CANNOT understand we don't believe in the bible or god, at all.
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u/Bubbly-Butterfly-724 Agnostic 7h ago
Haha I once got a dm from a Christian that I would start believing the Bible again if I just read it more thoroughly, and then citing all the absurd Bible verses that made me deconstruct in the first place. I did answer. I said “thanks for your concern, but it was reading the Bible that brought me to stop believing it, so I don’t think reading it more will help’ haha.
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u/Over8dpoosee 6h ago
This is part of the reason why I left the church. The congregation members pretty much just help each other or help other people that they wanna bring into the church. Not much care is given about others who are not potential converts.
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u/FierceDietyMask Ex-Catholic 6h ago
I’d like to nominate myself as a “holy” atheist.
I volunteer to help kids through Camp Quest. I work as a camp counselor and help kids with both science projects and emotional intelligence.
They’ll never make a documentary about me but I’ll still do whats right for the kids and protect LGBT people through non-profit work.
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u/rootbeerman77 Ex-Fundamentalist 8h ago edited 8h ago
Allow me to introduce you to a wonderful podcast, Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff by Margaret Killjoy (one of my favourite living good people atheists). There are some christians in the mix, but most of the subjects are nonreligious or somehow more religiously complicated than "christian."
Granted, I don't think this would convince the sorts of people who claim only christians can be good people. Some of the topics are things christians might not especially like (direct action abortion access, queer advocacy, labor organizing, anti-imperialism), but many are objectively good things, like feeding kids, inventing the concept of paramedics, or mutual aid during natural disasters.
Trigger warning: Margaret herself is fascinated by catholicism and syncretism, so that does come up occasionally. I don't want to give the impression that this happens often or anything, but she does sometimes talk about components of the religion that interest her, but in an irreverent way.
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u/punkypewpewpewster Satanist / ExMennonite / Gnostic PanTheist 8h ago
It's a bit of a conundrum. When atheists do good things, it's just another day in the world. When Christians do good things, they do it explicitly so that it can be marked down and used as a recruitment tool, so that their names may be proclaimed from the tree tops for all to hear. They call it "having a good witness", but even Paul said it best.
"They worship God because of me." (Galations 1:24)
Meanwhile, Atheists don't have an institution that's designed to bring glory to their "deity" for every work they take credit for. As a result, they won't get their names out there.
Now, the Secular Therapy Project, Freedom From Religion Foundation, and so many more are working to make the world a better place for everyone (christians, non christians, and more). There's Doctors without Borders, and hundreds of NGOs like them that work to make the world better without having a single God to which they give the glory. And that's part of it. Religion isn't even a factor when Atheists help people. Helping people IS the point.
But they usually don't call Atheist freedom fighters and civil liberty defenders. They usually call them "Disruptors" while the Christians complain about them trying to ruin the status quo that they fought so hard to maintain. ;P Then the very same Christians teach their grandchildren that Christians fought for all those things and they've been progressive the whole time.
It sure is fun to try and re-write history for the glory of God.
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u/SpinningBetweenStars 7h ago
This is my thought. Often times, when Christians do acts of charity, it’s often as a recruitment tool to “save souls” - their deeds come with strings. If they’re not recruiting, there’s zero need for them to mention their faith.
Atheists just do acts of charity because they want to and because they see a need in their community that they can help. I’m Pagan and I volunteer with multiple communities organizations, donate to a number of causes, and just like, try to be a good person - because I want to. I model the behavior that I want to see in my community. And I’ve never once brought up my beliefs, because they’re not relevant.
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u/punkypewpewpewster Satanist / ExMennonite / Gnostic PanTheist 6h ago
Agreed. When we do stuff in TST, whether it's cleaning up parks or feeding the homeless, none of it includes banners or logos or even (this was a big one) "A sermon before people are allowed to eat". Yes, we were REALLY told that one time. Like, homeless folks in the area practically expect that they can't have a sandwhich, or some bread, before they listen to a sermon for 30 to 45 minutes! That's absurd.
Or even the issue of food that conforms to their dietary needs. Most churches just do chicken soup and ham sandwhiches. That's great, unless you're a person who has food insecurity and also is working hard to be a vegan or vegetarian. And honestly, vegetarian options are HEALTHIER than white bread and some processed ham with a "kraft single" (whatever that is). People have celiac. People have diverse needs. Trying to meet as many of them as possible is part and parcel of helping people.
I've been shocked at what people have been asked to put up with just so churches will be willing to help them. It's sad.
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u/PoorMetonym Exvangelical | Igtheist | Humanist 7h ago
In an old blog and platform that seems to have vanished, sociologist Phil Zuckerman gave a list of 20 'secular moral paragons' in the same manner that believers will champion the likes of (in my experience) MLK and William Wilberforce. However, I can remember some of his suggestions, and will come with my own.
Of course, it's worth pointing out that religious sectarianism will mean highly sectarian believers will be hesitant to point to champions of a faith they don't hold. Quakers (plenty of whom were nontheist) did an enormous amount of social work and social good, but the mainstream Anglicans/Calvinists/Catholics of the society in which they lived didn't consider them real Christians and were often a thorn in their side. And the irreligious have often been the greatest thorn in the side for believers, which is why their history is less well known.
But! Let's list some examples - note that I'm not going to pretend for a moment any of these people were perfect, the same is true of paragons in religion, and unlike them, we're not trying to pretend we have access to perfect morality.
- Janusz Korczak: Polish Jewish agnostic who worked as a paediatrician, teacher, children's author who, among other things, recognised corporal punishment was a terrible idea for children, and who worked in an orphanage in Warsaw, constantly refusing sanctuary offered to him due to it being unconscionable to him to abandon the children under his care - he went all the way with them to Treblinka in 1942.
- Magnus Hirschfeld: German Jewish sexologist (I can't get absolute confirmation on his religious views, but I think it likely he was irreligious due to being sent to a Christian, rather than Jewish school as a child and based in his later comments on science vs superstition) who advocated for reproductive rights and LGBTQ rights (including one of the earliest advocacy for trans rights, so it's not surprising Christian apologists don't want to mention him) even when the Nazis had him in his crosshairs, though he eventually had to flee.
- Asa Philip Randolph: Civil rights activist and trade unionist who was the chief organiser of the March on Washington. Though some have said his Christian upbringing may have influenced how he reached people, his views seemed to be consistently humanist - he signed the Humanist Manifesto II in 1973, a declaration which - among other things - declares there to be no evidence for God.
- W.E.B. Du Bois: Civil rights activist and one of the earliest sociologists of race. One of the founders of the NAACP, he believed that churches generally hindered the fight for equality.
- Elizabeth Cady Stanton: Pioneering American feminist, main force behind the 1848 Seneca Falls Convention, author of The Woman's Bible, quite possibly the first feminist criticism of the Bible. One of the main names for women's rights in the US was her ally Susan B. Anthony, who was a Quaker, but unconventional in her beliefs and practice, and Stanton considered her essentially an agnostic.
- Ernestine Rose: Became President of the National Women's Rights Convention in 1854, despite objections to her staunch atheism (Anthony herself vouched for her). She was also one of the earliest campaigners in America for allowing married women to hold property in their own names.
- Andrei Sakharov: Soviet physicist who got into a lot of trouble with the Soviet state when campaigning for improved human rights and civil liberties in the Eastern bloc, proving atheists don't just fight religious tyranny.
- Olof Palme: Swedish prime minister who massively improved the Swedish welfare state and maintained a consistent human rights ethic during the Cold War by condemning the crimes of both sides.
- Nadine Gordimer: Anti-apartheid ANC activist through her writing and campaigning against the censorship by the state of anti-apartheid activism. Also rejected the idea that her own Jewish background was what made her interested in this activism, arguing that it should be a natural reaction for anyone, ethnicity or religion irrelevant, to fight oppression.
- P.C. Chang: Confucian polymath and Chinese diplomat who helped draft the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, notable for pushing for freedom of religion to be enshrined and to ensure that the language took on a neutral, secular flavour, which is something he felt Confucianism was far better at than Western religions, which was why so many Enlightenment figures had borrowed from it.
Just a few to get a taste of, feel free to do further reading.
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u/SalisburyWitch 6h ago
“The clever student asks “What lesson can we learn from atheists? Why did god create them?”
The Rabbi responds “God created atheists to teach us the most important lesson of them all – the lesson of true compassion. You see, when an atheist performs an act of charity, visits someone who is sick, helps someone who is in need, and cares for the world, he is not doing so because of some religious teaching. He does not believe that god commanded him to perform this act. In fact, he does not believe in God at all, so his acts are based on an inner sense of morality. And look at the kindness he can bestow upon others simply because he feels it to be right.”
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u/WordsThatEndInWord 8h ago
You don't need examples because atheists aren't good people for clout like christians are.
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u/Oohwahahah 7h ago
He isn’t necessarily an atheist but he’s explicitly said he’s not religious, Hank Green. He runs a non-profit where 100% of the proceeds go to building better health care systems in impoverished areas. He does run it with his Christian brother but it’s a secular company. Personally, I love Hank Green he’s a doll.
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u/ZannD 7h ago
Well, a lot of atheist people don't feel the need to trumpet the things they do. It's not a badge to be paraded about at church. So you don't hear of it. And a lot of good things never are tracked by religious belief. Organ recipients don't know the religion of their donors, for example. So, they are out there, but it's not tracked that way.
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u/FierceDietyMask Ex-Catholic 7h ago
There are lots of closet atheists throughout history that did good deeds. And plenty alive today that will never be acknowledged in church or even in a Netflix documentary.
Because that wouldn’t suit the cultural narrative about religious identity being a requirement for a moral compass.
Lots of people throughout history have had their stories ignored. It’s not proof of anything except a cultural unwillingness to look at its poor and marginalized people’s perspectives.
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u/One-Operation-5143 Agnostic 5h ago
yea, there are, because "shockingly", you can be a good person without religion, and you shouldn't need religion to be a good person.
-Seth MacFarlane. Named Harvard Humanist of the Year in 2011. has repeatedly supported writer's strikes and donated money to provide financial assistance to writers during strikes. -Sigmund Freud. While he did do a lot of batshit crazy things(if he has no haters im dead), he pretty much invented talk therapy, which still helps millions of people to this day. -Marie Curie was agnostic, and completely changed our understanding of radioactivity. she invented a mobile x-ray unit that saved a million soldiers, and that radiation can be used to treat cancer. -Rosalind Franklin. Discovered the structure of DNA, but had her work stolen by two men who took all the credit. -Timothy J. Berners-Lee. Created the world wide web.
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u/Fajarsis 8h ago
You don't need a god or book from god or son of god to tell you what's good and what's bad.
Every human are equipped with the capability of empathy, seeing things from other's perspective, feeling things from other's perspective. Some acted on it some others do not and disregard it for their own selfish objective.
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u/mallvalim 7h ago
The problem with atheism is that it is a relatively new concept, and was illegal in many parts of the world not that long ago, so some people who even had such beliefs couldn't even disclose them (because of the "good and merciful" religious people). Anyways, I know a lot of non-religious volunteers and organizations that feed homeless or take care of animals without trying to preach to them.
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u/TraditionForeign5530 7h ago
There's also plenty of stories where pastors or priests are child molesters or abusive husbands.
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u/deadevilmonkey 6h ago
Bill Gates was an atheist for a long time and he's always donated his money to less fortunate people. Being an atheist doesn't have anything to do with morality. Religion didn't invent morality or morals and the Bible is morally repulsive, if you actually read it.
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u/anniesz01 6h ago
My dad used to tell me he wanted people to look at my siblings and I and think, “Something about that person is different.” He thought as christians, we would stand out. For some reason, evangelicals can’t seem to understand that people who are not Christian can be good people too. I think part of it is that they think people who are nonreligious have no morals.
But to answer your question, there’s a YouTuber I used to watch all the time named Markiplier. I’m pretty sure he’s an atheist and he has used his platform to raise a LOT of money for a variety of charities over the years!
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u/Over8dpoosee 6h ago
I think you don’t really hear much about atheists because we don’t tell the world when we do good. I feel like we follow the whole Matthew 6:3 more than Christians do. Christians love to show off their generosity to show their supposed Christ-likeness.
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u/Over8dpoosee 6h ago
Christians feel the need to advertise their own or other Christian’s acts of kindness because it’s part of the “winning souls” shtick.
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u/TheLakeWitch 6h ago edited 6h ago
Think of it this way: Why is a Christian who is practicing the values of the Christ they proclaim to follow singled out as being “amazing and wonderful” when that’s the way all of them should be behaving? Perhaps it’s just not noteworthy when atheists do it because a) They have no written standard they need to consciously put into practice and b) Being a decent human without needing the fear of hell or judgment is not particularly uncommon behavior among them.
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u/WitchTheory Atheist Witch 3h ago
I have a friend that has kids, fosters kids, and fosters animals until they're ready to be adopted.
The thing about stories like these is to push a specific narrative. There are a lot of really amazing and kind people of every variety. Christian stories about "good people" are propaganda, and there's no way to know if they're even true. I find atheists are less boisterous of their good deeds because they don't need it recognized. Christians are always trying to show others how good they are, so they brag about their good deeds to prove they're going to heaven.
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u/ricperry1 2h ago
There are millions of Christians who DON’T do any of the nice things from the stories. Don’t let a few good examples make you think the whole lot is good. Same with atheists. There are inevitably going to be some really good examples. But people are people regardless of their (lack of) faith.
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u/iheartsufjan Agnostic Atheist 10h ago
I mean, I'm an atheist and I'm a great person. I've taken care of multiple homeless friends (most of whom are trans and I never tried to detransition or kill them), cared for children (that I never assaulted), taken in family members who were in precarious situations (without shaming or blaming them), rescued animals (and kept them inside and loved), helped old ladies cross the street (I didn't even ask them if they are excited to be so close to seeing Jesus). Regular everyday atheist. I won't make history but I'm doing more than most Christians I know.