I am Ganesh, an Indian atheist and I don’t eat beef. It’s not like that I have a religious reason to do that, but after all those years seeing cows as peaceful animals and playing and growing up with them in a village, I doubt if I ever will be able to eat beef. I wasn’t raised very religious, I didn’t go to temple everyday and read Gita every evening unlike most muslims who are somewhat serious about their religion, my family has this watered down religion (which has it’s advantages).
But yeah, not eating beef is a moral issue I deal with. I mean, I don’t care that I don’t eat beef, but the fact that I eat pork and chicken but not beef seems to me to be weird. So, is there any religious practice that you guys follow to this day?
edit: I like religious music, religious temples (Churches, Gurudwara’s, Temples & Mosques in Iran), religious paintings and art sometimes. I know for a fact that the only art you could produce is those days was indeed religious and the greatest artists needed to make something religious to be funded, that we will never know what those artists would have produced in the absence of religion, but yeah, religious art is good nonetheless.
The Belgian minister of Justice (Koen Geens, Christian party) wrote a column about Christianity, where he nicely summed up what it means to be a good Christian:
Try to align every decision and action with your system of morality, and be consistent in this.
Even as an atheïst/humanitarian, this is a constant struggle. It nicely sums up how we need to weigh our options and consciously try to do the right thing. To me, it was a profound observation.
That just means being a moral person, being a good ------ian requires a whole set of things to be believed as well.
Typically, the ------ian asserts that only they are capable of having a conscience.