The pope says atheists pick and choose their morals. This is correct.

[WillParkinson]

[Warren DeMontague]

1. Choose them? As opposed to what?

If you don't choose them, they're not morals, and there's nothing "moral" about subscribing to them.

Just as there's nothing intrinsically noble about saying "I don't kill people because if I did I would get sent to a bubbling lava pit when I die"

Is a refrigerator "moral" because it keeps food cold? No, that's what it's programmed to do.

[djean111]

2. Just as there's nothing intrinsically noble about saying "I don't kill people because if I did I

would die"
Exactly. I am pretty skeered of people who need a list to tell them not to kill, steal, etc.
Either the religious don't see the irony, or they think all atheists are merrily killing and robbing - or they have no understanding of innate morality that does not need the threat of other-worldly punishment.

[Warren DeMontague]

3. Yep. That's not morality IMHO.

[mr blur]

4. Better than letting the pope pick and choose them for you.

[Kennah]

9. Well said!

[Stuckinthebush]

5. Don't we all?

Silly pope. You do it, too!

[Curmudgeoness]

6. Doesn't it feel so much better

to decide what our morals are, instead of worrying about going to hell if we eat meat on Friday or some such idiotic belief?

I like choosing my own morals. And they basically fall into the "if it hurts someone else, don't do it", or "if it doesn't hurt anyone, it is ok".

[defacto7]

7. Isn't morality the natural progression

as we evolve from our early ancestors need to kill and steal to survive, eat, mate etc? When the needs are met and we don't need to kill we start to think about survival as a society. Just the fact that we move from primal greed to higher thought naturally creates ethics, personal moral concepts, etc.... we don't need some grand poobah to dictate that.

[Laelth]

8. Did Francis say that? Or are we talking about another Pope?

Ironically, many (if not most) American Catholics also pick & choose their morals. They're called "cafeteria Catholics," and the U.S. has a lot of them. They agree with the Church on some doctrinal issues and disagree with the Church on others. Officially, this makes them non-Catholic, but they still claim to be Catholic and still participate in Church sacraments.

-Laelth

[TZ]

10. You mean like

the people who pick and choose what they find most important in the Bible, like finding passages that support homophobia while ignoring things like the 10 commandments that say "Love thy neighbor" with no qualifications? LOL