Does Life Have "Meaning" Without Christianity

I recall a study group in the church student center in the 1950's where we students struggled with the question of why we are here. A famous book, The Purpose Driven Life, and its author Rick Warren were the talk of the town a few decades ago. I don't know of people today who are writing and discussing this big question, "Why are we here?", except in religion.  

 The ones I see in religion are always disappointing because they are merely a variation of Warren's The Purpose Driven Life. The "purpose" always turns out to be to be a good Christian. The link is a discussion of the decline in interest in the humanities and how that decline has tracked with the decline of interest in Christianity. The link author laments a decline in the study of the humanities. The humanities, he believes are the "bigger picture," the purpose of life. Because the link author is a devout Catholic, predictably, the purpose of humans is to serve the Christian god. He is incorrect in that the huminites, broadly speaking, are not about promoting Christianity.  

Those of us who have spent years in certain fields of academia have become accustomed to looking, not only at ideas, but for the source of ideas. Thus, when Rick Warren and the link author tell us the purpose of our lives is to serve God the first question is, "Where did that idea come from?" It is not an idea shared by all humans. Nor, was it an idea held by prehistoric humans who had different gods. The idea had to come from some relatively recent source.

From comments on this blog, it is apparent one sub group interested in certain branches of philosophy scoffs at those who see functional, rational, productive or useful ideas as important purposes to pursue in one's life. They see themselves as big picture thinkers, interested in questions beyond the visible. Because they talk of ethereal worlds, they consider their intellect to be superior. 

Another way of looking at them, however, is to see small people with small ideas. Their ideas came from cultural influences they seem unaware of. They were born into a culture of Christianity and know nothing else.

To understand what constitutes a genuine "purpose driven life" the first task is to toss the Bible. The notion that humans were "created to rule over all other things" is a product of wealthy self-serving ancients. Natives in North America were careful not to allow population to outrun their food and housing supply.  Humans did not rule their world.  The live eagle pair I watch each spring gave up hatching young this year in order to defend their nest and food supply from other eagles. Native Americans and eagles understood their place in the flow of life better than those who wrote the Bible. 

Anyone asking her/himself, "What is the purpose of my life?" or more precisely "how can I live a useful life?" needs to consider nature, the environment, our earth and where we fit into all that. We know humans came from these and if they are destroyed there will be no humans. 

Serving a god is not a high purpose for one's life. A higher purpose in life is preserving the earth that keeps humans alive.