There’s no better reason to believe in equality and social justice.
Jesus underlies most of what’s good and decent about the world. He taught us the value and dignity in all of human life, an understanding that’s the foundation for democracy and humanitarian compassion for all people, including and especially the most needy or disabled. Only belief in the divine and the knowledge that every person is created in the image of God justify the notion that all human life is sacred and worthy of everyone’s appreciation and nurture.
Sure, you don’t have to believe in Christ or any god at all to be compassionate or be a humanitarian. But contrary to what many among the learned classes believe, those convictions are not “progressive,” “learned” or “enlightened.” They cannot be derived from nor justified by anything in science in nature. They are not ideals to which people naturally arrive given the proper education and the freedom to choose one’s course in life. And they are not natural, rational or discernible as the next most obvious outlook for anyone who doesn’t believe in God or who abandons their faith.
Education does not lead you to “humanism” because laws of nature don’t support democratic or humanitarian ideals. In fact, the laws of the natural world often work in opposition to them, as does most of human nature, disposed as we are to tribalism and self gratification. The laws of nature support the practice in ancient cities of letting lepers rot outside the city limits so that they don’t infect others and rejecting children born ill or deformed so that they are not allowed to pass on their genes. Jesus teaches us to bravely and courageously minister to the needs of the sick and disabled because all life is precious no matter the science that surrounds it.
A well educated person can argue in support of humanist ideals, but another can argue just as persuasively not to do so, and the latter will have the laws of nature backing them. In the end, those who do not believe in God but choose to be humanist anyways do so based on nothing more than opinion. And in a strictly naturalist sense, it’s an opinion no more valid that Hitler’s, and likely even less so.
You should believe in God to cherish life as a divine imperative, not just an idea — an idea that on a rational basis, is not even a very good one.
There is no problem of evil
Secondly, you should believe in God because, contrary to skeptic thought, the tragedy and evil in the world does not prove that there can’t be a God.
Addressing the so called problem of evil might seem like an odd choice to believers as a second point in support of faith. But the truth is, reconciling the existence of a good, almighty God with the evils of the world has been logically impenetrable for millennia and the most reliable bludgeon against faith.
I wrote an ebook called The Endeavor of Life and the Wisdom of God that explains how it is that a perfect God could preside over an imperfect creation. I use common sense social reasoning from a Christian perspective argued on rational grounds that can withstand the skepticism of any nonbeliever or anyone falling away from faith.
It is God’s will that people live and die as mortals. That doesn’t mean that any type of suffering or premature death is ever necessary for any reason. But it is an essential and defining endeavor for humankind to live on earth as flesh and blood creatures who do all that we can to nurture life. It’s a line of reasoning that does not rely on the need for “free will” and does not settle on our inability to grasp God’s mysterious ways.
Imperfections abound in life, but our existence is ordered so that those imperfections compel us towards knowledge, wisdom and communion with God. There’s no such thing as a perfect life anyways.
You should believe in God because the problem of evil is bunk.
“In the beginning was the Word.”
The entire universe originates in mind.
Preceding the Big Bang that produced the universe and all of the laws of nature is a Singularity of infinite mass and zero volume in which the laws of physics do not apply. It is not a ball of light or heat, both of which are functions of physical laws that don’t exist before the explosion. The Singularity isn’t anything that you could touch or sense in any way. It is essentially a thought, not a thing.
From there, you can reason God’s omnipresence, His ability to know and touch all things and how it is that He to listen to all prayers everywhere and throughout time. And you can understand how our souls are eternal. We have not always lived, but we have always existed and will forevermore.
Encompassing all of being is mind. Whose else mind could it be?
Think about it.