(WR) Morality Without Religion?

Many people learn basic moral rules in a religious context, so naturally they associate the two. But nonreligious people generally subscribe to moral rules as well, so clearly it is possible to separate them. Here is the outline of a philosophical argument for the independence of morality from religion.

Suppose the God or religious text to which you subscribe has a rule about stealing being wrong. So you think stealing is wrong, and you think God says so. But notice that this is not the same thing as stealing being wrong because God says so.

Setting God aside for a moment, you can probably think of a number of reasons why stealing is generally a bad idea, and some of those reasons are clearly moral in nature (such as that stealing harms the people from whom you steal, or that it undermines the trust that enables a community to nurture its members, etc.). Now suppose for a moment that you re-read your religious text and become convinced that it has long been misinterpreted -- that God actually endorses stealing. You now inevitably confront a crisis of faith, because you know -- that is, you have many compelling, extra-religious reasons to believe -- that stealing is wrong, but God now seems to be commanding you to steal. You might be tempted to go ahead and launch a crime spree, but with luck the cognitive dissonance will drive you to take another look at the text instead.

Ask yourself:  Is stealing wrong because God says so, or does God say so because it is wrong? A little reflection suggests that the first option can't be correct, for if God were to say stealing wasn't wrong, God would be mistaken!