Ramon Casha, in his opinion piece ‘Product of common humanity’ (October 21), tries to demean religion and bases moral behaviour on humanism.

Granted that throughout time, man has created certain customs and regulations that rather than enhancing religion have enslaved him and undermined the true meaning of religion, but Casha generalises and is not able to go beyond what is limited and temporal to what is permanent and absolute.

For Casha there are no absolute truths. By stating that “morality is something that changes through the ages” he is denying the fact that man, as a dignified human being, does not change his behaviour or act according to circumstances when it comes to morality.

Man is not a changeable being. There are certain basic truths that are considered absolute and are unchangeable. To say that “the moral principles of humanism are fairly universal since they are not dogmatic or authoritarian but are a product of our common humanity” is the reverse of what is true.

Because we are created by God as dignified human beings whatever our colour, creed, sex or race, we have in us a common heritage, a “universal moral law, written on the human heart [that] must be considered effective and indelible as the living expression of the shared conscience of humanity”. (Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church.)

It is not dogma or authority that gives meaning to what is absolute and true.

Natural law is ingrained in the nature of man and for Christians revelation is truth and these principles are considered as dogma. It is not man who claims himself to be the sole measure of realities and truth, as humanists tend to affirm. Man is the product of someone who is above him and only when he submits himself to this absolute can he find the true meaning of himself.