Leong Tien Fock in his letter "Differentiate 'secular' from 'secularism'"(Aug 27) reasserted the religionist (the -ist is deliberate) belief that there cannot be morality without God and implied that secularists have tried to argue that a modern civil society cannot achieve the same sense of morality as a religionist-based society.

Leong talks about the 'ideal situation' but do we not talk about the ideal situation regardless of whatever politico-social system we are currently espousing? Do Afghanistan and Iran represent the 'ideal' religionist state or are they merely an imperfect attempt of putting theory into practice?

A modern civil society, in theory, can create as moral a society as a religionist one but it is much harder to achieve as it requires societal belief that it can work and the co-operation of the majority. A religionist society, in practice, often works on the principle of intimidation and fear.

A modern civil society can grow and better itself as we can see in Malaysia with the recent constitutional gains made for women. This has been achieved through the petitioning of society for the incorporation of these changes.

Consider these:

A religionist's motivation (in theory) is in loving God.

God's motivation (in fact) is in loving humanity.

A secular humanist's motivation (in theory) is the same as the latter. Can that be the basis for a higher morality? Again, countering this with the perfection of God does not take into account the imperfection of humanity's interpretation of "God's word".

But despite all this I am in full agreement with Leong that the secularist and the religionist will never be able to convince the other of their points of view so perhaps all these arguments and letters on this subject are moot. Keep in mind that for every bad secularist example there can be put forward a bad religionist one. Perhaps we are just venting instead?