When the late Charlie Kirk was asked why Christianity matters more to America than other religions, one of the answers he gave was simple: the moral architecture of the United States rests heavily on the Bible — and especially the Ten Commandments.

That claim isn’t saying atheists can’t be good people. Of course they can. Human beings, religious or not, are capable of honesty, courage, compassion, and sacrifice. The deeper argument is different: while individuals can behave morally without belief in God, the civilization we inhabit did not arise in a moral vacuum.

Consider the American founding. Of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence, the overwhelming majority identified as Christians, broadly within the Protestant tradition. They may have disagreed on denominational specifics — Congregationalist, Anglican, Presbyterian, Quaker — but they shared a biblical moral framework. Even those influenced by Enlightenment rationalism still assumed a universe ordered by a Creator and governed by moral law.

The Declaration itself appeals to “Nature and Nature’s God” and asserts that rights are “endowed by their Creator.” That is not accidental language. It reflects a worldview shaped by centuries of biblical teaching: that human beings possess inherent dignity because they are made in the image of God.

And where did the moral content of that dignity come from? In large part, from the Ten Commandments.

The commandments prohibit murder, theft, adultery, false witness, and coveting. They command honor for parents and establish a rhythm of rest. Strip away the explicitly theological elements for a moment and look at the social implications:

• If murder is wrong, life is sacred.
• If theft is wrong, property rights exist.
• If lying is wrong, contracts and testimony matter.
• If adultery is wrong, the family is protected.
• If coveting is restrained, envy does not destabilize society.

These are not merely private virtues; they are public goods. Courts, commerce, and communities depend on them.

One could argue that similar moral rules appear in other traditions — and that is true. But Christianity uniquely fused Hebrew moral law with a universal mission. Though administered within Israel’s covenant, the Old Testament moral law carried universal claims — claims Christianity later spread across civilizations.

The teachings of Jesus intensified rather than weakened the commandments: anger equated with murder, lust with adultery, truthfulness without oath manipulation. The standard became internal, not merely external.

That interiorization of moral law profoundly shaped Western conscience. It cultivated the idea that wrongdoing is not only illegal but sinful — that even if no court sees, God does. For centuries, that belief reinforced social order.

This does not mean America was perfectly Christian, nor that Christians always lived up to their ideals. Slavery, injustice, and hypocrisy all existed alongside biblical faith. But the reform movements that corrected those injustices — abolition, civil rights, prison reform — also drew heavily from biblical language and moral reasoning.

So the thesis is not “without Christianity no one can behave morally.” It is this: the moral ecosystem that makes widespread trust, ordered liberty, and human rights plausible was historically fertilized by biblical soil.

When people today say, “We can keep the values without the faith,” they may be right for a generation or two. Cultural capital can be inherited. But moral frameworks do not sustain themselves indefinitely if the philosophical foundations erode. If rights are no longer grounded in a Creator, they must be grounded somewhere else — the state, consensus, power, or utility.

The Ten Commandments functioned as a moral minimum — a baseline that restrained chaos and elevated conscience. Christianity added grace, forgiveness, and universal dignity to that foundation.

Whether one believes in God or not, it is historically difficult to deny that the American experiment was built within that moral universe. The question now is not whether atheists can be good. It is whether a society can indefinitely preserve biblical moral fruits while severing biblical moral roots.