Or, Why this Nonbeliever Wears a W.W.J.D bracelet
My friends in reason,
I was twelve years old when my Sunday school teacher handed me a simple woven bracelet embroidered with four letters: WWJD, What Would Jesus Do? It was meant to be a constant reminder to live like Christ, to resist temptation, to follow the righteous path. At the time, I wore it because I was told to, because it made my parents proud, because I believed in everything it represented.
Now, decades later, I no longer believe in God. I don’t believe in heaven, hell, miracles, or divine salvation. I have no reason to think Jesus was anything more than a man, nor do I believe he died for my sins. And yet, I still wear the bracelet.
Not out of nostalgia. Not out of sentimentality. Not because of some lingering attachment to a faith I no longer hold.
I wear it because, after years of searching, questioning, and rebuilding my moral foundation from the ground up, I have come to a realization: the core ethical teachings attributed to Jesus remain some of the most profound moral guidelines available, entirely independent of supernatural belief.
Walking away from Christianity wasn’t a single moment of epiphany, it was a slow erosion. A relentless questioning that chipped away at my convictions until nothing remained. I remember sitting in church, hearing sermons about an all-loving God who allowed suffering, about free will existing alongside divine omniscience, about eternal punishment for finite sins. None of it made sense. When I asked for answers, I found only circular reasoning, empty platitudes, or the insistence that I needed to “just have faith.”
By my early twenties, I had abandoned belief altogether. But in rejecting Christianity, I didn’t immediately replace it with a coherent worldview. I was adrift. Losing faith was liberating, but it left me with a fundamental question: If there is no God defining right and wrong, what does?
Determined to rebuild my moral framework, I read widely, philosophy, psychology, history, ethics. I studied the Greeks: Aristotle’s virtue ethics, Socrates’ relentless pursuit of truth, the Stoic ideal of resilience and reason. I explored Buddhism’s emphasis on compassion, humanism’s focus on collective well-being, existentialism’s demand for personal responsibility.
In time, I came to a realization: morality is not dependent on religion. It is not dictated by divine command. Ethics arise from human experience, our ability to reason, empathize, and cooperate. The question was no longer What does God want me to do? but What kind of person should I be?
In the process of reconstructing my ethics, I returned, unexpectedly, to the figure of Jesus. Not as a messiah or miracle worker, but as a moral philosopher. I re-read the Gospels, this time stripping away the supernatural, the dogma, the divine claims, and looking at the core ethical principles underneath.
And to my surprise, I found wisdom there.
When removed from their theological context, many of Jesus’ teachings align with the moral conclusions I had already drawn from my studies. His insistence on radical compassion, love your neighbor as yourself, mirrored humanist ethics. His rejection of legalistic morality in favor of inner virtue was strikingly Aristotelian. His defense of the outcasts, his challenge to the powerful, his refusal to respond to hate with hate, these were not just religious principles, they were moral principles, deeply relevant and profoundly practical.
More than anything, I saw a pattern in his teachings: morality is not about obedience, it’s about character.
When asked what the greatest commandment was, Jesus didn’t list rules, he spoke of love.
When confronted with sinners, he didn’t condemn, he forgave.
When tested by those who sought to trap him, he responded with wisdom rather than force.
This was not a divine lawgiver issuing commands from above. This was a man who saw morality as an internal transformation, a way of seeing the world that placed kindness, humility, and justice at the center of human life.
I do not wear my WWJD bracelet as a declaration of faith, nor as a sign of loyalty to Christianity. I wear it as a reminder that, despite everything, the question it poses is still worth asking.
What would Jesus do? Not in the sense of divine perfection, but in the sense of ethical aspiration.
It is shorthand for a broader inquiry: What would a compassionate, wise, and just person do in this situation? It reminds me to resist cruelty, to approach others with empathy, to challenge hypocrisy, to seek truth, and to act with integrity.
Of course, Jesus is not the only moral figure worth learning from. There is value in asking What would Socrates do? What would the Buddha do? What would Marcus Aurelius do?
But for me, WWJD remains a useful and deeply personal heuristic, not because Jesus was the Son of God, but because he was a man whose ethical vision, stripped of its supernatural claims, still offers profound guidance for navigating a complex world.
I do not need to believe in heaven to believe in kindness.
I do not need to fear hell to reject injustice.
I do not need divine command to pursue virtue.
I wear this bracelet not as a Christian, but as a human being trying, every day, to be better than I was the day before.
And if that’s all we ever do, if we reject cruelty, embrace empathy, and strive to leave the world a little better than we found it, then maybe, just maybe, we’re already doing what Jesus would do.
Love and peace,
R.L. Lawrence