I think very few people choose their religion. They are raised in it, and indoctrinated from a young age.

In the end morality must be that which preserves the life support system for all. Morality is not about what one believes or thinks but how one acts.

The vast majority of religious people, do not gain their moral objectivity from their religion, they simply ascribe it to their religion.
Most have never read their holy books and know nothing about what is actually written in them.
If you tell a Christian the bible contains advocation for slavery, misogyny, murder, child beating etc, they will say "Well not that bit obviously, just the good bits."
But what are the good bits?
The bits they agree with.
Meaning ultimately Christians like everyone else are the ultimate arbiters of their own moral codes, only they have abnegated themselves from the responsibility of the same.

Morality is a poetic term that really means nothing specific at all beyond maybe how comfortable you are with specific behaviors in other people.
Humans exhibit no social behavior that isn't found in other social creatures.
Except Twitter, no other species Twitters.

I believe that morality is innate in humans and is part of the evolutionary process and also closely connected to the capacity to empathise with others. I therefore believe morality to be objective not subjective. Our earliest ancestors very quickly found that to transgress the social mores of the tribe meant expulsion and certain death, because co-operation with each other within a society was essential for survival, and survival is the strongest instinct we have. Religion came very late into the morality forum, the Abrahamic ones such as Christianity are particularly recent. They have however managed very successfully to steal this very human characteristic of morality and pretend that their god bestowed it on them, and without it the rest of us have no morality. They may believe their own rhetoric, but that proves nothing because they also believe all the other fictions in the bible. There are people who do not have the same innate moral code as the rest of us, but they are anomalous, an aberration, and are what is known as sociopaths or psychopaths.

I think morality is mostly objective and embedded in our genes over thousands of years of evolution. We are a pack animal that requires others in order to prosper. To prosper and propagate we had to learn to co-operate, show loyalty and share the spoils. Unfortunately for many people morality extends no further than about the 100 to 150 people, that made up our tribes of hunters and collectors.

The challenge today is to extend those values to all world. And that is a decision we can choose to make or not, depending on the sort of person we want to be.

Somebody once said , "everyone in the world knows whats right and whats wrong", it's people that are "taught" the difference that are confused.

The case has already been made by persons sufficiently apt for the job, so I don't why you'd want to try and reinvent the wheel. Culture and experience shape morality. It has to be the case. Once upon a time the United States, for example, upheld slavery as morally acceptable, and a large number of its people happily practiced it believing it so. Now it does not, and they do not, and in fact the average person undoubtedly considers chattel slavery morally reprehensible.

We can't explain the alteration in our collective thinking on slavery by asserting "God fixed it," can we? According to the book that purports to describe his will (at least for Christians), he didn't seem to have much of a problem with it. Even the newer book does little to "update" his "thinking" on the matter, as Love Thy Neighbor wasn't exactly introduced as universal tenet.

It has to be subjective, therefore. But that is just one way among many to make the case.

The only morality that need exist, in order to ensure mutual benefit to all, is "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you," aka the Golden Rule. The simplicity and all-encompassing nature of this passage very nearly approaches the genius of E=MC2. And God didn't invent it.

Morality is basically a useful fiction designed to give humans a framework by which to behave so that we don't go around killing each other. Christian 'morality' is just what would happen to moral systems if you brought an all powerful being into the equation, because instead of living in peace and cooperating being the central concern of morality, avoiding punishment from said all powerful being would be the central concern.

Because they don't do logic.

And/or, because god does not exist, therefore god has no properties, and if something has no properties, then you can award it any properties you want, if you can only imagine them, (you will get no conflict.) So if you want, not only an objective morality, but moreover an objective morality which fits your prejudices exactly, and has the supreme authority which trumps everyone else's opinions on morality, then you just award those properties to god, and bang you get all you could desire, as if by magic. Not only that but you don't even have to work it out for yourself, since there is a whole range of pick and mix sects, to choose from, so that you can just select a ready made of the rack.

Never underestimate the none existent.

I just read a book that you might like. It presents an interactionist view of reason. It explains how we have evolved to reason in communication with others and explains why we have cognitive biases.

Morality and Ethical behaviours have been around in both humans and animals long, long before religions/religious beliefs were ever invented.
Morals and Ethics are what assisted humans to survive the predators and predations when they were just mere, helpless early primates.
As they grew together from mere , small family groups into larger clans they learned, mostly by mistakes, that supporting and protecting each other, and especially their young, made them stronger and safer plus reduced the the chances of deformities , etc, occurring via in-breeding.
Sadly, religions were invented and then hi-jacked these behaviours, etc, claimed them , falsely as their own, twisted and contorted them to SUIT their purposes and now we are expected to bear with the intrusions of these twisted ideologies into almost every aspect of our lives from what we should/should not wear, to what we may/may not eat, etc, etc, and even as to how when and why, in many cases, we can have and behave during Sexual Intercourse.
Imo, Religion does NOT give Freedom, it takes it from people and ALLOWS its purveyors the freedoms to fulfill, pursue and foster, without question most often, their own lusts and desires.

Moral means ethical, i.e. knowing the difference between right and wrong.

Moral (dictionary.com)

adjective

1. of, relating to, or concerned with the principles or rules of right conduct or the distinction between right and wrong; ethical: moral attitudes.

2. expressing or conveying truths or counsel as to right conduct, as a speaker or a literary work.

3. founded on the fundamental principles of right conduct rather than on legalities, enactment, or custom: moral obligations.

4. capable of conforming to the rules of right conduct: a moral being.

thing is that an interp of reality might easily lead one to assume that migt makes right, and not morality at all?

. . . (I just finished this) I highly recommend -- a very good read, and could very well change some of your ideas about morality :

[goodreads.com]

[righteousmind.com]

. . . (privately) test your morals :

[yourmorals.org]

I define morality by:
On the personal level: The way of acting and behaving to promote the model of society that you think is good and/or desire.

On society level: Ideally is the average of personal morality of the individuals. In practice is the average of morality of the cultural elite (the elite that controls production and distribution of culture).

In a more perfect world that might be ow it works. But the simple fact is that most religious people are indoctrinated at a young age and are taught that Atheists are heathens and that every "good and moral" person believes in god!

The starting point is NOT the same for all people. We all had parents who either TOLD us or TAUGHT us. There is a huge difference!

My take on it is that the Christian has his mind made up already. His "conclusion" is pre-determined and he will use straw men to prove it. In the end the believer is stuck just making things up. This is the same with the non-believer but we have no dogma and therefore nothing to make up.

According to Dao teaching, All moral teaching, is confusion. A.Watts

So my nephew is a Jesus freak, and he quotes Biblical scriptures up one side and down the other on Facebook.

He might acknowledge your point about immorality as the reality of living on planet Earth in 2020, but he would always respond with anything you say by pointing to a Bible verse.

How do you reconcile that?

Your argument reminds me of a poem I wrote a couple years ago:

Common Ground and Releasing Expectations

Resolution—
Healthy debate
A Christian, an Atheist and love
In one Place

Our differences won’t abate!
But antagonism can
If we realize what’s common
And lose our insistence.

A person actually looking at reality would conclude one of 2 things: there is only Chaos, or "gawd"most closely resembles Charlie Manson. Your entire premise is completely flawed.

No shit, Sherlock!

Well, I think an objective morality can be built using only the concepts of Pain and Death. These are two concepts that all intelligent living creatures viscerally experience and understand. In fact, I believe these form an unconscious morality as we grow up and experience pain and witness death in many forms as children. I also believe the two fundamental concept can be used as a common existential foundation we all share, upon which an conscious objective morality can be built.

Religion certainly are the first attempts. And they fail. We can do better now with logic and science. No need to toss out objective morality just because religions did a bad job of creating one.