Humanism is a meliorism

"… Humanism is a philosophy, not a religion, so it has no dogma—but it does have a creed: Humanism believes in the equality of all humans and celebrates the rich diversity of experiences between us. Humanism believes our actions are best informed by reason and critical thinking. And above all, Humanism believes in meliorism—that the world can be made better by human effort. That we can alleviate the suffering of our fellow man, and work toward human flourishing for all.

Thomas Paine penned his own Humanist creed in his work Age of Reason: "I believe in the equality of man; and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavoring to make our fellow-creatures happy."

And Humanism comes with thousands of years of philosophical texts: Ideas first espoused by the Greek philosophers Cicero and Epicurus, as well as the Chinese philosophies of Taoism and Confucianism, were later resuscitated by Renaissance Humanists like Petrarch, Desiderius Erasmus, and Michel de Montaigne. During the Enlightenment, Humanist writers like Voltaire and the Marquis de Condorcet brought those ideals into our states and governments, and modern writers like Steven Pinker continue the work, all gospel that humans have some agency against the ails of the world.

 
Throughout history, we took those ideals and made them manifest. As Sarah Bakewell points out in her book Humanly Possible: Seven Hundred Years of Humanist Freethinking, Inquiry, and Hope: "It was thanks to humanistic beliefs in reason and meliorism that Voltaire argued for tolerance of different religions, Condorcet and Olympe de Gouges argued for including women and non-European races in the French Revolutionary idea of human liberation, and their fellow Enlightenment thinker Jeremy Bentham argued for what would now be called LGBTQ+ rights."

It was Humanism's insistence on equality that demanded an end to slavery. It created orphanages, hospitals, social work, and women's suffrage. It implored us to devise spaces for disabled persons. It was Humanism's belief in meliorism that inspired human rights movements and liberal democracies. The progress we have made comes from Humanism's central belief that all human beings are equals and that we have an equal right to human flourishing.

 
Whether or not there is a God is irrelevant to this goal. "I am a humanist," the philosopher Kurt Vonnegut once said, "which means, in part, that I have tried to behave decently without any expectation of rewards or punishments after I'm dead."
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-Elle Griffin