It doesn't obviate the need for some external authority it proves it. Where does that "internal sense" come from? If it is just a evolutionary appendage the it isn't objective it is merely relative and can be discarded as there is no truth behind it. Without God it isn't objectively true.
"And I think you’re in dangerous waters claiming that only societies that believe in God as you believe God to be can be and historically have been moral."
I never said anything like "as I believe in God". I merely say that without a transcendent God there is no basis for objective morality. Without a trasncendant God the word "moralilty" loses all objectivity and becomes meaningless relativism, it becomes merely personal preference or social convention.
"Many Buddhist cultures have been highly moral, as arguably are many current, atheistic European countries."
"Moral" based on what? What defines "moral" in this context? What is the standard? What makes these societies any more "moral" than Nazi Germany or the Reign of Terror in 1796 France? Apart from a transcendent God the word "moral" becomes nothing more than a relativistic social construct which can and does change with the wind.
The point to which I referred you early in our discourse was toward Huxley’s observation of a ‘perennial philosophy’.
Since you can no more prove God as a moral authority than any other source of moral authority, I don’t believe your approach shakes the cover of relativity better than any other.
But my point is that whether God-based or otherwise, if an individual and those with which that individual interacts believe there is an objective morality toward which they and society strive that is as good as believing an an objective morality that may—objectively, if you will—or may not be more objective.
I think it possible that we are wired with a particular morality, and it is when particular religions resonate with the truths that people perceive from within that they gain credibility. From there, people are more inclined to believe whatever cosmology and tenets the religion also entails.
Now, do I believe that that particular, universal sense of morality is divinely inspired? Yes, I do. I can’t prove it, however, and I don’t believe that it is more effective when people believe in its divine origin rather than simply that it is the right and moral way to do and to be.