> I used to believe that religion was a crucial and effective way of passing an ethical code from one generation to the next. But every Ghanaian I met was either Christian or Muslim, and some even expressed concern for my soul when I said I wasn't religious.

I suspect what you might be seeing is moral licensing. I was first introduced to this as a discrete concept in Malcolm Gladwell's podcast Revisionist History (episode 1). Interestingly, he predicted that because of it Hillary Clinton would suffer quite harsh criticism if she were to be elected (prior to the election). Listening to it for the first time after the election I couldn't help but think he was right in general but quite off about how it would be expressed. We had just elected the first black president, after all...