Why is the concept of Human Rights becoming so all pervading? 
Could it be that we instinctively realise that there has to be something objective by which we assess the difficult moral choices society and individuals must make.

The pervading philosophy has been sheer relativism - where no real goodness was recognised but each person made up his/her own mind as to what is right. 

Relativism cannot be right for two reasons - the first practical and the second theoretical.

Practical.
Imagine Hitler had won the war, brain washed or killed all his opponents so that everyone believed the holocaust was right. Would the fact that it was generally believed to be right make it right? Relativism has no answer to that. 

Theoretical. 
The statement 'relativism is right' is in itself a moral statement claiming our allegiance. But here it refutes itself for if relativism is right then there can be no moral statements claiming our allegiance. Therefore if it is right it is wrong - which is a nonsense. Relativism refutes itself.

Therefore some form of objective standard has to be recognised by which the difference between good and evil can be determined. Hence the concept of human rights. But can it really provide the answers to our moral questions?

There are various complications and difficulties (some of which I owe to Lesslie Newbigin's writings) with this concept such as:

• What is the difference between a human desire and a human right?
• If we can't distinguish between them, then the desires of the powerful will determine which human rights have precedence in law. 
• Do we have a right to do what we like with our bodies in private?
• Does what I do in private affect society at large - now or in the future? 
• Some theories of human society say it does.
• Abortion - whose right - mother's or foetus/unborn baby's?
• When does the right to freedom of speech: 
• breach the right of someone to be protected from what he regards as offensive?
• propagate evil and harm society?
• Who is under obligation to honour our claim to our rights?
• Our quest for happiness is infinite  (we are always wanting more from life)
• Who has the infinite duty to honour the infinite claims? 
• The answer is perceived to be the nation state. 
• So the demands on the state are without limit. 
• The nation state has taken the place of God as the source to which many look for happiness.

• What is true happiness?
• If we can’t ask the Question: “What is the chief purpose of man’s existence?” then happiness is whatever each person defines it as.

• What God values and loves I must value and love.
• We have duties to one another:
• Whereas each person demanding ‘rights’ tends to separate us into rival isolated individuals; each person having a ‘duty’ to others unites us in relationships. 
• For our sake God Himself surrendered His rights and entered our suffering and death so as to forgive us and lift us up to Him.

Christ did not count His equality with God something to hold on to but He surrendered it for us:

• Sometimes we are called to surrender our rights and make sacrifices in order that we might help one another.
• The Biblical injunction is not to claim equality but to count others as deserving of greater honour than ourselves. 
• However the kind of honour and love we give is different for different people.
• A good society is one where we honour one another in ways appropriate to our relationships of being.
• I give a different love and a different honour to different persons depending on whether the person is my parent, child, teacher, pupil, colleague, employer, employee, spouse, or friend.