Karen Armstrong (pronounced Car-en, if you care) isn’t a religion scholar I’d normally recommend, but I think she makes a fairly good description of what appears to be a good bit of the situation we find ourselves in as regards the relationship of religion and science.
In short, religion hasn’t always carried around the obligation to “prove” God and his ways. As far as Christianity goes, it was a buy-in into rationalism that produced the kind of rationalistic fundamentalism that is, in my opinion, driving a lot of evangelicals into positions of increasing hostility to the findings of science. It’s common to read intelligent Christians, sometimes those who work in fields requiring technical proficiency, talking as if our default position toward science must be absolute skepticism or worse.
This morning at church, a little child sang “Jesus loves me….cause the Bible tells me so.” I wondered if that same child, wanting to be a doctor or an astronomer someday, will find out that they need to add verses like “The earth is 10,000 years old….” and “All scientists are lying….” Thankfully this isn’t true in every Christian communion. Please speak up if it’s not yours. Someone surely needs to know.
The divide between rationalistic apologists on the one hand and mystics/practitioners on the other is there for anyone to see. Evangelicalism has developed an entire personality of the rational devotionalist who can convince you that the Bible is whatever you want it to be in the realm of knowledge, from a book about the love of Jesus to a manual for all scientific knowledge to a diagnostic manual for the psychiatrist.
Suggest that dinosaurs might not have been on the ark and watch what happens. Evangelicals are puzzling me right now. They do know that Dr. Francis Collins is an evolutionist, right? He’s not on staff at AIG.
While I’m sure Armstrong can be faulted in some of her intellectual history, I have to agree that evangelicals are increasingly a group determined to set faith over against science and to find a way to put the word “Christian” in front of everything so that it’s OK for us to handle it.
I have sometimes wondered how much of my life I’ve spent listening to people who were, in their presentation of their beliefs, making no appeal to me other than a kind of badly aimed rationalism, where the fact that they could speak loudly and wave their views around convincingly was supposed to make up for any real personal credibility? How many blogosphere theologians are living the life taught by the Christ they constantly rant about being at the center of their life? Is the impression that many are living no different than anyone else in this culture just me?
I constantly come across people who love both Wright and Piper, and they want to know how the two sync, or don’t. Wright’s answers to these specific questions regarding the differences between himself and Piper are very clear. If you are one of those people who imagine they can both be on target, I’d say you should think again.
Wright’s contention is that Piper and other reformed voices tend to displace justification outside of its place in the Biblical story and make it virtually the entire story. I’d say that not only do they do that, but they are quite ready to label you as a dangerous heretic if you have any argument with that conclusion.
I’m not prepared to say Wright’s views are flawless- his idea of the “whole life lived” always has me hitting the brakes, though his longer explanations usually help- but I’m firmly in his camp as to where justification occurs in the overall message of the Bible. It’s bizarre to say that locating justification properly is somehow rejecting it. Those who do reject justification deserve to be deemed dangerous. Those who make less of it in the total picture of the Bible than some do aren’t in that category at all.
The Internet Monk Archives 
“Hey, how about a little more Christian love, fellows (and ladies)? There seems to be more heat than light being created here.”
With me and others I know and from what I read in comments on this site to past postings, many of us who feel YEC is very wrong, mostly stop there. We just feel it’s bad science and thus wrong. (And yes a few zelots go past that and thus too far.)
But I and others have been told that not only are we wrong we are likely not saved if we don’t believe in YEC. By multiple people multiple times. In no uncertain terms.
Lots of heat like that tends to generate some heat in defense.
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As you can see from what has continued to unfold here, the loud mouths exist on both sides of this debate.
As my mom used to say as she seperated my brother and me when we were fighting as children, “It takes two to fight.”
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Hey, how about a little more Christian love, fellows (and ladies)? There seems to be more heat than light being created here.
Just picked up my copy of Francis Collins The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief. I also looked up iMonk’s essay on this topic. As a YEC advocate I have always wondered how Gen. one is interpreted by “the other side.”
Thanks for the leads, people.
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Since you’ve decided to talk to the moderator of this site like he’s one of your students, you’re now on moderation. Your posts will be approved before they are posted.
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Mike, I am fully aware of primary and secondary causes. Thank you for the trouble you took, but you are missing my point.
The Bible is a literary work. Rule one in interpreting literature is to recognize and respect the integrity, the wholeness, of the finished work. That means that you do not subject it to outside sources and material in discovering its meaning. You consider the internal evidence on its own.
For example, the Lord Jesus in Luke three has a genealogy that goes all the way back to Adam. Adam was created on day six of time and space, about 4000 years BC according to Genesis 1, when you add up the life-spans in the genealogies provided in Genesis.
The fourth commandment has God in person speaking to Israel at Sinai, and he explicitly says that the reason for the Sabbath is that he stopped working on day seven of the first week of the creation. It all ties in.
That is the way that Luke, Moses, and God himself at Sinai, interpret Genesis.
You are subjecting the text to external material, and in doing so you have violated its wholeness, and in doing so, violated its meaning. Literature, like science, has its method. Don’t mix them up.
Finally, I fully accept your sincerity when you say that you trust God above science. However, I would suggest that you are a little naive in your reading of the text. That is not a sin. For your part, i would hope that you do not ascribe stupidity, ignorance, or deliberate willfulness to six day people. After all, it is the historical position of the entire Christian Church.
Peace
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Michael, I am not one of your school pupils, so please do not adopt an authoritarian tone with me. I am a grown-up man with a family, and a church to pastor. Please treat me with respect. If you are not willing to do so I will gladly move on from your site. Just let me know of your decision.
Also, you are missing my point. This is not about a different interpretation. It is about a wrong interpretation that is in fact not interpretation at all. It is subjecting scripture to science, indeed, modifying scripture to conform to it.
As a school teacher, you should know better than anyone else that every piece of literature must be granted its own integrity, that is, its wholeness. Adding other material to it, in this case an old earth theory, destroys that integrity and thus cannot be counted as interpretation.\
We don’t do that to Mark Twain, so why do it to God’s word?
James Barr knew this, and respected it, and said that every Professor of OT and Hebrew known to him believed that the author of Genesis taught six day creation – but they all disagreed. That is the honest and informed position.
I am not ascribing dishonesty to anyone here, but I am ascribing a certain literary naivety. I have found that people with a scientific education tend to be unaware of the rules surrounding textual integrity, or wholeness.
I am saying to Mike the Geologist that his position is not interpretation as defined by the rules of interpretation. You have made your own position clear, and I say to you that you need to rethink things in the light of a proper exegetical method.
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When did Young Earth Creationism become THE Gospel?
Did Christ somehow abdicate His throne and YEC grabbed the empty seat?
Oh, and Roger Du Barry?
Look up a Victorian movement called “Zetetic Astronomy” sometime. It was founded to preserve God’s Word from Godless Science, and used many of the same arguments you currently hear from Ken Ham et al regarding “Authority of God (in Scripture) vs authority of modern man”, i.e. “God Said It, I Believe It, That Settles It.”
They’re still around, but they’ve changed their name in the intervening century and a half.
Now they call themselves The Flat Earth Society.
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“The creation versus evolution/old-earth debate boils down to one very simple point: authority. It is the authority of God versus the authority of modern theories of origins. That is the bottom line. Everything else is a red herring.”
For the last 2000 years this position has failed miserably. I hate to bring it up but this was exactly the same position many of the faith took when telescopes revealed the way the solar system worked. And their arguments were lost. But not without a lot of name calling and burning at the stake and driving many from the faith. Now days we skip the burning but continue with the name calling and driving from the faith.
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Roger, I really think you are conflating proximate cause with ultimate cause. To borrow an illustration from the Glover series I referenced earlier: If you come to my house and there is a kettle boiling on the stove and you ask me; “Why is that kettle boiling” I could answer you two ways. One I could say it is boiling because the heat from the burner is transferred to the metal of the kettle and hence to the water. The temperature of the water is raised above 212 deg. F and there is a phase change from liquid to gas. Or…I could say because I want a cup of tea. One is a proximate cause the other is an ultimate cause. Now notice you could empirically reach the same proximate cause as me but you could not reach the ultimate cause unless I reveal it to you. I submit to you the Bible is not a book of proximate causes, you don’t reference it if you want to build and program a computer, build and fly an airplane or a space shuttle, etc. The Bible is very much of book of ultimate causes which we could not know unless its author revealed them to us. Let us take another example closer to the controversy; did God create you or did your biological parents have sex, and your father’s sperm fertilized your mother’s egg, you became an embryo, developed in her womb and was born. Did God form you in your mother’s womb or did you naturally develop. Neither answer contradicts the other. One speaks of God’s providential sovereignty through natural laws, the other speaks to God’s special purpose in creating you. My belief in an old earth is based on my understanding of proximate causes, but I still firmly believe that God created this earth and all that is on it. I believe that God created me therefore my life has meaning and purpose. In fact it was the teleological and moral arguments that caused me to drop my atheism. I could not believe the materialist assertion that my life had no meaning or purpose except to exist. At least at the time that is how I saw it from my viewpoint. I know now that God was patiently and lovingly revealing himself to me through Jesus Christ. No amount of so called “scientific” arguments or data i.e. proximate causes could ever cause me to disbelieve the Bible, BECAUSE I know and am known by its author. I trust Him implicitly, even when so-called scientific facts seem to contradict. I know ultimately that His general revelation will NEVER contradict His special revelation- The Word. Any seeming contradiction is always a matter of misinterpreting either the Bible or the natural data. Hope that clarifies my position.
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“Well, yes.. in the sense that 99.99999999999999999999999998% is much smaller than 99.99999999999999999999999999%”
If you drop off all the advocates of each position and just follow the people doing research in the areas you’ll find than natural selection has a lot of troubled followers. They don’t like it but outside of a “god” they can’t come up with anything else so they don’t so much champion it but more tolerate it as they have nothing (from their perspective) better. Things like eyes and reproductive systems coming about by random mutations is a hard nut to swallow but jumping to “God did it” is harder for many of them.
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Most scientists in paleontology and biology support evolution. A much smaller percentage support natural selection.
Well, yes.. in the sense that 99.99999999999999999999999998% is much smaller than 99.99999999999999999999999999%
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If you want this thread to continue, do not tell another commenter they don’t believe the Bible when they believe it, but interpret it differently than you.
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Mike the Geologist
Yes, I take Genesis literally. No, Genesis does not teach that the earth is flat disc. To say that I should think it does is a false argument. Yes, the universe is earth-centric, but not in a geological or astronomical sense. From my perspective the sun rises and sets. If I were on the sun the opposite would be that case. To state the obvious, the Bible is written for earthlings, not aliens, so for us the universe is geocentric.
In my eyes it is you who is misusing the Bible by using sources external to it to make it fit in with what you have been taught elsewhere. That is not interpretation, but imposition.
You are making the Bible conform to your geological education. Again, it is a matter of authority. You trust your geology lecturers more than the Bible.
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“Darwin’s theory of evolution”
What this means to 99% of the people who use the term is NOT what the hard science folks understand.
Evolution is change over time. The theory of natural selection was Darwin’s way to explain the evolution he felt took place. Ramming them together adds a huge amount of confusion to this issue. And all sides do it.
Most scientists in paleontology and biology support evolution. A much smaller percentage support natural selection.
I personally feel you can be a Christian and support evolution as noted above. Or at least admit it might have happened. The theory of natural selection has a lot “non support” amongst both Christians and non-Christians as having way too many issues to be believable.
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“What is the error/sin in understanding creation as a genuine, inexplicable miracle? Jeremiah, Psalmists, and Jesus (to name 3 off the top of my head) affirm the doctrine of creation, and Jesus and Paul seem to historically affirm Adam and Eve (not figuratively, but historically). And it seems to me that the resurrection is a far greater stretch to explain scientifically. Water to wine? Bread and fish for thousands? So … what is the error/sin in understanding creation as a genuine, inexplicable miracle?”
-Robert TRJ
It seems to me the theory of evolution is still genuinely miraculous. The theory explains the mechanism of the process- in no way does it account for the whys or hows of the process. The miracle to me is that we, the planet, the world etc, exist at all. Existence is in and of itself a miracle. The process of how existence changes from one form to another is pretty amazing, but knowing about how it works, or thinking we know, doesn’t take away from that initial, central shock of miracle- that where there could be nothingness, there is something.
I imagine standing in front of a blank canvass, watching it slowly transform into a painting. The hand is invisible to me- but I can watch the strokes and the gentle piling up of color. Is that less miraculous than the painting existing- pooof- all the sudden? To me, both are pretty amazing miracles.
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Jjoe
I think your illustration does not make your point. Evolution is the accepted creation myth in our culture and, evidently, of many churches. Evoultion is not some minority report held only by a few.
YEC are the ones who disagree with the accepted paradigm of our culture, and of many who read this blog (of which I am a huge fan! imonk, you are the only blog I read every day!).
“Is teaching children that the earth is 6000 years old right or wrong? Is it OK to teach untruth because the teachers stand on the “authority of God†rather than modern theories?”
I will make a note: There is a right way to think and a wrong way to think. Clearly reasoned viewpoints that disagree with your understanding must not be taught to children, impressionable as they are.
At least you are consistant with you agreement with the new athiests. They too view the teaching of a literal view of the Biblical creation account to be child abuse. Please be a little more careful where your reasoning leads.
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I remember coming across the piazza in Rome where they burnt Bruno for believing the earth revolved around the sun.
Was this right or wrong? Was it OK because the people doing the burning stood on the “authority of God” rather than modern theories?
Is teaching children that the earth is 6000 years old right or wrong? Is it OK to teach untruth because the teachers stand on the “authority of God” rather than modern theories?
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Roger du Barry:”The creation versus evolution/old-earth debate boils down to one very simple point: authority. It is the authority of God versus the authority of modern theories of origins. That is the bottom line. Everything else is a red herring.” As in “Who ya gonna believe, me or yer own stinkin’ eyes” (joke). Consider these quotes:
“People gave ear to an upstart astrologer who strove to show that the earth revolves, not the heavens or the firmament, the sun and the moon. Whoever wishes to appear clever must devise some new system, which of all systems is of course the very best. This fool [or ‘man’] wishes to reverse the entire science of astronomy; but sacred Scripture tells us that Joshua commanded the sun to stand still, and not the earth.”
– Martin Luther, Table Talk
“Those who assert that ‘the earth moves and turns’…[are] motivated by ‘a spirit of bitterness, contradiction, and faultfinding;’ possessed by the devil, they aimed ‘to pervert the order of nature.'”
– John Calvin, sermon no. 8 on 1st Corinthians, 677, cited in John Calvin: A Sixteenth Century Portrait by William J. Bouwsma (Oxford Univ. Press, 1988), A. 72
There are 67 Bible verses that “affirm” geocentrism, more so than “affirm” a young earth. But you don’t believe in geocentrism, tell me why not. Also, I’m willing to bet you don’t really take Genesis literally. To take Genesis literally would be to conceive of the earth as a flat disk with waters below it and waters above it, with the waters above it held up by a dome-shaped firmament on which the sun, the moon, and all the stars are hung. None of us believe in that cosmology today, nor should we. Nor do God’s eternal truths expounded in Genesis require us to believe that cosmology. Consider this verse of scripture: Revelation 6:12 When he opened the sixth seal, I looked, and behold, there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth, the full moon became like blood, 13 and the stars of the sky fell to the earth as the fig tree sheds its winter fruit when shaken by a gale.(ESV). I agree with the host of this site when he wrote concerning this verse: “I do not believe the stars will fall to the earth. I don’t. I don’t believe stars are in the sky. I don’t believe the writer understood what stars are or how they operate or the distances involved. I think this is pre-scientific language, and it is meant to tell us truth in its own way. A simple illustration, but it clearly shows that literary purpose must come before “literal” interpretation.
Now if I insist on a literal interpretation of this verse as a way of saying it is true and inspired, I am not treating the text with reverence and respect. I may be well motivated, but I am damaging the text.(https://internetmonk.com/articles/C/creation.html.
When we misuse the Genesis text we undermine the authority of scripture to the next generation.
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Jeremiah Lawson and Andrew: I’m not good at guessing games. I did figure out that IVF probably does not mean Inter-Varsity Fellowship. Now I’m thinking it might mean in vitro fertilization. Am I still wrong and it means something else? I am older and not really a part of the all abbreviations all the time crowd (ROFL, LOL, WTF?, etc.)
Apologies, iMonk, for this between-the-lines request for clarification. You can’t tell the players without a program.
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The creation versus evolution/old-earth debate boils down to one very simple point: authority. It is the authority of God versus the authority of modern theories of origins. That is the bottom line. Everything else is a red herring.
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Tim
In your reply you seem to indicate that YEC have a problem with dinosaurs. Please look up Ken Ham’s web site to correct this misconception. These “terrible lizards” are modeled throughout AIG’s Creation Museum.
My young nephew (homeschooled though he is) can tell you all about the dinosaurs. No visit to their home is complete without a rehearsing of the characteristics of his latest dino model or a fosil discovered in the stream on grandma’s farm. Amazingly, he can even spell their names correctly!
My sister and brother-in-law do not share your reticence in telling their children when they disagree with his favorite paleontologist.
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Ah, another creation-evolution discussion is brewing.
Well, I only want to strike a blow for the dinosaurs, for they are not here to defend themselves.
My son is 10. Small boys need lots of loud sources of destruction, and if it has red eyes and claws and is as big as a house, all the better. So we have buckets of plastic dinosaurs at my house, and late at night, when my son should be asleep, they can be heard roaring from upstairs.
Now into this perfectly fun fetish come stomping the Creationist puritans, who are apparently afraid that if children get fascinated by dinosaurs, they will slide all the way down that slippery slope into the maw of hell. You think I exaggerate? I know of parents in the homeschool circles we frequent who keep dinosaurs away from their children. We have to check my son’s pockets before certain playdates.
The Great Lizards have apparently become the evil icons of evolution in the eyes of many conservative christians. Maybe you have to have children a certain age to appreciate just how far the ghetto-ization of evangelicalism has gone.
I actually believe whatever Genesis 1 and 2 are saying, but I cannot tell my son that the paleontologists he adores on YouTube have the dates all wrong, or that they are part of a conspiracy to destroy the bible. Good grief, these are good people, telling the truth about what they see in history. They are not the enemies of Jesus.
My serious point is that we are setting up our children to grow out of their faith when they leave home and we can’t cover their ears any more.
Let the Ken Hams give their lives to the cause if they must, but leave the dinosaurs out of it. They, also, are not the enemies of Jesus.
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Andrew, the lack of evangelical objection to IVF might be because of quiver-full theology.
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What is the error/sin in understanding creation as a genuine, inexplicable miracle? Jeremiah, Psalmists, and Jesus (to name 3 off the top of my head) affirm the doctrine of creation, and Jesus and Paul seem to historically affirm Adam and Eve (not figuratively, but historically). And it seems to me that the resurrection is a far greater stretch to explain scientifically. Water to wine? Bread and fish for thousands? So … what is the error/sin in understanding creation as a genuine, inexplicable miracle?
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I think I’d be a bit of a skeptic of a purely genetic component for homosexuality no matter my religious faith. There are identical twins who have two different sexual preferences. Obviously there is more to it than simply genetics. However, I have no religious reason to deny it’s genetic basis either. — Kenny Johnson
Apparently the opposing dogmas say that it’s behavior/choice and that it’s genetic. Why can’t it be both? A vector solution of many factors that come together? A vector solution whose resulting orientation and strength of that orientation/behavior vary from individual to individual?
(Because if you say so, both sides turn on you with “DIE, HERETIC!”, that’s why…)
“…usually purported by the people with the loudest mouths…†— APritchett
Pritchett’s right, Phil. I was in an Internet mailing list (God’s Creatures) that melted down into WW3 over Creation vs Evolution, perpetrated as well as “purported by those with the loudest mouths”. The only thing I can compare it to is the screaming denunciations in Chairman Mao’s Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. It killed the list and started grudges that continue to this day.
And while we’re at each others’ throats screaming over Evolution and Homosexuality, pastors’ widows are still eating out of dumpsters.
If the world is the way that God wants it, and suffering and destruction and corruption only glorifies Him, then what point would there be to responding to faith with works, and being judged by the works rather than by the faith? “Lord, when did we see you?†— Todd Erickson
Last week I was visiting my writing partner, a burned-out pastor in rural Pennsylvania. Last Thursday night I tagged along to the Bible study he gave in the second (tiny & grey) church he pastors and heard him speak.
The study/sermon included a warning about the teachings of some Hyper-Calvinists he had recently encountered. (Pastoral responsibility to warn the flock of bad “teachings which spread like gangrene.”) Part of that warning was exactly what Todd has described above. Since to Hyper-Calvinists everything is Predestined and God’s Will is Supreme (as in Islam), what we have around us is “The Best of All Possible Worlds” because that is What God Hath Willed — all the suffering and destruction and corruption and the majority dying without knowledge of healing — and there is no point in responding to it with works of mercy or ministry.
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Yes, Paul says “We are justified freely by our Faith, it is not of works, lest any man should boast.”
But.
Jesus talks about the goats and sheep coming up before the throne, and the goats call Him Lord, and believe in Him, but refused to commit to works in the world, and as such were cast out.
and
In II Corinthians 9, Paul talks about a great work of giving that the surrounding churches are involved in for Jerusalem, and how the giving of all of these churches openly displays the Gospel of Christ.
So
For all of the folks who want to deny works of any kind in justification…even James seems to say that Faith without works is dead. You can argue all that you want about sola fide, but in the end, all of the writers of the New Testament seemed to understand that if you truly believed what Jesus said, that you would actually follow His commandments, and in Love, do the same things that He had been doing, rather than just believing in Him.
If the world is the way that God wants it, and suffering and destruction and corruption only glorifies Him, then what point would there be to responding to faith with works, and being judged by the works rather than by the faith? “Lord, when did we see you?”
If, on the other hand, stewardship still stands, and we are still meant to work in this world as God assigned us in the beginning, despite the influence of sin that we have brought to the created world (or perhaps, precisely against Sin, that the glory of God’s Love may be made apparent to those who have forgotten it) then works are imminently necessary, for they are the job we have been given.
People keep throwing around God’s Glory, and somehow seem to be able to detach that Glory from God’s love.
But God’s Love, Holiness, and Glory are all part and parcel of each other, and any attempt to separate them is to do damage to the character and nature of God.
To say that a world which suffers and in which the majority die without knowledge of healing glorifies God is an unloving statement, and outside of the character of the Jesus that we know, who actively ministered to the worst of sinners, and openly condemned the most correct of religious individuals.
However, since I’m not reformed (though I did graduate from a Reformed school) there may be no point in continuing this argument here.
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Phil R,
I re-read arprichett’s comment about the “people with the loudest mouths” He doesn’t seem to be talking to anyone here.
I’ve found that his description of the YEC to be very accurate. If they truly knew how science works, they wouldn’t be so confident.
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arprichett
“…usually purported by the people with the loudest mouths…”
Can we keep the discussion on a higher plane, please? Name-calling is not defending your position. It should not appear on this blog.
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IMHO, FollowerofHim has nailed it when it comes to YEC and its relationship to science. Excellent posts.
I would only add that the “Origins” debate has also become politicized and that the main reason we are fighting about it today is because it has become culture war material for both sides to fight about. I’m for anyone who is willing to step back from the culture war debates and have a serious discussion about the actual content. But that is rare.
BTW, my primary objections to YEC grow out of 30+ years of studying the Bible, not science. I would recommend that folks take a look at John Walton’s new book, The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate, as well as his commentary on Genesis (IVP Application Series), for a much more thoughtful and careful interpretation of Genesis than any YEC material out there.
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YEC is a popular view because it’s usually purported by the people with the loudest mouths and a slick way of getting you to think there’s a great science conspiracy out to get you. Combine that with rabid atheism (a la Richard Dawkins) and you’ve got a recipe for some serious science hatred.
The more I read the Genesis account, the less I am prone to think that YEC fits with it. Maybe it could, but it’s not an indestructible iron box either.
I’m a fan of both Piper and Wright, but I lean more toward Piper. Wright has been a wonderful defender of the resurrection, but I’m not convinced of some of the aspects of the New Perspective on Paul (especially in the realm of the Exile). I think their debate is an important one to follow, and I’m interested to see where it goes.
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Great post. I too am horrified by what passes as scholarship and thinking in Christian circles today. To belief that the word is 6,000 years old on Biblical grounds is both unscientific and, frankly, pour exigesis.
I am all for a literal belief in the Bible and for treating scripture as infallible…but please, only insofar as it was intended to be. The creation story is to me the most profound and thologically important literature ever written. But taking it to mean what is was not intending to say is creating an unnecessary barrier to people accepting the really important message of the Bible.
You don’t have to toss our science to believe in Christ. Its a shame we have forced people to think they must pick sides.
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I might add that the confusion between the apologetic ends of CS and the open-ended search for scientific truth has parallels in the confusion that exists between scientific findings per se and the public policy based on those findings. This is true of several of the topics mentioned above, such as global warming.
The only saving grace in that particular debate is that there appears to be a shared assumption that if climate change is indeed man-made, then we do have to do something about it. Based on what I’ve read in her “The Great Transformation”, I’m sure that Ms. Armstrong could comment at length on our reaching such a cultural plateau.
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More and more I take the line:
“Creation Science is not a science: it is an apologetic discipline which seeks to bolster a certain Christian worldview using scientific insights concering origins.”
This takes a bit of the air out of the balloon, I think. The very point of explicit CS is to bring one around to Christ, presumably, or to some sort of generic theism, at the very least.
Using scientific arguments is not the same thing as doing science.
There are no open questions in CS. This disqualifies CS, not only as a science, but even as an area of active inquiry. (Falsifiability is thus beside the point.) What DON’T CS advocates know that they’re feverishly trying to figure out? Nothing, of course: CS is an apologetic venture. This is not a shameful thing — it simply clarifies the status of CS.
Even with CS as an apologetic enterprise, however, we are still at the same point which concerns Karen Armstrong’s in the linked article: belief THAT vs. belief as practice.
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Andrew,
Thanks for the clarification. For what it’s worth, I largely agree with you.
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Kenny,
I guess I shouldn’t make generalizations about evangelicals based on the emailings I receive, many of which represent the far right wing of the evangelical bird. But anyway, let me flesh out my thoughts on the list of topics above.
Climate change. My understanding for the resistance of evangelicals to this issue is that it detracts attention from the abortion and gay issues. Perhaps it’s true that it’s more of a conservative-liberal debate, but I know a lot more conservative evangelicals than liberal evangelicals.
Genetic components for homosexuality. I agree that this one’s still up in the air. But what I find concerning is an unyielding belief that homosexuality is the result of lifestyle choices and a disavowal of the influence of factors such as genetics
Stem cell research. Perhaps it’s not skepticism, but I sense a resistance to stem cell research and the funding therefor. Oddly though, I sense very little resistance from evangelicals when it comes to IVF.
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Oops. “opposed”
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Andrew,
Please don’t further the misconception that most evangelicals are apposed to stem cell research. While most would oppose embryonic stem cell research, many are in favor of adult stem cell research.
Phil R
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Andrew,
It’s been my experience that the climate change debate has been mostly a conservative/liberal debate. I know a hard core atheist Libertarian who is a skeptic of man-made climate change.
I think I’d be a bit of a skeptic of a purely genetic component for homosexuality no matter my religious faith. There are identical twins who have two different sexual preferences. Obviously there is more to it than simply genetics. However, I have no religious reason to deny it’s genetic basis either.
Stem cell research is an ethical issue. Is there a skepticism involved?
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Evangelical skepticism towards scientific findings extends beyond evolution. Some other areas of conflict are:
Climate change
Genetic components of homosexuality
Stem cell research
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Phil R: excellent post; rather than pretend we have no bias, I recommend knowing what they are and working within them. The idea that , of course, the macro-evolutionary stance is the only ‘true science’ possible in this discussion is the heigth of arrogance, matched only by the absurd claim that the ONLY christian position is the YEC position. Talk about border patrol.
An aside: I greatly appreciate hearing a variety of views on this topic here at I-MONK, and this reminds me that many JESUS lovers have different understandings on it, and probably always will.
Reminder to self: major in the majors, and this ain’t one of ’em.
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Phil R,
That’s a good point and one that I wish both sides would humbly admit.
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Kevin;
Of course scientists want to produce experimental data that matches their theories; at the same time every theory is only ever one experiment away from being disproved. If it’s not, then it’s of no scientific value.
I’d be very interested in hearing you expand on your last paragraph – in what ways are creation and evolution falsifiable theories? What experiment or observation would disprove each theory?
I may well be an idealist by expecting scientists to be followers of Popper, but I think it’s a very honest position to hold. Indeed, I think it would help very much in this debate if both sides could say ‘this is the hypothesis we propose, and the following observation would disprove our position’. It would be an interesting excercise to postulate what those observations might be for both sides.
If the participants in the debate cannot do this then we’re back to my original point, that the debate is not about observation but about appeals to authority.
I’ll freely admit to being an admirer of Popper, and while the origins debate frustrates me in its popular forms I’m very interested in figuring out an epistemology that can embrace both empiricism and revelation.
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Chaplain Mike
You speak as if evolutionary scientists do not have a “determined conclusion set in stone.” Listen to the current doucumentaries and read the evolutionary articles. They begin with evolutionary thought as the basis for their argument. This is not their conclusion, it is their presuposition.
So to say that one side of an argument begins with a bias and the other looks with a clear and impartial view is rather unsophisticated. There is no unbiased view. Scientists (and might I say theologians) must know thier own prejudices.
This is why one scientist may observe raw data and see the unguided force of evolution while some other scientist will see only the hand of the Creator.
Is it possible to do away with this myth that it is possible to be an unbiased observer? Both sides of the argument have a dog in the fight, as it were.
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Ray A, and others,
Wright is not American; He is an English Anglican, now bishop of Durham but for many years an academic. He prefers Calvin’s views on some things over Luther’s, and if backed into a corner he would call himself Reformed, but his writings aren’t at bottom a defense of an particular “view” of the NT, much less a Roman Catholic view. They are his own view, taking all those others into account; he acknowledges his debts where due, but his views are developed primarily from being steeped in the texts themselves. (This is what we admire about the Reformers, that they went “back to the bible…) Wright actually does distinguish law and gospel, and he is not beholden to pre- or post-Reformation scholastic views. On one level, the differences between him and Piper don’t matter, sure. On another level though -and this goes to why they have such devoted followings- it’s a question of what Paul means when he writes certain things. And differences in hermeneutics -perception of meaning- are at the bottom of many divisions among Christians.
Disclaimer: I’m one of Wright’s devotees. I’ve been reading his work for eight years, and I think he’s brilliant, possibly the greatest living theologian. He gave me a Jesus I can truly worship and made me indescribably glad to be a Christian. His influence is huge in my journey. I know there are people who can say all of that about Piper as well. Like Irenicum, I don’t think their views on can ultimately be reconciled (not least because of the differences in their views of the church). Part of the problem, because of our situatedness in history, is that we like what can be systematized, and Paul’s writings seem to lend themselves to that, so we tend to use Jesus to explain Paul. But actually, everything in scripture needs to be read and interpreted through God’s acts in history in/through Jesus; I came to that conclusion long before I ever knew of Wright. This is what Wright contends as well, and he is the only theologian I have ever encountered who has been able to show me that there are no “contradictions” between Jesus and Paul. Wright doesn’t have to “fudge” anything.
Now, I have no problem whatsoever with people who don’t agree with him. (I disagree with him on a few things, different points than those with which most Protestants who disagree with him disagree.) What bothers me is that they don’t seem to understand what Wright is saying about what Paul means, because they are unable to temporarily lay aside certain definitions of certain words/phrases. It’s all about the vocabulary.
Whoever wants to truly understand Wright needs to read his larger works on Christian Origins: “The New Testament & the People of God”, “Jesus & the Victory of God” and “The Resurrection of the Son of God”. (A couple thousand pages for your summer reading pleasure…) The next book in the series, on Paul, is going to be out next year, so the arguments are not going to die down soon.
(It may indeed be dangerous to read Wright. If anyone alive is responsible for me becoming Orthodox, it’s him… I know of several people who have become Orthodox because of Wright’s work – one while a student at Reformed in Florida. The only acquaintance Wright has with Patristics is from his seminary studies years ago- he’s not setting out “an Orthodox view”. But precisely because he knows the New Testament and Judaism backwards and forwards, he has come to the same conclusions as the great thinkers of the early church about many important theological issues. There is room for him in English Anglicanism, he is committed to the unity of the church, and he is a very loyal person, so I wouldn’t be surprised if he remained Anglican to the end.)
Dana
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Trevor,
I don’t want to run down a rabbit trail here, but most philosophers of science would disagree with you regarding falsifiability. It simply does not describe how scientists work. Scientists do not spend their time trying to prove that their hypotheses are wrong, they try to prove that they are correct. Science does involve observation, measurement, and experimentation as you state, but it is often done in a positive sense–trying to prove that an idea is true–rather in the negative sense as implied by those who push falsifiability.
The Wikipedia article on Karl Popper has a fairly good discussion of the criticisms of Popper’s philosophy of science.
I guess this does apply to the whole creation/evolution discussion, as both sides often accuse the other side of presenting a non-falsifiable theory. Both sides are wrong on this.
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The Armstrong article places much in perspective for me, especially about praxis over belief. We all know people who “believe all the right things,” but show little or none of the spirit of Jesus in their lives. It also illustrates what you say in your following post about learning from those with whom you may disagree.
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Obed said:
As a brand new student of biblical Greek (it’s my first semester), I find myself curious as to Armstrong’s translation of logos as “science†or “reason.â€
I don’t have it in front of me, but the NIV Study Bible I have mentions this translation and even says that John may have been playing with that idea a bit in his Gospel.
Apparently the Greeks had an idea about Reason being some kind of universal almost divine thing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logos
“The Stoic philosophers identified the term with the divine animating principle pervading the universe.”
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quote: “Wright’s contention is that Piper and other reformed voices tend to displace justification outside of its place in the Biblical story and make it virtually the entire story. I’d say that not only do they do that, but they are quite ready to label you as a dangerous heretic if you have any argument with that conclusion.”
While my theology is Lutheran, for pastoral reasons I’ve currently at a Reformed Baptist SBC church where the pastor and leaders are big admirers of men such as Piper. I’ve also read quite a bit of Reformed theology. I just finished Calvin’s “Institutes of Christian Religion.” So I’m not Reformed, but I am familiar with the Reformed and their theology.
The above statement doesn’t strike me as correct. Perhaps Reformed critiques of Wright seem to make justification the entire biblical story in their criticism of his work. Nonetheless, on the whole the big emphasis of Reformed theology is not justification. Rather, it is God’s sovereignty and glory. The Reformed get the gospel right. However, sometimes the doctrine of justification seems to be a sub-set of God’s sovereignty or his glory.
Here are two brief examples of this:
A recent excerpt from an article on Calvin from the “Desiring God” website:
http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/Biographies/1471_The_Divine_Majesty_of_the_Word/
“When Calvin did eventually get to the issue of justification in his response to Sadolet, he said, “You . . . touch upon justification by faith, the first and keenest subject of controversy between us. . . . Wherever the knowledge of it is taken away, the glory of Christ is extinguished” (see note 8). So here again you can see what is fundamental. Justification by faith is crucial. But there is a deeper root reason why it is crucial. The glory of Christ is at stake. Wherever the knowledge of justification is taken away, the glory of Christ is extinguished. This is always the root issue for Calvin. What truth and what behavior will “illustrate the glory of God”?
The opening lines of “The Westminister Catechism”
Q. 1. What is the chief end of man?
A. Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.
Contrast this to “The Smalclad Articles” or Luther’s “Small Catechism” where justification by grace alone through faith in Christ alone is called the chief and most important article of the Christian faith, without which the church will fall and you will see the difference. Again, it may seem that the Reform make justification to be the end all be in within the context of their criticism of N.T. Wright. Overall, however, I don’t see how justification can be said to be the main focus of Reformed theology.
rr
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Kevin, falsifiability is critical to the enterprise we call ‘science’. Theories are never proven, but may be disproven by experimentation. More than a century after the publication of ‘The Logic of Scientific Discovery’, I remain convinced that no one has proposed a more cohesive framework for scientific methodology than Sir Karl.
Falsifiability is fundamental to what it means to be scientific. If a theory is contradicted by experimental data, it is false. If it cannot be tested experimentally, it may well be true, but it’s not science.
Furthermore, we need to remember that science can only concern itself with matters that are quantifiable as well as empirical. It’s not enough to say ‘my experiment fits your theory’, but we have to be able to say ‘my experimental data conforms with your theoretical predictions with an error margin of 0.25%’
A prime example of this is Quantum electrodynamics, where theory and experiment have the same results to within a few parts in a billion.
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Oh I forgot to add…
And my pastor agreed with me.
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Having not grown up in the church, I had no particular reason to believe the Earth was young. I had no reason to doubt it’s age when I learned about it in science class. I really had no faith reason to doubt evolution either (though I never have and still don’t buy into Darwinian evolution — though it has nothing to do with Genesis 1).
So I came to Christ with less baggage in that regard. I think, living in California means I run into far less YEC than maybe some of you do. I do have YEC Christian friends/family, though none of them are fanatical about it (eg, they don’t care what I believe).
My wife and I just went back to our old church (long story) 2 weeks ago. Our current church is part of the Evangelical Covenant and they have no doctrine on creation. In fact, I had coffee with my pastor (when I told him I wanted to come back) and talked to him briefly about the whole evolution/creation/YE/OE debate and how I think being dogmatic about it is a poor witness and in fact, could be damaging — because we may leave people with the impression that they either have to accept a YE or deny evolution in order to be a Christian — as if their choice was atheistic old earth evolution or faithful Christianity and a literal interpretation of Genesis 1.
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I should have added a bit to my final sentence:
On this basis, YEC fails to be good science because it fails to be successful in explaining how the universe, the Earth, and life got to be the way they are.
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Headless Unicorn:
I’m not a fan of YEC, but I disagree with Stephen J Gould’s reason for rejecting it. Most philosophers of science these days reject Popper’s idea that falsifiability is the key part of science. In reality, very few scientists work to show that their own work is false; they are more interested in showing that their own work is successful. On this basis, YEC fails to be good science because it fails to be successful.
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I just add a brief point to what has been said. I suspect (and I don’t know of any surveys to prove it)but that vast majority of the 80%+ youth that leave the church do so, not because they have been “hood winked” by the evolutionists . . . but finding out one day that they have been lied to by good Christian people . . . about a lot of things.
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HUG is totally on target imo.
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Steve S…there is no “evidence†for YEC because YEC by definition is not science. Anything that starts with a determined conclusion already set in stone (pardon the pun) is not a legitimate scientific enterprise. — Chaplain Mike
As Stephen J Gould put it, “Creation Science is not science because its theories are not falsifiable.” According to Gould, a true scientific theory will always have the possibility of being proved false.
If there is no possibility of proving it false (“And then a Miracle happened… And then a Miracle happened… And then a Miracle happened…”) it’s not science, it’s The Party Line where Reality must bow before Ideology and Goodthinkers Doubleplusbellyfeel INGSOC.
As long as the YEC movement continues to consistently present bad arguments in defense of the truthfulness of Scriptures, and as long as there are alternative interpretations from within the theologically conservative community, I will continue to reject young-Earth creationism. It is bad apologetics and should not be used in our churches and schools. — Kevin N
Even when YEC becomes (has become, actually) THE Litmus Test of whether You’re Really Really Really a Real True Christian?
And BE-LEEEVING in YEC (instead of Christ) becomes the entire Gospel?
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Steve S said “The author of this article does not understand radio isotope dating methods and the TREMENDOUS assumptions built into a handful of dating methods by evolutionists. It is the same for astronomy.”
Maybe I didn’t read the Karen Armstrong article closely enough, but I don’t think she said anything about radiometric dating or the age of the universe.
I just finished Thousands… Not Billions which reports the latest YEC thinking on radiometric dating, and found it to have significant problems. The chapter on fission-track dating, which I used in graduate school, had errors that indicated the author had only a superficial knowledge of the method, along with some circular reasoning. Thankfully, the more sophisticated YECs have jettisoned some of their older ideas on the topic. However, they have introduced new ideas that are just as problematic.
If you want an analysis of the “tremendous” assumptions that go into radiometric dating from a conservative Christian perspective, I would recommend The Bible, Rocks, and Time by Young and Stearley.
As long as the YEC movement continues to consistently present bad arguments in defense of the truthfulness of Scriptures, and as long as there are alternative interpretations from within the theologically conservative community, I will continue to reject young-Earth creationism. It is bad apologetics and should not be used in our churches and schools.
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You know a different Christ than I do. Where did you meet this one, Berkley or Brown? — JMulkey
Neither. Born-Again Bible-Believing Christian Fellowship (TM) after Born-Again Bible-Believing Christian Fellowship (TM), with Scripture (TM) by Hal Lindsay, Jack Chick, et al, until I finally swam the Tiber to escape.
In short, religion hasn’t always carried around the obligation to “prove†God and his ways. — IMonk
This obsession for PROOF(TM)! is what fuels all those expeditions for Noah’s Ark and all those End Time Prophecy charts cross-referencing current events. Lotsa Christians want Absolute Proof (TM) that they can rub in everybody else’s face — “SEE? I’M RIGHT! YOU’RE WRONG! SEE? SEE? SEE?” And finding Noah’s Ark with its freeze-dried dinosaur poo and/or getting Raptured right on schedule while everybody else is Left Behind WOULD be that Absolute PROOF. “I’M RIGHT! YOU’RE WRONG! HAW! HAW! HAW!”
Which is why God don’t play that game.
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If you all think today’s scientific community is sound and rational, look no further than the climate change debate.
I think all scientific theories from YEC to spontaneous evolution and all iterations in between have holes you can drive trucks through. It’s sad that the scientific community has taken on a “religious” tone over the past couple decades, resulting in any opposition to be painted as “irrational” Debate is stifled in the scientific community, and thereby moves to other channels.
I don’t think that belief in any theory should affect your faith, either positively or negatively.
I’m as much offended by somebody saying my faith depends on my belief in Creationism, as I am by somebody that says I do not have a serious understanding of science if I don’t believe in evolution. Both statements are ludicrous.
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Christ as nothing more than a Party Line of YEC Uber Alles, Pin-the-Tail-on-The-Antichrist, and piously denouncing everything in-between.
You know a different Christ than I do. Where did you meet this one, Berkley or Brown?
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Thanks so much for pointing to this fine article. We desperately need to recover the word pistis. She is exactly write that “believe” was the right translation 400 years ago. But now the meaning of the word has changed and we have yet to change our translations. Jesus was not calling for intellectual certainty; he was calling for faithful followers.
I am convinced that unless we do serious work explaining ourselves, when we tell people to “believe” they will have no idea what the Bible means by that phrase.
Thanks for your blog, it wakes up my mind every morning.
To Gammel: Can you tell me the citation for that great quote from E. J. Bicknell.
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Once again, our head elder (pastor’s right hand man) made the statement . . . after I said that I did not agree with Ham’s young earth view . . . that “you cannot know Christ and believe in an old earth.†— JMJ
This is called “Ees Party Line, Comrades.”
Christ as nothing more than a Party Line of YEC Uber Alles, Pin-the-Tail-on-The-Antichrist, and piously denouncing everything in-between. Somebody explain to me how THAT ever spread across the early Roman Empire?
This is one of those issues that is tied to the 85% of kids leaving the church and the church stands scratching its head and pouring on more guilt manipulation, trying to force them to stay. — JMJ
Remember the Soviet Union and its clones? Whenever they had a problem with their “kids leaving the church”, the solution was always the same: Increase Political Consciousness Re-Education.
Long ago, I used to joke that the only difference between some Christians and the Communists was they quoted different Party Lines. Looks like the joke was on me.
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Steve S…there is no “evidence” for YEC because YEC by definition is not science. Anything that starts with a determined conclusion already set in stone (pardon the pun) is not a legitimate scientific enterprise. You are following an entirely different method than the scientific method. YEC is only concerned with proving what they think the Bible already says by trying to find “evidence.” That’s why no actual scientists will listen to you.
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This morning at church, a little child sang “Jesus loves me….cause the Bible tells me so.†I wondered if that same child, wanting to be a doctor or an astronomer someday, will find out that they need to add verses like “The earth is 10,000 years old….†and “All scientists are lying….â€
Actually, it’s “The earth is 6013 years old…”
Suggest that dinosaurs might not have been on the ark and watch what happens.
Same thing as when I switched from a Mac to Windows PC: Red face, bulging eyes, cords bulging in neck, and scream of “DIE, HERETIC!!!!!!!”
While I’m sure Armstrong can be faulted in some of her intellectual history, I have to agree that evangelicals are increasingly a group determined to set faith over against science…
As Mohammed abu-Hamid al-Ghazali did to Islam some 800 years ago. (And look where it got them…)
…and to find a way to put the word “Christian†in front of everything so that it’s OK for us to handle it.
“It’s gotta be Christian — look how shoddy it is!”
— SF litfandom proverb around the Eighties
I understand that Christians are called to spread the good news of Christ as savior, and I understand that words are needed to do that. But I sometimes feel that in current Christian circles, it is so much more about proving the unprovable, rather than living lives of bold faith. — Sarah O
It’s all a big game of one-upmanship. “I’M RIGHT! YOU’RE WRONG! HAVE FUN IN HELL! HAW! HAW! HAW!”
So often, it seems to me that many of the people of zealous faith that I encounter (faith in a Christian God, faith in a Muslim God, faith in the impossibility of God’ existence) seem to feel some perverse need to argue me into their corner. — Sarah O
Again, “I’M RIGHT! YOU’RE WRONG! HAW! HAW! HAW!”
I always wonder if there is some underlying insecurity there- do people of faith need things to be watertight, need to see their beliefs reflected back at them in the faces of others? If so, how strong of a belief is that? — Sarah O
One so weak it requires constant support and pumping up, can only tolerate utter agreement and praise, and cannot exist with anything outside of its own utter certainty. Anything.
After 9/11, I read an analysis that suggested that 9/11 was not so much a terrorist attack as an Act of Faith, a desperation move to PROVE Al’lah was there and would fulfill His promises to His Faithful: “See, Al’lah? How Faithful we are? Enough so You will intervene and give Islam victory!”
And where is the room for wonder, for mystery, for what is more than human? — Sarah O
They have all been burned for Heresy.
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I feel it’s important to understand that the debate is fundamentally not about the age of the earth but about epistemology – how we acquire knowledge about the world around us. If the discussion boils down to ‘my high school teacher says this’ or ‘my pastor says that’, then there is actually an agreement on epistemology; knowledge is that which is imparted to us by those in positions of authority; the debate then becomes WHO we should listen too.
However, whenever I see the debate being carried out in these terms I feel that both the church and the scientific establishment has failed in their duties. As a scientist, church leader, and occasional educator it is not my job to persuade people to regurgitate the right soundbites on demand, but to give them a framework for learning.
On the fairly infrequent occasions that I’m asked about this topic, I don’t say that I’m an ‘evolutionist’, as though a particular scientific model was a dogma that I follow religiously. Rather I describe myself as an empiricist; and explain what that means. Namely, like all scientists since the Enlightenment, I believe that physical truth is observable, quantifiable, and testable. Like Popper I believe that knowledeg about our physical world is gained by proposing hypotheses and mechanisms for testing them; and rejecting or refining them based on the outcome of these repeatable tests. Also like Popper I believe that the strength of a scientific theory lies in its ability to be tested.
Living in Canada this debate has never for me taken on the contentious nature that some have described here, for which I’m truly thankful, but I believe that the debate could be far more productive if it were centered around questions of epistemology. For example ‘How can we learn about the world around us?’, ‘Is truth concrete and knowable?’, and one that’s interesting me particularly right now: ‘are there things that are true but not quantifiable?’
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If I lose my job at some point, this Hamm strategy will likely be the reason. Our current head administrators have been great on this issue, but successors likely won’t.
Another reason to buy my book when it appears 🙂
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Interesting this subject (science and faith)is on your site right now. A very good friend of mine and fellow church member is the science teacher at the largest christian school in the area. He and I have been discussing science and faith issues for a while and I persuaded him to watch the Gordon Glover series on Science and Christian Education http://www.blog.beyondthefirmament.com/video-presentations/science-and-christian-education/science-and-christian-education-page-1/ Last week he was given an article by the principal from Ken Ham that had to do with a survey about young people leaving the faith and Ham’s proposed solution which was to brow-beat them early and often with YEC. He wrote her back suggesting this might not in the best interest of the kids education and requested a meeting to discuss. He and his school are literally at the cross-road in deciding how science is to be taught. And since this is the largest christian school in the area, their decision will have ramifications for christian education in the whole area.
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As a brand new student of biblical Greek (it’s my first semester), I find myself curious as to Armstrong’s translation of logos as “science” or “reason.” Of course, Day One of biblical Greek teaches logos to mean “word” or “speech.” Add into that a class I took a few semesters ago on historical theology that discussed the philosophical concept of the Logos in 1st Century Helenistic culture (esp. in Platonic Realism and proto-gnosticism), and her translation seems a little wierd to me. Is this an issue of Classical Greek being different than Koine Greek? Or is this one of those areas where “Armstrong can be faulted in some of her intellectual history”?
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The author of this article does not understand radio isotope dating methods and the TREMENDOUS assumptions built into a handful of dating methods by evolutionists. It is the same for astronomy.
Why don’t people in the media urge debate between specialists on both sides? It’s hidden fear they cover with sarcastic (and worse) comments about us YECs.
There is more evidence for YEC surfacing quite regularly as science (as in true knowledge) progresses. These misled “scientists” of today and the past have been deluded and delude the masses. No? Debate publicly then, with the best chosen by each side; NOT the evolutionists choosing the creation scientist THEY want.
Just as important as whether the chicken or the egg came first, is who is the chicken here?
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While I’m all for the “hey can’t science and religion just get along” argument, I can’t say that currently they aren’t mortal enemies, but not for the reasons assumed. science isn’t God’s enemy, merely His means here in the physical. I have noticed that the average Christian is not intellectually equipped to deal with such issues. While science, in its pure sense is not at odds with Christianity, the modern perception of science and scientist as infallible truth and unbiased spectators. The truth is that many notable modern scientist see science as able to answer any and all questions concerning existence, including God and faith issues, mostly towards the atheistic approach. If you’ll look at history and how science tried to cram their own personal agendas into their “science” it becomes apparent, just look at Eugenics, embryonic issues, primordial soup theory and its many preposterous(and failed) experiments and suppositions. Newton said it best, “I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.”
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ChristSpeak:
“Of course, if evolution / old earth is incompatible with Scripture, than we must reject it.”
Why not reject scripture instead?
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What bothers me about the whole Piper v. Wright debate is that it seems like these two men (or at least their followers) act like their difference of opinion on this is a really big deal. Here’s what I know, not having particularly studied up on them:
a) Wright is a theologian, or something.
b) Piper pastors a congregation in Minnesota.
c) both are in the Reformed wing of American Protestantism.
d) both seem to have fairly devoted followings.
And I’m not 100% sure about all of those. Now that’s the impact these two men (both undoubtedly great men of the faith) have had on someone who’s been a Christian for coming up on 22 years, all of them living in the U.S., and has read fairly widely. So I can’t help but think that maybe a debate on a secondary point of theology between two guys whom possibly 99% of the church has never heard of is just not that important in the grand scheme of things.
Just maybe. I’m open to other viewpoints.
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Savannah, I have got to get me one of those bumper stickers!
Sarah O, I love what you have to say! Couldn’t agree more. Sadly, your words about arguing someone into a corner hit too close to home for me. I’ve been guilty of that too many times to count. And yes, it was borne out of insecurity on my part. It’s a painful reminder, but nonetheless needful, and for that I thank you.
There seems to be a deep seated fear among many if not most evangelicals to science in general and evolutionary science in particular. I attend and am a member of an OPC church, which is about as theologically conservative as you can get. I suspect most of the members are YEC (Young Earth Creationist) in their views. I’ve been pretty open about my scientific convictions as a Christian evolutionist. A large part of the antipathy towards evolutionary science comes from the accident of timing in which evolutionary theory emerged. The mid 1800’s was an era of theological tumult to say the least. Theological liberalism was spreading like wildfire through all of the mainline churches. The reaction to this movement, fundamentalism, decided that anything modern was therefore an enemy to true faith, including science. Were there evolutionists who were enemies of Christian faith? Absolutely. Did theological liberalism embrace evolution unquestioningly? Pretty much so. And they did so because they didn’t regard the authority of scripture seriously. That obviously complicated the issue tremendously. However, as others have already mentioned, there have been and continue to be Christians who are theologically orthodox who nonetheless accept the scientific validity of evolutionary biology (not to mention evolutionary cosmology). Just in the last few years there has been an explosion of new materials available for Christians from Christians regarding the integration of faith and science.
Biologos from Francis Collins is a great start.
The Faraday Institute, which Denis Alexander is associated with, I very highly recommend.
And speaking of Denis Alexander, he wrote I believe, the seminal work on the subject, “Creation or Evolution: Do We Have To Choose?”. It’s scientifically sound, but he also digs deep into the most thorny theological issues.
I would also recommend “Coming To Peace With Science” by Darrell Falk. There are numerous other resources out there now, unlike years past, and so it’s getting better.
I recommend two websites: http://scienceandcreation.blogspot.com/ and http://evanevodialogue.blogspot.com/
They each have helped me tremendously.
Will we get an exhaustive answer to all of our questions concerning the interaction between science and faith? Not on this side of eternity. But that’s OK with me.
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I’ve been reading some E. J. Bicknell recently and I recognize in his work much of the tradition that N. T. Wright has inherited. (The Anglican heritage of only using two initials has apparently been going strong for a while.) It’s been interesting reading. Related to this discussion, one of my favourite passages from Bicknell is concerning the purpose of revelation:
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I’m one of those people who love both Piper and Wright, but I agree that ultimately their views regarding justification can’t be reconciled. I lean towards Piper on this one, simply because I think Wright gets his assessment of Second Temple Judaism wrong, and therefore his interpretation of Paul is fundamentally impacted. Quite often, it’s presented as an either/or regarding “being made right with God through Christ’s imputed righteousness” versus “who belongs in the covenant community”. Paul obviously addresses both the soteriological issue and the racism/ecclesiological issue. We need to see and understand both. Has traditional Reformed/Lutheran theology emphasized the first to the exclusion of the second? Too much so, I agree. But the answer isn’t to do the opposite and ignore the first in order to emphasize the second. Can people land on both sides of this issue and still be Christian/ Absolutely. Does that mean it’s not an important issue that needs to be hammered out more? Not at all. This is a fundamentally important doctrine and must be seen that way. But equally sincere Christians have reached conclusions that are not reconcilable and we need to keep listening and arguing and respecting. I will continue to read Piper and Wright and be blessed by both.
Now on to science…(tune in next post)
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Wright’s book on Justification is much more conciliatory than things I had read by him previously. He seemed much more accepting of Reformation theology, only concerned, in my view rightly, with placing it securely in the context of the Biblical story and Jewish setting.
Did I read that wrong?
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Personally, the whole age-of-the-earth debate seems to revolve around one question: can an earth that old be conformed to the scriptural account? If it can, than the theologian’s concern on the whole matter should drop. Though it could theoretically affect some issues (did animals die before the fall?), I can’t think of anything of actual substance that it would affect, at least assuming a literal, historical Adam and Eve.
I tend to reject evolution on scientific grounds more than theological (I’ve heard some very convincing arguments), but if it turns out to be true, it changes very little about anything else. Thus I tend to not get into many debates over it.
Of course, if evolution / old earth is incompatible with Scripture, than we must reject it. I’ll leave that up to more advanced scholars than I though 🙂
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Thanks for the “your boy” line. I probably don’t understand him enough to be worthy.
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I live a heck of a long ways from the creation museum (on an island in Puget Sound) however Ken Ham’s video series was a topic of Sunday school at my church a few years ago. Once again, our head elder (pastor’s right hand man) made the statement . . . after I said that I did not agree with Ham’s young earth view . . . that “you cannot know Christ and believe in an old earth.†Ouch! I am considered a flake in my church for this and other reasons.
My wife doesn’t know why the age of the earth is such an issue with me. I honestly couldn’t care less about what others believe. I totally respect them. However,it becomes personal when; a.) I am told that I don’t know Christ and b.) my kids are taught that young earth is a Biblical truth on the same level as Jesus is God’s son. Once a kid learns that the first “truth†is not true . . . what is stopping them from doubting the second truth?
This last issue is why I gave my son, when he was in high school (and is now working on his PhD), a pass from church to go out and sit in the car and read Hugh Ross (and we discussed it over lunch) rather than sit in church and hear that the young earth was the only “Biblical” view.
This is one of those issues that is tied to the 85% of kids leaving the church and the church stands scratching its head and pouring on more guilt manipulation, trying to force them stay.
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Wright’s view of justification veers toward the Roman Catholic view. I think he runs into the danger of blending together law and gospel, which ought always to be distinguished (your boy Luther once said that anyone who can distinguish law and gospel is a true theologian).
I like the fact that Wright attempts to put the whole Bible together, but on some significant points I don’t think he gets it quite right. It is important to locate justification within the whole sweep of redemptive history, but it must be kept in mind that Wright is not the first person to attempt to do this. It was specifically the post-Reformation scholastics who began to trace the Bible’s storyline around the theme of covenant and develop a covenantal doctrine of justification. In their wake Reformed theologians like Bavinck, Vos, and more recently Gaffin, Horton, and Fesko have done an excellent job of putting these things in a whole-Bible context.
I have read some of Wright’s recent comments about his debate with Piper (and just snippets of the most recent book), and I am convinced that Wright does not have a competent understanding of historical theology. He knows the New Testament and early Judaism backwards and forwards. But until he learns to be more conversant with what Piper is actually saying, he will remain confused on the issue of justification.
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I recently moved to the Kansas City area and we’ve visted a lot of churches here. In talking with pastors, I’ve always asked about how I would be received as someone who doesn’t believe in a old earth. I’ve been pleasantly surprised – at most chuches I’ve heard “no big deal, we’ve got people here in both camps,” at a few I was told “our official position here is young-earth, but we recognize that other opinions exist and give a nod to them in our teaching. You are welcome here despite our differences.” Only one church that I visited gave me the message that I was “capitulating” in my views. These were mostly SBC, PCA, and independent churches.
An even more pleasant surprise came last night when I engaged a young-earth, home-schooling friend of mine in a conversation about the age of the earth. She was very open to hearing my opinions (despite having watched a Ken Hamm video the week before), admitted she had no extensive scientific training and wanted to learn as much as she could to give the best possible education to her children. I do have a scientific background so she was willing to listen to my ideas and borrowed my copy of “The Creator and the Cosmos” to read. Same thing happened when I brought up my views in a small group I attended – most of them had simply never heard a good presentation of the old-earth view from a theologically conservative Christian before and were very interested.
All this to say – there is hope!
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Sadly, I find the issue of justification to be a critical area where N.T. Wright dances very beautifully into heterodoxy.
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No offense taken, I knew you weren’t trying to insult me. I was being honest, not sarcastic for a change.:)
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Monk,
That link was great.
AFter reading it,Wrights ideas make perfect sense.
What does that say about me?
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Sigh
I’m not trying to insult you. I just can’t boil it down. I’m not that kind of thinker. I sent along the CT primer as a help. Sorrry.
ms
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Well,
I don’t want to sound like an idiot, and I don’t take your statement as an insult.
Would it be close to say that Wright sees Justificatin as something involving me and my place in a larger picture of redemptive history, while Piper’s view is more just about Me and God?
Thanks for the link.
Austin
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Austin,
I’m not going to get it any simpler than Trevin. If that doesn’t work for you, I’d say don’t give it any attention. It doesn’t matter.
This might help http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2009/june/29.34.html
ms
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Imonk,
I’m not being intellecutally lazy, I’ve read the interview and I’ve tried to do a little reading on Wright.
Could you please try to put in laymen terms what the disagreement with Wright is and why Piper would object?
Just from reading the interview I find nothing objectionable.
Is there some undercurrent having to do with salvation or something major I am missing?
Help:)
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I first saw that statue several years ago, and immediately wondered how many people have died in accidents caused by that thing.
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A recent Pew study explored the differences between scientists and the public when it comes to scientific issues. Quoting about two hot button issues for fundamentalists/evangelicals:
“When it comes to contemporary scientific issues, these differences are often even larger. Most notably, 87% of scientists say that humans and other living things have evolved over time and that evolution is the result of natural processes such as natural selection. Just 32% of the public accepts this as true.
“And the near consensus among scientists about global warming is not mirrored in the general public. While 84% of scientists say the earth is getting warmer because of human activity such as burning fossil fuels, just 49% of the public agrees.”
Much more at http://people-press.org/report/528/
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Sorry, the Heywood Banks link doesn’t work. For a laugh about the Cincinnati statue, go to http://www.heywoodbanks.com and click the link on “Big Butter.”
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iMonk, I too live within a short distance from the Creationism Propaganda Center, er…the Creation Museum. Which is also home to the “Big Butter Jesus” statue, made famous by my favorite comedian, Heywood Banks (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gq01UYiMyHg). But I digress…
Probably the best sites for helping believers understand the relationship between science and faith are Francis Collins’ Biologos (www.biologos.org) and accompanying blog, Science and the Sacred (http://blog.beliefnet.com/scienceandthesacred). These are great resources, user-friendly, wonderfully written in concise layman’s language and in a civil and winsome tone.
And iMonk, I feel your pain. My last opportunity at church ministry ended when this issue became a straw that broke the camel’s back.
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“The flintstones was not a documentary” is pretty funny. Kudos to your son, Savannah.
One thing that troubles me about the ascendence of rationalism as a means of verifying or legitimizing faith in Evangelical Christianity is that it seems to remove God from the equation, somehow. The emphasis moves from allowing oneself to become a vessel for an ultimately unknowable God to do His unfathomable will, to a battle of wits between two humans.
I understand that Christians are called to spread the good news of Christ as savior, and I understand that words are needed to do that. But I sometimes feel that in current Christian circles, it is so much more about proving the unprovable, rather than living lives of bold faith.
So often, it seems to me that many of the people of zealous faith that I encounter (faith in a Christian God, faith in a Muslim God, faith in the impossibility of God’ existence) seem to feel some perverse need to argue me into their corner. I always wonder if there is some underlying insecurity there- do people of faith need things to be watertight, need to see their beliefs reflected back at them in the faces of others? If so, how strong of a belief is that? And where is the room for wonder, for mystery, for what is more than human?
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I live within about an 90 minutes from the Creation Museum in Kentucky across the river from Cincinnati. So needless to say, “young-earth creationism” is the going thing here. As a believer of 36 years, I have never been persuaded by the biblical and intellectual contortions necessary to believe in the young earth thing, so I just try not to discuss it with other Christians. The couple of times I have engaged on any level, it isn’t long before my spirituality or even my salvation is questioned. Swell. So I just try to avoid the whole zero-sum game.
As the mother of three teens, one entering college this fall, I have long been disappointed in the religious right’s antipathy toward science and intellectualism in general. We have encouraged our boys to think for themselves, and I understand our eldest has gotten into some interesting and even combative conversations with some young people from a very large, fundamentalist church in our town. I advised him to just stop engaging about the issue, but apparently, he did not think my advice was the way to go. Pretty soon he slapped a sticker on his backpack that said “The Flintstones Was Not A Documentary”, so I’m guessing he is not as uncomfortable with the whole debate as I am. And ultimately, I believe it is good for him to have his ideas challenged, and at the least, it will enable him to hone and sharpen his own arguments.
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It is different within driving distance of the Creation Museum, yes. I could deny the trinity and get less flack.
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At times it seems that the young-Earth creationists have a stranglehold on our churches and the Christian education system, but there are signs of hope. People like Francis Collins (who accepts both an old Earth and evolution) and Hugh Ross (who accepts an old Earth but rejects evolution) have helped the church to see that there is a diversity of viewpoints on origins within evangelicalism.
Many leading apologists and theologians (past and present) accept an old Earth, or at least consider it to be a possibility. These include:
–J.I. Packer
–Francis Shaeffer
–Norman Geisler
–Charles Spurgeon
–C.S. Lewis
–William Lane Craig
–J.P. Moreland
–Gleason Archer
–Walter Kaiser
–Charles Hodge
–B.B. Warfield
–R.A. Torrey
Perhaps it is different in the hills of Kentucky, but I have been able to hold to an old-Earth position within Christian ministry without taking a whole lot of flack. Some strongly disagree with me, but they have at least listened to what I have to say.
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Vedy vedy eentaresting…
Particularly so as a person who once worshipped all things Piper and had slowly and steadily moved farther and farther from that place, almost avoiding Piper and voices like him if and when possible… I am now enjoying NT Wright’s stuff like the good rich food that it is, slowly and thoughtfully working my way through “Surprised by Hope” with a pencil in hand, and a small stack of some of his other books sitting by to be gone through next.
I still don’t exactly have words for WHY or even HOW I went from deeply admiring Piper to finding myself troubled about some of the things he says and teaches… But I’ve never put the two men together until now, reading this post.
Btw, did you see this (re. Piper)? A friend sent it my way, this being the former pastor of a friend of hers who has nothing but good to say about the guy. It was an interesting read:
http://peripateticpastor.blogspot.com/2009/05/young-restless-and-revolting.html
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