Last August, Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry remarked that evolution is a theory with "gaps" in it, immediately generating up millions of Google search results.His perspective is not his alone; polls continue to show that while evangelicals are not entirely closed-off to the idea, evolution is far from being overwhelmingly accepted by them.
When it comes to the creative engagement of science -- whether it is on human origins or climate change -- the evangelical majority cannot shake its reputation that it is courting irrelevance by adopting fringe science and insular thinking.
Can evangelical theology evolve in its relation to scientific inquiry or is it destined for extinction?
In his recent piece here at The Huffington Post, Karl Giberson wonders about the future of evangelicals and science, particularly given what he sees as the evangelical tendency to reject established scientific claims in favor of "fake challengers."
"American evangelicals desperately need credible leaders to wean them off their preference for discredited and indefensible knowledge claims," says Giberson. "At the moment, however, it is hard to imagine where these leaders might come from."
A few voices have challenged the canon of acceptable evangelical vocabulary, whether for good or bad, but the limits of what is tolerable are often reached quickly, and sometimes, painfully. Last month, NPR reported on John Schneider, a former professor of Calvin College who was pressured to resign as a result of his conclusion that there was no historical Adam.
Even though Calvin College accepts the idea of evolution, which logically leads to Schneider's view, the odds that his position will find a jubilant reception among his fellow evangelicals are not all that great.
Recently, a new poll conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute in partnership with Religion News Service shows that on the issue of evolution, "a third (32 percent) of white evangelicals affirm a belief in evolution, compared to two-thirds of white mainline Protestants, six in 10 Catholics and three-quarters of the unaffiliated." The last major poll done by The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life in 2009 showed the majority of evangelicals (55 percent) rejecting evolution in favor of the idea that human beings were created in their present form.
The subject of evangelicals, evolution and Adam was reprised again last week on NPR. Talk of the Nation host, Neal Conan, discussed with Barbara Bradley Hagerty (NPR religion correspondent), Daniel Harlow (religion professor at Calvin College) and Albert Mohler (president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary) on the importance of a historical Adam for Christianity in light of evolution.
There were some explosive moments in those 30 minutes.
For Mohler, to question the original story of Adam is to forfeit the Christian gospel -- a slippery slope to rejecting Christ. For Harlow, science has already provided the soundest evidence for rejecting the Genesis Adam as historical; to dismiss this is to ignore God's revelation through nature. Both claim to be orthodox Christians.
The very existence of this conversation over the historical Adam, however, is evidence that real in-roads are being made by some leaders in the evangelical world. Fewer scholars appear less fearful of considering the implications of science for theology. Christianity Today featured an article on the heated conversation over the historical Adam last summer, and Baker Academic's The Evolution of Adam: What the Bible Does and Doesn't Say about Human Origins by Peter Enns (2012) are some examples.
When it comes to science, however, evangelicals still have a lot of potential theological re-imagining ahead of them.
When I consider the challenges raised by neuroscientists in reference to the nature of the human mind, I see a thousand more difficulties on the horizon. The more tests are done, the more it appears that for the human being, that seat of the mind, or the real you, is to be found in the brain. What does this say about the existence of a soul or spirit -- that immaterial side, which is often understood as eternal, according to evangelicals?
Should evangelicals begin considering Christian materialism as an alternative to the soul? Some have suggested as much, though this position has yet to pick up steam (see, for example, Rethinking Human Nature: A Christian Materialist Alternative to the Soul by Kevin J. Corcoran).
From my place in the mainline, perhaps these questions do not stir the pot as much as they do in the broader evangelical world. It does appear, however, that while the majority voice is very loud, there are some who are asking others to stop long enough to consider the ramifications of new ideas and discoveries rather than just dismissing them through bad science for convenience sake.
There is also the real question of boundaries. When does someone or something stop looking evangelical? Albert Mohler wants to draw his lines thick and clear with little room for deviation. Harlow tends to take the Augustinian approach usually paraphrased as, "all truth is God's truth."
Who gets the final say on whether evangelical theology can evolve?
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There are, however, perfectly viable hypotheses about how cells came into existence. Note, please, that I call them hypotheses. A good scientist doesn't call something a "theory" until the evidence in favor is overwhelming.
The problem is you conceive God as a fallible being, like something FROM another Galaxy instead of a creator of ALL universes.
And-- I believe God is infallible, man as fallible, including their theories and their sciences . God is the creator, yes, of the universe, and since He is a spirit creature, he does not dwell in the universe, but beyond. That does not mean He is from another 'galaxy' (which is a innumerable large grouping of stars) but since He is the Creator of all the galaxies, then his dynamic energy and power is incomprehensible. God describes himself, in scripture, as a Spirit, which means he is invisible and powerful. Not a genie, magical fairy or other childish story.
In short, within the internal logic of your belief system either god is infallible or the bible is authoritative. Logically you cannot have both. If the bible is not authoritative then you have no foundation (albeit an illogical one) upon which to base your belief in god. If your god is fallible then the bible is incorrect and you are in the same position, which is that there is no reason to believe your god exists.
However, there appears to exist logic and reason that suggest a basis for that faith. http://blogspotthinker.blogspot.com/2011/09/logic-and-reason-supporting-creator-god.html addresses the topic. I welcome your thoughts.
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I reviewed your article. My thoughts are:
1) It is not written very clearly as it uses many superfluous words and awkward sentence structures.
2) The argument appears to be based entirely upon the presumption that the bible is authoritative. However, there is no good reason to consider the bible authoritative. It was written by multiple people who were not even present to witness the events they write about. Moreover, a number of the texts in the bible are widely considered amongst scholars to be forgeries.
3) Although the post purportedly "shares a few examples of logic and reason that appears to point to God and a few challenges to apparent assertions that appear to suggest that the attributes of God are fictional" it is rife with logical fallacies.
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4) The most prominent fallacy in the article is a shifting of the burden of proof. The burden of proof is always on the person making the positive argument (ie that god exists). There is no need for anyone "to suggest that the attributes of God are fictional" until there is reliable evidence to support a claim that such an entity exists.
5) The more fundamental flaw with the reasoning is that assumes the bible axiomatically as true and accurate. However, you cannot prove the existence of god through the bible just as you cannot prove that Hogwart's existence solely by referencing the Harry Potter series of books. You need reliable external evidence to validate your claim.
6) The article is also an example of reasoning from the desired conclusion.
7) Another significant flaw is the failure to support broad statements with reliable evidence. Eg, the article states "History appears to report a human trend toward pomp and circumstance and the establishment of leadership figures." Firstly, it does not matter what "history appears to report". What matters is what actually has occurred. Secondly, you provide no evidence to support that claim.
In short, the post is weakly reasoned, logically flawed and makes many statements that are unsupported by reliable evidence.
You may want to review some of the basic logical fallacies. There is a good summary here: http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/
At one time, religion dictated what the majority of people believed, now science and other self proclaimed intellectuals want to take up the shield and declare victory. Cannot the 2 exist side by side? If not-- one always blames the OTHER side for any and all problems. The blame needs to be shared, but what is the solution? For many it seems to be- destroy the opposite side. That would be wonderful, yet then the only one left to blame is yourselves.
No one is pressuring you to believe in evolution. I don't care whether you do or not. I've never had an atheist knock on my door in an attempt to "convert" me. But I've had many religious visits of that type. Frankly, we're just sick of a bunch of self-righteous, lazy thinkers trying to foist their religion on us in the form of laws - laws that prevent stem cell research, or prevent two people from marrying if they're of the same gender or try to get Creationism taught in science classes by passing laws instead of doing the requite science. THIS is the crime of Christians and the behavior that we resent. The "I've got the Truth and you have to live by what I believe is true" mentality.
As far as political persons being our saviors, I wouldn't hold my breath on that one either, no matter which side of the fence they reside. They are still imperfect men. I am not one of the "Evangelicals" that you alluded to. There are others of us that do not believe that the theories of man can be used to dismiss God the Almighty.
Astronomy will dominate the world
http://www.freethoughtnation.com/contributing-writers/63-acharya-s/597-astronomy-will-dominate-the-world.html
Not that I see any problems with that. ;-)
Biblical rules, anyone?
But a new player in the 'culture' wars has picked up challenge and brings 'religion' but not as we know it, into line with the scrutiny we are more familiar from science. The first wholly new interpretation of the moral teachings of Christ for two thousand years is spreading on the web. Radically different from anything else we know of from history, this new 'claim' is predicated upon a precise and predefined experience, a direct individual intervention into the natural world by omnipotent power to confirm divine will, command and covenant, "correcting human nature by a change in natural law, altering biology, consciousness and human ethical perception beyond all natural evolutionary boundaries." Like it of no, a new religious claim testable by faith, meeting all Enlightenment, evidential criteria now exists. Nothing short of a religious revolution appears to be getting under way! More info at http://soulgineering.com/2011/05/22/the-final-freedoms/
The blog continues to tear down the fallacy it presented using the bible as it's launching point for supporting God. It uses the same arguments that all evangelicals use in promoting God. Which is morality and the lack of evidence equating to evidence in favor of existence.
It's a wonderful example of circular rational presenting one self-authoritating source as the only source of evidence and conclusion.
In Exodus chapter 20, the Lord said to Moses, "tell the Israelites this: 'You have seen for yourselves that I have spoken to you from heaven."
Many other examples from scripture recording that the words recorded in the Bible are indeed God's word, and is considered sacred.
These apparently contradictory accusations appear to substantiate the perspective apparently suggested at http://blogspotthinker.blogspot.com/2011/09/logic-and-reason-supporting-creator-god.html that accusations appear to be levied against God despite the propriety of God’s dealings with humanity.
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I believe that as humans evolved, so did their capacity for experiencing personal spiritual events. Perhaps it was the latest human, sapiens sapiens, who developed the ability to make contact with something "other," God, if you will.
Through thousands of years of human history, certain types have been drawn to the spiritual. They profess a need for it, and may be of a common personality. They bring their experience into the common community, where non-spiritual types turn it into organized systems. As with Jesus, we see attempts by people without spiritual inclination to understand spirituality through pure letter and ritual, while.the spiritual person remains content in his less-defined discoveries. It doesn't invalidate the spiritual. It only suggests that the majority are less inclined toward such personal need. Christianity began as a community of common spiritual experience. It is the spiritual experience with the Spirit of Christ of which I find myself in daily need.
The heart, indeed, is deperate and spiriitsm tries to fill this missing element one feels if they do not have God in there life. Our spirit understands we came from His spirit, yet our (figurative) treachorous hearts impel us away from Him. Spiritism is like "junk food" though, it takes away some of our hunger for a time, but in the end makes us ill if that is all we eat.
It's incredibly easy for anybody reasonably smart to incorporate whatever he observes as God's will & act - there is nothing whatever contradictory about saying that a God willed evolution, along with the usual story that anything bad is a test of faith, while anything good is God's grace.
The real question is why do some Christians oppose science as undermining their faith? Is it because that is the way they understand their faith, ie the most immediate, literally obvious statement?
I suspect it's deeper than that, it's an emotional motivation. Maybe an assurance that they belong to some sort of tribe that they don't want to think about; or more likely their rationalization for their station in life. If they are an Episcopalian stockbroker, they can look down on non-believers; if they are trailer dwelling Baptists, they can use it as a vehicle for their resentment. Yes, there is a lot to Marx's comment about religion being the opiate of the masses - isn't there?
Pat Robertson and Rick Perry. Do I need to explain their role and positions? Shall I add say Michelle Bachmann? How many of these people do you think we could name in a half hour?
If we were to poll the Republican congress, how many of them do you think would identify with John Huntsman's views over Rick Perry's?
Have you noticed that there is a bit of a debate over this issue, say for the last decade? Have you noticed a lot of controversy about teaching creationism in schools as an alternative to scientifically accepted ideas?
I don't know that your question is really serious. As I've pointed out, a faithful person could incorporate all science by reference and call it God's will. But that is a VERY rare POV. Most of them understand instinctively and correctly that science is about skepticism, (not any particular belief), and therefore diametrically opposed to faith.
In "Not Every Spirit," Christopher Morse concludes:“While there are certainly other formative influences as well, most of the disputes over what constitutes a valid Christian theology in the twenty-first century continue to reflect in some form or another... the dogmatic approaches of Ernst Troeltsch and of Karl Barth..."