Article Leader Telegram
February 6, 2014
In preparation for Evolution Weekend
Rev. David J. Huber
Tuesday saw the big debate between Bill
Nye The Science Guy and Ken Ham, founder of Answers In Genesis and
the Creation Museum. They debated the merits of the science of
evolution, geology, and astrophysics as accepted by the scientific
community worldwide (Nye) versus the merits of Creation Science
espoused by Ham and other Young Earth Creationists who dis-believe
evolution and believe in Biblical literalism, which in their reading
of the first creation story in Genesis allows the earth to be no more
than roughly 6,000 years old.
The first chapter of Genesis holds the
familiar “In the beginning...” creation story that progresses
through six days as God creates everything, ending with human beings
on the sixth day. Ham’s scientific theories are based mostly on
this story. But chapter 2 of Genesis begins a different creation
story. This is the Adam and Eve one, in which God creates Adam on the
same day as creating the earth and the heavens, then creates plants,
then animals, then Eve. The order of creation in these stories is
very different, and the second one offers no sense of time.
As a professing Biblical literalist,
Ham’s apathy toward these disparate stories is significant. Perhaps
he realizes they cannot be reconciled. These two different creation
stories are certainly a good proof for not taking the Bible
literally, because one is forced into numerous impossible
contradictions. The Bible offers two contradictory stories of
creation right off the bat as though to warn us, “Don’t look for
simplistic answers to God’s complexity in this book.” Which makes
the name “Answers in Genesis” seems even more vacuous. The Bible
is not concerned at all with scientific truth. Physics, biology, and
mathematics were of no concern for those who wrote our scripture. Ham
and his camp abuse scripture by forcing its square hole of
theological concern to adjust to their square peg of scientific
inquiry, a role that scripture was never intended to fill.
This weekend is the ninth annual
Evolution Weekend during which Christian, Musim, Jewish, Buddhist and
other religious leaders and communities speak in favor of science and
against the idea that we must reject any scientific finding that
“disagrees” with scripture. If God is the Creator (and I think
God is) then exploration of that creation is another method of divine
self-revealing. That seems a more faithful approach, and shows a more
loving God, than any creed that believes God to be a trickster or
liar that would plant false information for us to find and test our
faith. God is not malicious. The creation stories are poetry. They
speak of God as the creator, but without regard to modern homo
sapien’s desire for a scientifically detailed account. The stories
contradict in details, but cohere in meaning: God is the creator and
source of life. God then gave us reason and imagination to explore
that creation and discover more about God.
Thousands of religious leaders,
including me, have signed on to the Clergy Letter Project out of
which Evolution Weekend comes. That letter includes this paragraph:
“We believe that the theory of evolution is a foundational
scientific truth, one that has stood up to rigorous scrutiny and upon
which much of human knowledge and achievement rests. To reject this
truth or to treat it as ‘one theory among others’ is to
deliberately embrace scientific ignorance and transmit such ignorance
to our children. We believe that among God’s good gifts are human
minds capable of critical thought and that the failure to fully
employ this gift is a rejection of the will of our Creator.”
Some faith expressions are a threat to
science, but science does not threaten faith. Every week, new
scientific findings expand our knowledge. For me, these continue to
reveal new layers of a God who grows more majestic and awe-some. We
are created beings, we are evolved beings. Thanks be to the Maker.
When freed from the shackles of literalism, our holy scriptures –
whatever religion they come from – paired with our rational minds
and imagination are able to soar into the heavens of science and
philosophy and scripture, embracing the questions born of our
theological yearning.
I quite agree with you David that scripture cannot trump science and that every day our human knowledge about the cosmos is expanding, but sometimes I'm unsure about what Evolution teaches us about God.
ReplyDeleteWhilst there is a creative and beautiful aspect to Evolution through the myriad and diversity of living organisms, I do feel that Richard Dawkins has a point when he says that Evolution is blind and essentially uncaring.
In Evolution the best adapted to survival will survive and the least adapted will not - ie the weakest will be the most likely to suffer. Evolution seems to be driven by competition and violence - not very 'godlike' qualities.
This is NOT An argument for Ham, as he is obviously somewhat deluded. What I'm unsure of is how a God of love is properly squared with Evolution. Evolution is not on question, but maybe the human formulation of God might need to be.
Simo
Thank you so much for commenting! You are the first person to comment on anything in my blog so far. Woo hoo!
ReplyDeleteI think you did well in your last sentence - that our human formulation of God might need to be in question. Though I would get rid of the "might" and say "does". Such as the omnipotent and omniscient God, neither of which jibes well with scripture or with science (what we know of science at this point, anyway).
I think of the great faces/attributes of God is change - ours is not a stagnant God of the status quo, but a changing, creative, curious, inquisitive, almost child-like in glee at watching things grow and evolve and change kind of God that set the universe in motion but in a way that even God could not predict with absolute certainty that it would unfold.
As to evolution, it really is just change over time. Yes, some versions of species will be better suited to survive in a specific situation because they'll get a cool mutation or something, and some other versions might disappear, but that doesn't mean the previous ones were necessarily inferior from a moral standpoint - just less suited to the conditions than something else. And as I think of it -and maybe this is a cop out, I'm not sure - I like to think that God did indeed watch over and care for all the individual life forms that have died, even as species go extinct because of the natural processes (and just as stars, planets, galaxies, particles go extinct). And God has welcomed with glee the new lives, and new species, and new stars and mountains and lakes of methane and planets made of diamond and black holes... [though I think God is very disappointed when species go extinct because of our bad stewardship].
I don't think of evolution as being driven by competition (though partly) or violence - I think those are more properties of being alive, unfortunately. Everything that lives does so on the life-energy of something else. That's where I get bothered by not very 'godlike' qualities. Haven't quite figured out how to make that one work, and I refuse to buy into the "God put us at the top of the food chain so we can do whatever we want", but life feeding on life is definitely the reality.
Maybe in my above statement one could replace "change" with "impermanence" - nothing lasts forever, universe always in flux, and so it is time for a theology that matches that reality. And quite possibly, not even the universe or God are permanent. Your questions are excellent, and ones I wrestle with, usually coming down on the side of "It isn't my job to try to figure all this out (though one can certainly explore the issues), it is my job to see the suffering around me, whatever the reason for its existence, and strive to alleviate it and strive not to cause any more." Less "How can we solve the universe/God" and more "How do we respond to it with compassion and love?"
Don't know if that helped or not. I hope it did. But feel free to be less than whelmed by it. These are thoughts that are always in process. :D