I will explain it to you, if you wish, but why don't we focus first on your particular religion, and mine.
You are British, which means you are probably Church of England even if you don't really believe it or really practice it. The Anglican Church accepts evolution as "the way we probably got here", and so whether you are a religious Anglican or a "baptisms and funerals" Anglican, either way, you don't have a religious dog in the evolution fight.
I am a French Catholic, which means that I belong to a Church that accepts evolution as "the way we probably got here", and so I don't have a particular dog in the evolution fight either.
The reason evolution is not an issue in England or France is that both are Catholic countries (of either the Roman or Anglican form), and traditionalist Catholic faith, either Anglican or Roman, does not have any particular reason to oppose evolution.
America is not a Catholic country, but a Protestant country. (Yes, yes, I know, Anglicanism calls itself "Protestant", but it isn't. It's English Catholic. And the difference is that Anglicanism reposes on tradition, and has an ordained priesthood and bishops to interpret theology. This is Catholicism with an English head. Protestantism, especially American-style Protestantism, is not Catholic, in the sense that it's not hierarchical and doesn't have an autoritative (and authoritarian) clergy with the final decision-taking power. No, most Americans are Protestant, and more are Baptist than anything else. After the Baptists come other evangelical groups. What they all have in common is that they are not Catholic and don't have an authoritative clergy to interpret tradition. Rather, they individually read the Bible, straight, and apply it, straight. There is a tremendous devotion among American Protestants to the Bible as the literal, word-for-word, Word of God. Thus, AMERICAN Protestant religion, which is extremely healthy and extremely vibrant, has a dramatic issue with Darwin and evolution because of the first two books of the Book of Genesis. Genesis opens with the Jewish Creation myth. Now your Anglican "Protestant" Catholicism and my Roman Catholicism both teaches that this is not an anthropology lesson but a sacred poem on creation, teaching that God made the world and that man is prone to sin; the flood is lot a literal world-covering event but an allegory. If you're not a practicing Anglican, you believe that, and if you ARE a practicing Anglican, you believe the same thing. Ditto for Catholics. So, when Catholics or Anglican Catholics say "There is no conflict between science and religion", they really mean it. There isn't any particular TENSION within Catholicism or Anglicanism about evolution - nobody thinks that Genesis is to be taken word-for-word literally in your Church centered at Canterbury, or mine centered at Rome. It doesn't come up. All the way back in the 400's AD St. Augustine himself wrote that Genesis was obviously not to be taken LITERALLY, and since the scientific age, Catholicism on both sides of the Channel doesn't have a problem with Darwinian biology. It's really NOT a religious issue in England, or France, or Italy, or even Ireland. God made the world, and evolution is how he did it. This is what you and I believe, and what the English and French and Irish believe. So, there is no TENSION in the religion of your country and science.
What about the real Protestant countries in Europe? Anglicanism is Catholicism in everything but name, but the Lutherans aren't Catholic, and the Dutch Calvinists aren't either. So, why isn't there a terrible stress and strain over evolution in Protestant Europe?
You know the reason for that too: Protestant Europe doesn't really believe in the old religion anymore. It's really secular Europe, with some churchy Protestant traditions, mostly tied up with the local monarchy. Thus, Sweden and Holland, Denmark and Norway are all "Protestant" countries, with good Protestant Queens and Kings, but there is about as much real faith in those countries as there was real belief in the old Roman gods among the Romans in the 300s AD. Catholic Europe is in general more devout than Protestant Europe (think Ireland, Poland, Italy, rural Spain and Portugal) and you will acknowledge that there really are countries in Europe where religion is still taken very, very seriously and believed. But the snag is that these are all Catholic countries, and Catholicism accepts Darwin, so there's no religious struggle over evolution coming from any established quarter. The non-catholic Protestant quarter of Europe is the least Christian part of the Continent.
So, the issue just does not come up anywhere. Catholic Europe and Anglican Catholicism accept Darwin. And Northern, Protestant Europe...think Sweden and Amsterdam...doesn't take Christianity a bit seriously anymore.
So, what does that leave Europe?
It leaves Europe with nobody who is reading the Bible LITERALLY and taking it LITERALLY.
But MOST Americans are religious, and MOST of THEM are hard-core Bible Protestants. Which means that their religion IS in conflict with Darwin.
Now, America is a democracy. Public policy in everything reflects the democratic will. The public schools are not autonomous organs of state: school boards are composed mostly of parents and are elected. Mayors and legislators who set schooling law are elected. Bible-Protestants take their Bible seriously, very, very seriously, and they believe it very, very literally. So, to them, Darwinism with its randomness is a direct assault on God and God's word. That is so radically alien to your culture in England, or to any Christian culture in Europe, that you're just at a loss in the face of it.
But that's what's happening. This is a conflict as profoundly theological and based on different world views as the struggle between Anglicans and Puritans in the English Civil War and Cromwellian Dictatorship. In England, the Puritans won for a time, but the Anglican Catholics reasserted themselves and tradition, and Biblical purism was defeated. In America, Puritan Biblical purism is the DOMINANT religious strain. Catholics are in the severe minority. And, democratic as America is, the pressure to teach what parents believe is the TRUTH about the origins of the universe is very much a political issue.
You don't have this in England, because England is a Catholic "Protestant" country at best, and an agnostic country in the main. You don't have it in Ireland, which is indisputably still devoutly Christian, because Ireland is Catholic, and Rome theologically accepts evolution. You DO have it in America, because Americans are Puritan Roundheads and Biblical literalists, in the main - and that strain disappeared from English society a couple hundred years ago, through emigration to America.
This gulf in comprehension you stare across is really the IDENTICAL gulf in comprehension that the Anglican bishops stared across at the Cromwellian Roundheads back in your Civil War. It's the same idea and the same tension of authority, for the same reasons. Evolution is merely the latest topic on which the fundamentally different ways of looking at the universe clash.
I hope that helps.
My compliments on a very well written reply and analysis.
Indeed, yes, a very meaty and thought-provoking piece, many thanks--let me stew on it and get back to you. I think you are spot on about the Church of England--and you have a credible explanation for the gulf of incredulity which divides some aspects of conservatism. Thanks again.
Not really. The Catholic sect of Christianity is the largest in America by a fair amount. Moreover, conservative Catholics and conservative Christians of other sects are allies in the cultural war being engaged with the secular humanists and liberal Chirstian sects. And judging by national elections, those battle lines are drawn evenly.
Yes, there are more Biblical literalists in sects other than Catholicism but that misses the point entirely. Evolution/ID is not on most of their radar screens. They could care less.
They do care deeply about issues like abortion, homosexual marriage, parental rights, public prayer et al and that is where the battle lines are drawn.
Your posting continues to reverberate with me, thanks again. If your analysis is correct (and I certainly find it intriguing), there are many ironies here. Today, it is the British Left which claims descent from the tradition of Cromwell and the Roundheads; the Labour party (socialist) claims Methodism as much as Marx among its roots.
That being said, for all my involvement in a couple different churches over the years and with different homeschooling groups, I could not tell you what any of the people I know believe on evolution. As matter of fact, while I know what my kids think of it, I couldn't tell you what my own family thinks of it; the subject simply never comes up for discussion.
Contrary to what appears on these threads, I also don't see it as an issue that is dividing the conservatives in this country as it is not a moral issue as significant to most people as abortion, homosexuality, euthanasia, etc. The issues that are important are moral ones as jwalsh listed. I do agree with jwalsh07 with his observations in post 319.
The ToE simply does not come into play in peoples everyday lives. I don't make any decisions about who I associate with or do business with based on their belief or acceptance of the ToE. The only time it seems to be an issue is in regard to public education and that's not because evolution IS being taught but that there is such a concerted effort to keep creation from being taught. As far as I've noticed, there is not the effort by the creationists to keep the ToE out of the schools as by the *evolutionists* (or whoever) to keep creation out of school.