Notre Dame priest: Creationism debate unique to U.S.

The Bozeman Daily Chronicle ^ | 2003-05-11 | Walt Williams

[Junior]

Despite movements across the nation to teach creationism in public schools, a science historian said Monday that Christians haven't always used a literal interpretation of the Bible to explain the world's origins.

"For them, the Bible is mostly to teach a religious lesson," said Ernan McMullin of the earliest Christian scholars.

McMullin spoke to a crowd of about 60 people at Montana State University on "Evolution as a Christian theme."

McMullin, a professor at the University of Notre Dame and a Catholic priest, is recognized one of the world's leading science historians and philosophers, according to MSU.

He has written about Galileo, Issac Newton, the concept of matter and, of course, evolution.

It's a subject has been hotly debated ever since Charles Darwin first published "On the Origins of Species" in 1859.

Christian fundamentalists have long pushed the nation's public schools to teach creationism as an alternative, which in its strictest form claims that the world was created in six days, as stated in the Bible's Old Testament Book of Genesis.

But McMullin said creationism largely is an American phenomenon. Other countries simply don't have major creationist movements, leading him to ask: "What makes it in the U.S. ... such an issue (over) evolution and Christian belief?"

The answer probably lies in the nation's history, with the settlement by religious groups, he said. Also, public education and religion are more intertwined here than other countries.

McMullin discussed how Christians have tried to explain their origins over the past 2,000 years, using several examples to show that many viewed Genesis as more of a religious lesson than an exact record of what happened.

It wasn't until the Protestant Reformation of the 16th Century that Genesis started to be taken literally. Then theologians started using nature - and its many complexities - as proof of creation.

Charles Darwin spoiled that through his theory of natural selection, and the battle lines have been drawn ever since.

"It replaced an older view that had sounded like a strong argument for the existence of God," McMullin said.

[Dimensio]

Evolution in both contexts means the exact same thing.

Evolution in biology refers to a change in alelle frequency over time. I fail to see how changes in alelle frequencies over time relate to the origins of the universe.

[Dimensio]

He was a very left-wing democrat, and a sodomite (but I repeat myself).

Excuse me, but I know some very level-headed and intelligent sodomites who would be very upset with your comparison.

[PatrickHenry]

Excuse me, but I know some very level-headed and intelligent sodomites ...

I don't doubt that they exist. At the time of my post, I was thinking of how the dems take pride in reaching out to such groups as the core of their party, and how the activists seem to be always left-wingers. Gives a really bad reputation to the others. Politically. As for the rest of it, that's for another thread, and it's a topic that doesn't really interest me. I was trying to be clever. Sometimes it doesn't work.

[Dimensio]

Actually, I was mostly being silly as well, what with trying to play off the term 'left-wing democrat' as one of the most insulting labels that could be applied. Sometimes I try to be clever, but it rarely works.

[gore3000]

Charles Darwin spoiled that through his theory of natural selection, and the battle lines have been drawn ever since.

"It replaced an older view that had sounded like a strong argument for the existence of God," McMullin said.

Actually, the argument was never won by the evolutionists. They have yet to show a single species which has transformed itself into a more complex species. They have yet to show a single mutation which has resulted in a more complex organism in the lab (in spite of decades and tens of billions of dollars spent every year on biological research). In fact, the last 50 years of scientific discoveries have shown quite well the impossibility of evolution ever transforming a species into a more complex one and evolutionists have never been able to show the physical process by which a species could transform itself into a more complex one.

[Aric2000]

A blue plus yellow, skipping placemarker.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Like I said, a bit long, but I thought it was a good read

Nice post.

[Doctor Stochastic]

Are you sure that it wasn't because Moses struck a rock with a stick to obtain water rather than merely asking the rock to give forth water?

Dowser
Dowser
Dowser

[BenR2]

If he wasn't tired, then why did he rest, or is that just a misnomer as well, and he didn't actually rest but did something else, like watch sunday night football or seomthing?

//////
Wow! What a knee-slapper.

Look up the word anthropomorphism. Then come back and we can talk.

[Virginia-American]

...it be taught as part of the "Fallacies, Frauds, and Myths" section of a course of study on "Critical Thinking"...

I'm of the opinion that Creationism should be taught as a part of Rhetoric (which includes studying advertisements, political speechifying, and other sophistries). It's a prerquisite of Critical Thinking.

[Aric2000]

My, what big words we know.

So, if he wasn't tired, then why did he need to rest?

If he didn't need to rest, then why did he rest on the 7th day?

And if he didn't rest because he was tired, then why did he rest?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Either gensis is to be taken literally, or it's not, which is it?

[Aric2000]

By the way, christians are the ones that try and put god in a box, and give him/it/her human tendencies.

I never have, because a god should not have limitations, period.

But, what the hey, I'll play for a while.

[BenR2]

My, what big words we know.

////
When you have looked up the word, I will reply.

Until then, your comments are so much infidel flatus.

Cheers.

[BenR2]

I never have, because a god should not have limitations, period.

///
A 'god?' LOL.

[Aric2000]

Infidel flatus, now that is amusing, just because I said that you know big words, does not mean that I do not know what that word means.

I do not act like I know everything, and that it is obvious that you are clueless about the meaning of a word that I pop out of the air. Arrogance, all I ever get is arrogance out of Christian fundamentalists. Why is that?

[longshadow]

I'm of the opinion that Creationism should be taught as a part of Rhetoric (which includes studying advertisements, political speechifying, and other sophistries). It's a prerquisite of Critical Thinking.

Sounds like a good fit....

[Aric2000]

Yes, I said "a god" what about it.

Tolerance is not a thing Christians do any more?

No tolerance for anothers beliefs, anothers beliefs are to be ridiculed and laughed at?

Wow, I wonder what happened to Christianity, has it been hijacked somewhere along the line? Because it sure doesn't seem to have the moral compass that it once had, either that or it's followers don't.

Hmm, well, if that's the way you want to play, yes, I said a god should NOT have limitations, let alone human falacies(such as my horendous spelling tonight), what about it?

[BenR2]

So it is not meant as a literal interpretation?

/////

Since God is Almighty, it costs him ZERO energy to do anything. Hence, he cannot get "tired."

Christ showed fatigue on this earth, because He had taken on a body of flesh.

The Creation occurred well prior to the Incarnation. No fatigue can possibly be in view here.

The LORD had ceased from his work of creation. It was finished. He was setting the pattern for man: Six days of work and one of rest, as Exodus 20 point out.

When we work, we get tired. When we rest, we do it to recoup our strength. When God works, he loses no strength. When He rests, he regains no strength.

The Bible goes to great lengths to accommodate itself to man's limitations. It uses what theologians call "anthropomorphisms," using terms to which we as humans readily understand to describe an infinite, invisible God that we don't fully understand. When the Bible says of Him that "His ear is not heavy ... His arm is not shortened . . . ," it is using human phyisical terms to describe a Spirit who (prior to the Incarnation) did NOT have ears or arms. (This is NOT to say that He cannot hear or reach out and "touch" someone!)

Here is how 18th-Century English Baptist theologian John Gill puts it in his commentary:

" . . . he rested on the seventh day from all his works which he had made: not as though weary of working, for the Creator of the ends of the earth fainteth not, nor is weary, (Isaiah 40:28) but as having done all his work, and brought it to such perfection, that he had no more to do; not that he ceased from making individuals, as the souls of men, and even all creatures that are brought into the world by generation, may be said to be made by him, but from making any new species of creatures; and much less did he cease from supporting and maintaining the creatures he had made in their beings, and providing everything agreeable for them, and governing them, and overruling all things in the world for ends of his own glory; in this sense he "worketh hitherto", as Christ says, (John 5:17)"

[Aric2000]

Do I get #600?