Posted on 10/14/2006 11:16:50 AM PDT by lizol
Keep Darwin's 'lies' out of Polish schools: education official 2 hours.
WARSAW (AFP) - Poland's deputy education minister called for the influential evolutionary theories of Charles Darwin not to be taught in the country's schools, branding them "lies."
"The theory of evolution is a lie, an error that we have legalised as a common truth," Miroslaw Orzechowski, the deputy minister in the country's right-wing coalition government, was quoted as saying by the Gazeta Wyborcza daily Saturday.
Orzechowski said the theory was "a feeble idea of an aged non-believer," who had come up with it "perhaps because he was a vegetarian and lacked fire inside him."
The evolution theory of the 19th-century British naturalist holds that existing animals and plants are the result of natural selection which eliminated inferior species gradually over time. This conflicts with the "creationist" theory that God created all life on the planet in a finite number.
Orzechowski called for a debate on whether Darwin's theory should be taught in schools.
"We should not teach lies, just as we should not teach bad instead of good, or ugliness instead of beauty," he said. "We are not going to withdraw (Darwin's theory) from the school books, but we should start to discuss it."
The deputy minister is a member of a Catholic far-right political group, the League of Polish Families. The league's head, Roman Giertych, is education minister in the conservative coalition government of Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski.
Giertych's father Maciej, who represents the league in the European Parliament, organised a discussion there last week on Darwinism. He described the theory as "not supported by proof" and called for it be removed from school books.
The far-right joined the government in May when Kaczynski's ruling conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party, after months of ineffective minority government, formed a coalition including LPR and the populist Sambroon party.
Roman Giertych has not spoken out on Darwinism, but the far-right politician's stance on other issues has stirred protest in Poland since he joined the government.
A school pupils' association was expected to demonstrate in front of the education ministry on Saturday to call for his resignation.
Don't forget rotten teeth and abject poverty.
Oh! And the Devine Right of Kings, too! Let's not forget that!
You're droit about that! LOL
Some people are easily amazed. Some even believe in Darwin.
How I heat my cave is really my business but, what the heck! We build warm, cozy fires using unread surplus copies of The Origin of Peachies or Species or something like that. Keeps us warm and keeps the Darwinists in the, ummm, dark thinking that there are people who listen and people who care about their charming little fable about apes as men (not unlike the Teamsters Union buying 1 million copies of then House Speaker Jim Wright's autobiography. A million Teamsters were not really interested). Also keeps such fables out of the hands of the innocent. Great fun, really!
Hmmm. Charles I of England (Read his scaffold speech) or Nancy Pelosi (Slick Willy, Mrs. Arkansas Antichrist, Dykes on Bikes, etc.). I'm going with the Divine Right of Kings.
Dieu think so?
How about the authority of the Pope?
You might appreciate this one.
When the world was finished, there were as yet no people, but the Bald Eagle was chief of the animals. He saw that the world was incomplete and decided to make some human beings. So he took some clay and modeled the figure of a man and laid him on the ground. At first he was very small but he grew rapidly until he reached normal size. But as yet he had no life; he was still asleep. Then the Bald Eagle stood and admired his work. "It is impossible," he said, "that he should be left alone; he must have a mate." So he pulled out a feather and laid it beside the sleeping man. Then he left them and went off a short distance, for he knew that a woman was being formed from the feather. But the man was still asleep and did not know what was happening. When the Bald Eagle decided that the woman was about completed, he returned, awoke the man by flapping his wings over him and flew away.The man opened his eyes and stared at the woman. "What does this mean?" he asked. "I thought I was alone!" Then the Bald Eagle returned and said with a smile, "I see you have a mate! Have you had intercourse with her?" "No," replied he man, for he and the woman knew nothing about each other. Then the Bald Eagle called to Coyote who happened to be going by and said to him, "Do you see that woman? Try her first!" Coyote was quite willing and complied, but immediately afterwards lay down and died. The Bald Eagle went away and left Coyote dead, but presently returned and revived him. "How did it work?" said the Bald Eagle. "Pretty well, but it nearly kills a man!" replied Coyote. "Will you try it again?" said the Bald Eagle. Coyote agreed, and tried again, and this time survived. Then the Bald Eagle turned to the man and said, "She is all right now; you and she are to live together.
I will give you credit for coming up with an article which peels me ever so slightly from my usual total submission to the wisdom of John Paul the Great. OTOH, I take it that you do not stand with the Middle Ages Vatican against Galileo any more than I do. I am sticking with Pope St. Pius X on the apeman issue.
You mean that the Bald Eagle accomplished all this without an ape in sight?????
I was focusing more on Coyote's role. (With a screen name like BlackElk I though you would appreciate this kind of a story.)
You're probably right about JPII wanting to please the mighty scientists, though. Look how the Pope felt a need to be so obsequious about the Soviet Union.
The bishop and many diocesan priests are in love with the school which is also a no Kumbaya zone. It is a work in progress but has given every expectation that, a decade from now, it will be among the very best in the country. It just received an award as one of the top fifty Catholic schools in the US and it is only about nine years old, having begun in the basement of one couple's house.
We don't want to farm you for money and we don't want to give one nickel to a school you would approve. America, it's a great country.
Oh, and many "Catholic" schools in many dioceses are being run into the ground by Sr. Mary Pantsuit and are, in fact, inferior institutions. I had to pull my eldest daughter from first grade at my old "Catholic" grammar school when they taught her about six times in Kindergarten and 1st Grade that Jesus did not really know He was God even when He was on the Cross. The principal was a heathen ex-nun. The pastor was a great Catholic priest but busy as a one-armed paper-hanger and lacked the time to bring the principal to heel. Any private or Catholic school would have a hard time being inferior to public schools but many are working hard at it by demanding teaching "certifications" of their (loosely speaking) teachers so that they can match the institutionalized and agendaed incompetence of J. Random Public School or PS 666. Our "teaching guidelines" are verrrrrry different from those of Sr. Mary Pantsuit and friends. We get results.
Any Catholic school, even those run by Sr. Mary Pantsuit, has the advantage of being able to impose academic and behavioral discipline and standards without a by your leave to the ACLU. We just take a lot more advantage of that freedom than do the Kumbaya schools and the results show it. Oh, and we do not ask diocesan assistance either. We have thorough, quality Catholic education with no strings wanted, accepted or attached. Any parent who does not like it is free to withdraw their kid(s) and choose another school, homeschool or whatever. We draft no one.
See #652. If Pope Benedict XVI whom I cherish says it will rain next Wednesday, I don't have to believe it. Ditto John Paul the Great.
Some Catholic schools teach socialism but that does not mean that socialism is Catholicism or that my kids are going to be taught such bilge or that they are somehow "descended from" apes.
I know what Pope St. Pius X taught and truth does not change.
I also know Charles I's (blessed king and martyr to some) scaffold speech and I bet you don't. The substance (which includes a defense of the divine right of kings but also an eloquent defense of individual liberty and property and of the notion that the liberty and property of each citizen was the most sacred trust imposed upon the king by God. If you did, you'd have some respect for him. That does not make me a monarchist but I would prefer to live under Charles I as an absolute monarch rather than under Pelosi, Clinton or Clinton. Charles I had everything to do with Western Civilization and nothing whatever to do with apeman theories. If you disagree, we will just have to disagree. It isn't as if I live for your approval or anything. I assume that you are practical enough not to live for mine. Good thing too since you won't get it at the current rate.
Of course, that was a few years ago. OK, well, a few decades ago.
Good going!
Now, just make sure you teach real science, including evolution, along with the rest of the subjects you mentioned and we'll get along fine.
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