Bush: Bible, evolution not at odds

afp ^

[marthemaria]

WASHINGTON (AFP) — US President George W. Bush said in an interview Monday that the Bible is "probably not" literally true and that a belief that God created the world is compatible with the theory of evolution.

"I think you can have both," Bush, who leaves office January 20, told ABC television, adding "You're getting me way out of my lane here. I'm just a simple president." But "evolution is an interesting subject. I happen to believe that evolution doesn't fully explain the mystery of life," said the president, an outspoken Christian who often invokes God in his speeches.

"I think that God created the Earth, created the world; I think the creation of the world is so mysterious it requires something as large as an almighty and I don't think it's incompatible with the scientific proof that there is evolution," he told ABC television. Asked whether the Bible was literally true, Bush replied:

"Probably not. No, I'm not a literalist, but I think you can learn a lot from it." "The important lesson is 'God sent a son,'" he said.

[buwaya]

Is the Presidents opinion different from that of the Pope ?

I don’t think so.

Is the Pope then a lukewarm Christian ?

[2Wheels]

“His position is the traditional institutional Christian”

And your data comes from....???

No, traditional followers of Christ believe and love with all their heart, soul, strength and mind.
And they do not doubt or deviate from this. They have no desire to deviate or take away from this.

The term ‘institutional’ is misplaced, unecessary and has nothing to do with a follower of Christ.

[Larry Lucido]

Um, no we can’t. Unless you have the same insight into his heart that God has. Are you holding out on us?

[buwaya]

My data is my Catholic education. Which has been in the same continuous tradition going back 2000 years - i.e., this is an institution, a community of belief, the Church.

Christianity was founded as a community.

I understand what Mr. Bush said perfectly well, in the argument between that tradition and the “literalist” arguments of the last few centuries and today.

[2Wheels]

“Will President Bush be more likely to go to Hell for saying this?”

Ah what a ‘lead in’! You’ve lured me in to your trap!

Listen, are you more worried about Bush’s soul or your own?
Or is it that you just like to stir things up!

So since you’ve asked the question - you obviously had the condition of Bush’s soul on your mind - as I’m sure you do others - what did you determine? Is it Haaven or Hell for Bush?
If you chose heaven, that makes you quite intelligent, doesn’t it? If you chose hell, that makes you equally as intelligent. Or should we say, “All Knowing”? “Omnipotent” maybe?

[js1138]

Yes, they are revealing that they are celebrating God's great gift to mankind of unique self-awareness, intelligence, curiosity and enlightenment.

It's interesting that when Philip Henry published Omphalos, it was met with opposition primarily from theologians.

God essentially created two conflicting accounts of Creation: one in nature, and one in the Torah. How can it be determined which is the real story, and which is the fake designed to mislead us? One could equally propose that it is nature which presents the real story, and that the Torah was devised by God to test us with a fake history! One has to be able to rely on God's truthfulness if religion is to function. Or, to put it another way -- if God went to enormous lengths to convince us that the world is billions of years old, who are we to disagree?

[GL of Sector 2814]

Last time I checked, none of you look like monkeys.

No, but you and I do look like apes...since humans are apes.

[Matchett-PI]

bttt

[2Wheels]

“I think that evolution is the best current explanation as to HOW God made what we see around us.”

In all honesty, please, do you have any idea what you are saying? Or are you just talking for the sake of talk?
Please read Romans Chapter 1.

There is no evolution in there. Isn’t it amazing that the Bible is the worlds all time best seller, and yet within the first 5 WORDS of the Bible, mankind and his pride begin the quest to disprove, belittle and demean what God said in those 5 words.
“In the beginning, God created...”. If you cannot handle the magnitude of the term “created”, then you do not believe with all your heart, soul strength and mind. You either believe it wholly or you do not - no middle ground, no grey area, and there is certainly no evolution required to help, support, uphold, validate, justify, or to make you feel better about yourself - that God needs in order for His creation to have come to being. Can you handle these words “...God spoke them into being...”? Can you comprehend this? ‘Spoken into being’ doesn’t need the help of anything, let alone a feeble attempt in adding evolution. “O you of little faith”.....are the words once spoken....

[Matchett-PI]

"Well at least we can finally dispense with the "George Bush is a Christian" myth."

Spoken like a true fundi bigot.

Inerrancy and Human Ignorance

Scroll down to:

Religious and Philosophical Reasons Why We Don’t Have Inerrant Copies

This is the granddaddy of the issues in answering this argument. The first aspect of it is one that Skeptics themselves should easily see.

Hardened skeptics often call Christians "bibliolaters" - thus implying that the Bible is some sort of "leather-covered security blanket" that Christians worship and would be frantic without. This charge is unfortunately sometimes true, although I could say the same of some skeptics and their copies of Origin of the Species, or of certain adherents of certain Skeptics in regards to their own fearless leaders. At any rate, we can see easily why, first, this dichotomy is wrong, in terms of a blanket assessment; and second, how this leads us to the biggest reason why we do not have inerrant copies of Scripture today.

First, it is plain that neither the Bible nor a belief in inerrancy is required to be a Christian. If this were so, then skeptics like Frank Morison or C. S. Lewis, who believed in the historicity of the Resurrection but not in the inerrancy of the Gospel reports of it, would never become Christians. ..." Click above link to continue.

[SoftballMominVA]

I do believe those first 5 words, honestly and deeply. That being said, only a fool could deny that micro-evolution happens all the time around us. It is micro-evolution that causes bacteria to become resistant to anti-biotics.

However, I do not believe in macro-evolution. I do not believe that we humans came from single cell organisms and I believe the first man and woman were created in God’s image and the world as we know it was created in 6 days, in the order Genesis lists.

I don’t know what that makes me on the evolution-creationist scale, but I am what I am and can back up why I believe what I believe without a whole lot of thinking.

All that being said...... there is pre-Biblical history alluded to in the Bible that is not recorded in Genesis. I can’t help but ponder if some elements that others attribute to proof of evolution come from this time.

[aimhigh]

that the age of the earth is much more than 6 thousand years

Genesis: "So the evening and the morning were the first day."

The text doesn't allow for 6,000 years. Cowards can opt for 6,000 years, but that won't satisfy the evolutionists.

[2Wheels]

“Well, pretty much every Christian Scholar agrees that not everything in the Bible is literally true.”

With the same confidence you declare this - I will say there are just as many “Christian Scholars” who have attempted to either elevate themselves to God’s level, or have attempted to bring God down to man’s level.

I can assure you based in belief in what God’s word says on this subject - that none of these scholars best efforts will achieve their goal - mentioned above - in the end. God is not affected by the ‘brilliance’ of ‘Christian scholars’, but they certainly have an effect on those with weak faith, don’t they?
Again, those scholars in making such grandiose statments, by default then, MUST be able to tell you with 100 percent accuracy which are literal, and which are not literal meanings.
These scholars will ALWAYS add caveats to their statements:
‘This MAY be literal’, ‘that MAY NOT be literal’. They are too intelligent to commit their statement as fact, because they have doubts in the very things they proclaim.
And of course, they would never want to be held totally accountable for their false statements or lack of complete faith - if they found out they were wrong.............

[Matchett-PI]

"God tells us that He wrote the Bible. Now we have George Bush, like so many atheists, declaring that the Bible isn't "literally true"."

You embarrass yourself.

"...It doesn't take very long to realize that a thorough understanding of the Bible -- and this would actually apply to any complex work from any culture -- requires specialized knowledge, and a broad range of specialized knowledge in a variety of fields. Obviously the vast majority of believers spend their entire lives doing little more than reading the Bible in English (or whatever native tongue) and importing into its words whatever ideas they derive from their own experiences. This process is very often one of "decontextualizing" -- what I have here called "reading it like it was written yesterday and for you personally." ... ["trailer park scholarship" ].

Let's anticipate and toss off the obvious objection: "Why did God make the Bible so hard to understand, then?" It isn't -- none of this keeps a person from grasping the message of the Bible to the extent required to be saved; where the line is to be drawn is upon those who gratuitously assume that such base knowledge allows them to be competent critics of the text, and make that assumption in absolute ignorance of their own lack of knowledge -- what I have elsewhere spoken of in terms of being "unskilled and unaware of it."

And is my observation to this effect justified? Well, ask yourself this question after considering what various fields of knowledge a complete and thorough (not to say sufficient for intelligent discourse, though few even reach that pinnacle, especially in the critical realm) study of the Bible requires:

[snip]

That's quite a list, but there's one more note to add -- the holistic ability to put all of it together. How serious is this? Very. A carefully crafted argument about a text being an interpolation can be undermined by a single point from Greco-Roman rhetoric. A claim having to do with psychology can be destroyed by a simple observation from the social sciences. Not even most scholars in the field can master every aspect -- what then of the non-specialist critic who puts together a website in his spare time titled 1001 Irrefutable Bible Contradictions? Do these persons deserves our attention? Should they be recognized as authorities? No, they deserve calculated contempt for their efforts. (By this, I do not mean emotional or behavioral contempt, but a calculated disregard for their work from an academic perspective.) They have not even come close to deserving our attention, and should feed only itching ears with similar tastes. ... engaging what I will call from here on "trailer park scholarship" ..."

Continued HERE

[2Wheels]

Giovanna,

I like you and you speak very well. Wish I could speak so well! Keep up the good work!

[Matchett-PI]

bttt

[allmendream]

The both of you agree with Bush, Pope Benedict XVI and myself.

[Coyoteman]

Just where is the “missing link”? Show me.

Easy. Here's one now. Note its position in the chart which follows (hint--in the right center):

---

Fossil: KNM-ER 3733

Site: Koobi Fora (Upper KBS tuff, area 104), Lake Turkana, Kenya (4, 1)

Discovered By: B. Ngeneo, 1975 (1)

Estimated Age of Fossil: 1.75 mya * determined by Stratigraphic, faunal, paleomagnetic & radiometric data (1, 4)

Species Name: Homo ergaster (1, 7, 8), Homo erectus (3, 4, 7), Homo erectus ergaster (25)

Gender: Female (species presumed to be sexually dimorphic) (1, 8)

Cranial Capacity: 850 cc (1, 3, 4)

Information: Tools found in same layer (8, 9). Found with KNM-ER 406 A. boisei (effectively eliminating single species hypothesis) (1)

Interpretation: Adult (based on cranial sutures, molar eruption and dental wear) (1)

See original source for notes:
Source: http://www.mos.org/evolution/fossils/fossilview.php?fid=33

Source

[mathluv]

When I taught Biology, I always said that God could do whatever he wanted. I don’t think we came from apes, however.

[mysterio]

Bush: Bible, evolution not at odds

Wow. I agree with him on something.