My religious backgroud is that the Bible teaches us how to go to Heaven and not how the Heavens go.
Once upon a time the "how the Heavens go" school believed that the Bible stated that the Sun rotated around the Earth.
How many of even the most Fundamentalist Christians believe that now?
If some insist upon taking every sentence of the Bible literally, snakes can talk.
Such literal interpretations of the Bible are the best way to raise future generations of atheists. How many children nowadays will believe in talking snakes?
As someone posted earlier on this thread:
"If sound science appears to contradict the Bible, we may be sure that it is our interpretation of the Bible that is at fault." ................... Christian Observer, 1832, pg. 437
These folks certainly do make their cults, and to some even Christianity itself, look bad with their angry and adamant devotion to utter nonsense.
However, let's hope everyone learns that the merit lies in the messages, not the messengers. Thus Joe the creationist can't undermine the arguments for Christianity, and Darwin can't undermine the arguments for evolution. We should evaluate each point on its own, not its author's, merits.