I apologize for taking so long to get back to you and this thread. It's been hectic around here...
That Young Earth Creationists call themselves Creationist does not constitute a trademark.
Absent a trademark filing, anyone who believes that Creation happened whether Christian, Jew, Muslim or whatever has just as much right to call themselves Creationist.
Personally, I perceive no conflict at all between God the Father's revelation in 1) the Person of Jesus Christ, 2) the Person of the indwelling Holy Spirit, 3) Scriptures and 4) Creation both spiritual and physical.
I agree with Jewish Physicist Gerald Schroeder that, applying relativity and the inflationary theory, an equivalent week at the inception space/time coordinates equals approximately 15 billion years at our present space/time coordinates. For my "primer" on matter, relativity and beginnings, click here.
I also perceive the first three chapters of Genesis referring to the Creation of both heaven and earth, spiritual and physical - that God is the only observer and the author, the perspective is His, not man's. The events He describes are not ipso facto occuring in the physical realm (emphasis mine.)
And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Genesis 2:9
He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God. Revelation 2:7
I likewise agree with some early Christians and Jews that Adamic man was appointed a week which is 7,000 years and that the last day, the Sabbath, is Christ's 1,000 year reign on earth. Depending on whether one uses Christian dating or Jewish dating, Christ is due to return any time now or in a couple of centuries.
Bottom line, I'm YEC from the inception space/time coordinates and OEC from our present space/time coordinates.
I am a Creationist.
Truly, there is no excuse for anyone to not be a Creationist:
And that without being crammed into the *creationist* box of the evos making.
Absent a trademark filing, anyone who believes that Creation happened whether Christian, Jew, Muslim or whatever has just as much right to call themselves Creationist.
Sure. But none of them do. I've never heard anyone who accepted the theory of evolution call themselves a creationist, and despite asking several times, no one has shown me such an example (from somewhere other than these discussions). I'm talking about what the word means as it is used, not what it could hypothetically mean.
And my point is that this definition of "creationist" isn't something evos came up with to disparage people who believe in creation. You said, in the post I was responding to,
Some want the term narrowly construed to match their seemingly favorite target, the Young Earth Creationists.More recently, metmom referred to "the *creationist* box of the evos making." Your insistence that it's evos who made up the anti-evolution aspect of the term "creationism" is just wrong, historically and according to common usage. You can't change that just by asserting that anyone who believes in Creation is a Creationist.
If you want to start a movement to redefine the word, that's fine with me. Get a bunch of people who believe in an old earth, God as the creator, and evolution to start calling themselves creationists, and maybe your redefinition will eventually become accepted. But in the meantime, don't act like it's just the mean ol' evos who made up this definition you don't like--we're just using the term the YECs asked us to use.
I'll ask again: since many people, as you acknowledge, accept both God the Creator and evolution, and by your standards should be called creationists, what term would you suggest for those who are anti-evolution because it conflicts with their beliefs about Creation?