Issuing theological statements isn't normally thought of as the job of a federal judge. Yet, this week when U.S. District Court Judge John E. Jones III released the first federal ruling on intelligent design, there was at the core of his written decision an unambiguously theological ruling: that evolution as formulated by Charles Darwin presents no conflict with the God of the Bible. Quite apart from what one thinks of his legal decision, what should we make of his theology? In brief, Jones ruled that disparaging Darwinian evolutionary theory in biology class violates the separation of church and state. The...
