What’s at Stake

As I type this article, Christian nationalists, Russell Vought et al., are dismantling America’s science and education programs. This will be devastating for our country going forward and we will not recover from this damage for many generations. Sadly, only a tiny percentage of Americans consider themselves Christian Nationalists. But this whole concept of Christian Nationalism and the culture wars that some segments of Christianity have gotten themselves wrapped up in, has its roots in this debate with Darwin.

As mentioned, this discussion for the Christian has huge ramifications on many levels. The first is about the nature of God and his relationship with man. However, you will soon see, the process of this debate has shaped modern Christianity and, in my opinion, is one of the key reasons that the American interpretation of Christianity is rapidly becoming obsolete. One of the ways this debate has shaped modern American Christianity is in the area of epistemology or how they find truth to start with. It is profoundly different now than before this argument with Darwin started. In has changed the nature of how the Christian finds truth or lives within or without factual truth.

There was a time during the Enlightenment when the church was highly supportive of education and the pursuit of science. Most universities (such as Harvard) were started by churchmen and women. If God is truth, as he must be, the pursuit of God and the pursuit of truth would be in agreement. But now, the conservative Christian sees science as evil and education as superfluous. It is also the reason that people like me can’t even whisper the words, “reason” or “evidence” within the walls of most churches, conservative or liberal. This is the fruit of this debate about evolution and similar issues. I will try to illustrate as we go forward.

In getting back to Aquinas’ “Two Books” concept, let’s call “Book I” the Bible and “Book II” the earth, or nature. Look at what the earth or nature (Book II) should look like if it is in complete agreement with the the way conservative Christians interpret the Bible, “Book I.”

A “Biblical” Earth

This “Biblical” earth would be rather smooth, no mountains except for a few young stratovolcanoes (like I can see from my town). Now some young earth creationist would argue that God could have created the earth with the Alps, Himalayans, Appalachians, Rockies, and our own Cascade mountains. But that’s a bit of magical thinking, requiring you to ignore the written story in the geology. For example, they layering, the upward thrust, and deep sea fossils at the top of Mount Everest.

There would also need to be a place for the 4.5 billion cubic kilometers of water that a worldwide flood would have required to cover those tall mountains, far more than exist anywhere on earth.

If all fossils were caused by this worldwide flood, then the life forms would be mixed and scattered in no pattern throughout the rock formations. For example, a woolly mammoth (estimated age by current secular scientists as living between 2.5 million years ago, up to 10,000 years ago) could be found with a trilobite (modern secular scientists believe lived 500 million years ago) between it’s toes. However, more complicated than that, earth should not have any sedimentary rocks at all, in which fossils are formed. It takes over a million years for the simplest sedimentary rocks, mudstones or sandstones, to form. So, there could be layers of soft silt and mud, like you find at the bottom of any lake, but not sedimentary rocks such as limestone, shale, sandstones, and mudstones.

But I want to get away from geology because this is about human evolution. If the earth (Aquinas’ Book II) was in agreement with how conservative Christians interpret Book I, there would be no human artifacts, bones, or fossils prior to the late neolithic period (4,000 BC). Not one. Certainly there should be no remains (bones or fossils) of any animals that occur between the linages of other animals and are not alive today. You might call these “transitional forms,” which is a very broad term.

In the case of humans, this Book II should have no fossils or remains that are not clearly apes as we have now (for example, a chimpanzee remains from six thousand years ago would be okay). Or clearly human remains. Different human races are okay, but not different species from homosapiens. This is what the world should look like if Book I, the Bible (the way conservatives interpret it) and Book II, nature were in agreement. I will end this perspective here, but I could extrapolate this into many pages of discussion.

But is that the way reality is? Next, I will look at the main evidential arguments conservative Christians have against evolution.

Mike