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Christian Churches Celebrate Darwin's Birthday
kthejoker writes "Today is the 197th anniversary of the great biologist Charles Darwin's birth. In response, some 450 Christian churches are celebrating Darwin's birth, saying, 'Darwin`s theory of biological evolution is compatible with faith and that Christians have no need to choose between religion and science.' There's also an interesting perspective on Darwinism and Christianity in the San Jose Mercury News."
How Darwinian, huh?
Mod however your anger moves you to...
I'm glad to see in these comments that a large number of ./ readers believe that science and faith do not have to be at odds. There is a book called "The Science of God" by Gerald Schroeder, a physicist by trade, which argues this point. The author uses the writings of promenent scientists, theologians, and the Bible to show why he believes that science and religion form a duality. It's a good read, no matter which "camp" you're from.
Something that this book has led me to look into is the writings of Darwin, specifically "The Origin of the Species." The following two excerpts come from Darwin's closing remarks in "The Origin of the Species."
"Authors of the highest eminence seem to be fully satisfied with the view that each species has been independently created. To my mind it accords better with what we know of the laws impressed on matter by the Creator, that the production and extinction of the past and present inhabitants of the world should have been due to secondary causes, like those determining the birth and death of the individual."
"There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved."
In both cases, notice that Darwin himself noted the possibility of a Creator, some higher force that set the world in motion. Evolution as it is often thought of today is macro-evolution, something that Darwin never spoke of and something that, judging by his own writings, Darwin did not seem to believe. If anything, evidence points to Darwin being the first observer of what we now call "intelligent design." That is my just opinion on the matter based on my observations from the writing.
450 out of the literally thousands of protestant churches in the USA? How is this significant? I'm sure there are that many that support abortion too, but there are far more Christian churches that oppose both abortion and evolution.
I am a Christian. I believe that the world was created in 6 days. I believe that Jesus Christ was born of a virgin, and he lived a sinless life. He died on the cross at Calvary to save us from our sins. Part of the reason I believe as I do is that I can see the complexity and the order in the world around me, and I cannot force myself to accept that it was all by mere chance, as the evolutionary theory would have me believe.
I also have absolutely no problem with people that want to say what they believe. Voltaire once said: "I may disagree with everything you say, but I would fight to the death to defend your right to say it."
The problem that I see most often here on Slashdot is the people that simply say things like 'you're an idiot if you don't believe ______' every time a controversial subject arises (and yes, to those of you that would argue otherwise, this is a controversial subject, or it wouldn't have made it to the front page of Slashdot, and we wouldn't be sitting here on our duffs typing responses back and forth).
Another problem that I see is that people refuse to believe that scientific data is interpretative (i.e., it's not easy [if it's possible at all] to prove what caused _____). The Christian scientist first accepts what he believes about the Bible, and then interprets the scientific data in one way. This is not unusual, however, as the evolutionary scientist accepts what he believes from the teachings of Darwin first, and then interprets the scientific data in another way.
Finally, it irritates me that people see and hear the ramblings of Pat Robertson, and claim that he is the representative of the entire Fundamentalist movement. This fact can also be seen in other sects of Christianity. Take the Catholic church for example: the vadican has made it clear in recent years that it does not see evolution and Catholicism to be mutually exclusive. However, many of the Catholics that I have spoken to disagree whole-heartedly.
How the hell did this get modded insightful?
He just flamed the parent, accusing him of not backing up his statements, while none of his statemens themselves were proven. Seems he's railing against creationists as zealously and blindly as they rail against the 'heresy' of evolutionary theory.
It's nice to see that educated, scientific people have evolved beyond discrimination based on religious or social beliefs.
Jerk.
Since Hitler is all over this thread, let me use a Hitler analogy: should we not have attacked Germany to bring down Hitler because of the innocent German civilian casualties that were caused?
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.