Richard Dawkins and Steven Fielding

ABC's Q&a had and interesting discusion. It revealed the conservative religious nature of Family First senator Steven Fielding.

I find it fascinating that a man who is has an engineering education could be swayed over politics and religion more so than the weight of evidence with science.

You can download the episode and see him in action here.

On a positive side I found it interesting that the majority of world religious believers, did believe in evolution. Ah, I'm in good company.

Tim Keller on Evolution

Interestingly some big names are starting to speak up on the Genisis/Evolution disscussion. Tim Kellor who makes a lot of sence to me writes that it does not necessarily mean a yes or no answer.
This comes from the white paper written by Tim Keller for the November workshop "In Search of a Theology of Celebration" is posted on the BioLogos web site: Creation, Evolution, and Christian Laypeople.
He gives three question and brief then followed by more detailed examples...

Question #1: If God used evolution to create, then we can’t take Genesis 1 literally, and if we can’t do
that, why take any other part of the Bible literally?

Answer: The way to respect the authority of the Biblical writers is to take them as they want to be
taken. Sometimes they want to be taken literally, sometimes they don’t. We must listen to them, not
impose our thinking and agenda on them.

Question#2: If biological evolution is true—does that mean that we are just animals driven by our
genes, and everything about us can be explained by natural selection?

Answer: No. Belief in evolution as a biological process is not the same as belief in evolution as a world-
view.

Question #3: If biological evolution is true and there was no historical Adam and Eve how can we know
where sin and suffering came from?

Answer: Belief in evolution can be compatible with a belief in an historical fall and a literal Adam and Eve. There are many unanswered questions around this issue and so Christians who believe God used evolution must be open to one another’s views.

I found it fascinating that he used C.S.Lewis as part of his detailed answer.

One of my favorite Christian writers (that’s putting it mildly), C.S.Lewis, did not believe in a literal Adam and Eve, and I do not question the reality or soundness of his personal faith.

(It also interests me that people like John Piper love to quote C.S.Lewis, yet I'd say for Piper a non-belief in a literal Adam and Eve would be heretical!)

I do like Keller's approach. It gives the reader some outs, as well as options. A freedom to think though things and not be boxed in. It does mean that a certain undoing or diminished importance of aspects of Scriptures which certainly if reading from Genesis has implied effects through out Scripture. This for some people will feel like shaky ground.

I wish I was given the option...

I wish I was given a few options when I was growing up within the Church. It seemed to me, at school as well as at church, there was only one answer to how the world began as a Christian. Creationism. I wish some one could have stopped and said 'Hey Scott' there are a few solutions to your pondering.
I've settled now on 'Theistic evolution", for the moment. Seems to fit and is regarded by most mainstream denominations as a viable option of belief for Christians.

Here is part of the blurb from the good old Wikipedia on theistic evolution::

Theistic evolutionists argue that it is inappropriate to use Genesis as a scientific text, since it was written in a pre-scientific age and originally intended for religious instruction; as such, seemingly chronological aspects of the creation accounts should be thought of in terms of a literary framework. Theistic evolutionists may believe that creation is not literally a week long process but a process beginning in the time of Genesis and continuing through all of time, including today. This view affirms that God created the world and was the primary causation of our being, while scientific changes such as evolution are part of "creatia continua" or continuing creation which is still occurring in the never ending process of creation.