Today I came across an article that both encouraged me, and surprised me that it would be a major media outlet: 'Almost a Thousand Major Scientists Dissent from Darwin!'[1] Well that add a bright spot to my day, although it doesn't change my beliefs. I've always thought that Darwin was a few cells short. I have never believed in evolution to the extent that my gggggggggggggggggggggggggggggreat uncle was a monkey, and so although its neat that so many scientists have stepped forward, its not a proof positive that I've ever searched for. Now I will agree that from time to time I run across an individual who seems to have skeletal similarities or intelligence somewhat lagging behind the apes, that hardly means they have to claim we're family. While we're on the subject of science, let me present you with another serious doubt that I have, [not being a scientist this probably doesn't carry any weight] 'carbon dating.' I've always been a skeptic of it and figure that probably one day we'll find out the whole process is messed up, or scientists in different places have high-jacked the process to say what they wanted it too.
Then I came across an article: 'Religion, prayer and government.' Now its always interesting to read about prayer and government, because we have such a difficult time with it, and we're such hypocrites. I like one of the first sentences in the piece, 'At the same time the framers of the Constitution were creating separation between the church and state, they were staring legislative meetings with religious invocations and allocating money for Christian missions to Native Americans.' This issue had never truthfully bothered me much; if there was prayer in school and the teacher had prayer before my children's classes, to be honest with you I would be somewhat concerned ........... who is offering the prayer? what are the words that are being prayed? I worry about such things because misguided prayer can be more harmful than no prayer - though I've never been a strict seperatist. Lately though as I've been delving into my spiritual roots I learned that the Anabaptist movement that I'm descended from was for seperation of church and state; and the more I become engaged in the controversy the more I am appreciating their point of view. America, as I view it, was established as a place where religion could be practiced freely, and we need to be careful with freedom. My freedom does not entitle me to step on yours, nor does yours entitle you to enfrenge on mine - but let both enjoy the same freedom in respect and peace. Perhaps what it really comes down to is that its not really a church vs. government issue, but more a church vs. religion issue?
Can the Christian, the Jew, the Muslim, etc. etc., enjoy, worship and live peacefully in the same state? I find it offensive to my soul, to my profession when anyone [Christian, Jew, Muslim, etc., etc.]abuses the privilege of praying before a government entity to preach or push their doctrinal agenda, and then when opposition crops up, our faith becomes a jihad. This is probably not a very popular stand, even in my own church ... but perhaps its time to stop complaining and just start living our beliefs. God doesn't need me to defend himself, he's done pretty well without me for quite some time, matter of fact inspite of what evolutionists think, since creation! So we'll continue to haggle over opening with prayer, rather we can manger scenes on our courtyards or crosses along the road on state owned land ... and who can and who can't do what, all in a clumsy search for who we are and why we're here.
I have a not-so-secret suspicion that the conflict is kept aflame by innocents being used as fodder; the parent who uses their child to complain to the school board, the outside how passes through town and sees a manger scene, the individual who has no faith offended because someone else does ......... when the Constitution writes about
'establishing a religion' I don't think our founding fathers thought voicing a prayer or singing a hymn quite qualified - oh, the trouble they'd saved us if they just taken a few more minutes to figure this out. ... but then again maybe its to our advantage they stopped where they did ...... I'm so confused. I'm sitting at my desk in my office, so perhaps I'm going to go close my blinds and prayer about it. [2]
[1] 'Almost a Thousand Major Scientists Dissent from Darwin!' Canada Free Press
[2] 'Religion, prayer and government' Los Angeles Times
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The religion in public life debate has been conflated to a point where it is unrecognizable. I think the founders wanted the government to stay out of it, but at the same time, did not care about public displays of faith by individuals, either.
ReplyDeleteLike you, I'd be concerned about prayers offered officially in a public school setting for the reasons you cite. Yet, by the same token, things like generic prayers before football games and the like don't offend me in the slightest.
Of course, my answer was to pony up the change to send my kids to a parochial school where I know the theology they're getting and where religious practice is not something to be ashamed of. In truth, I always figured my kids' spiritual welfare was my responsibility, not anyone else's.
As for Darwin, Natural Selection is easy enough to prove. Drop 10 brown rabbits and 10 white rabbits in the Arctic and eventually you'll have just white rabbits.
The problem is, (and has always been), that scientists jumped from there to the "life from the ooze" conclusion, a conclusion which flies in the face of a boatload of other proven theories, i.e. The Second Law Of Thermodynamics to name one.
Life ex nihilo, according to proponents like Richard Dawkins relies on "the magic of large numbers." (Dawkins' word choice, my emphasis.) That is, no matter how improbable it is, it must be the explanation because we determine at the outside that a Creator is not even a possibility.
Cheers.