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One unfortunate result of the outspokenness of creationists holding to the young earth position is that most people now assume that all who believe God created the universe must subscribe to the young earth view and, worse yet, that the Bible directly states that the earth and all its life forms were created in six consecutive 24-hour days. Because of the implausibility of such a position, many reject the Bible out of hand without seriously investigating its message or even reading for themselves the relevant passages.¹

1. Ross, Hugh The Fingerprint of God(New Kensington, Whitaker House; 1989)p. 144

“Christians should be comfortable with methodological naturalism in the natural sciences simply because God himself is sovereign over all of life.”(Jeeves, Berry 1998: 64)

--As opposed to the Creation Science model, this author puts forth the idea that since God’s creation is separate from Him, there is no danger in using a naturalistic model to learn about this creation. Before going any further, I need to define terms:

1.Methodological Naturalism: Methodologically studying the natural workings of the cosmos to seek to know and understand the workings of the cosmos. Cosmos here covers everything from the smallest sub-atomic particles to the universe itself. (This is directly contrasted with the preferred method of the Creation Scientist who jumps to God to fill any gaps that they have not yet figured out.)

2.Naturalism: This is the view that everything can be explained through only natural means.

Many in the creationist camp want to devalue methodological naturalism because there are some both inside and outside of the scientific community who come at all of life from an only naturalistic view. The problem with throwing out all the findings of science because some scientists are committed to only naturalism is foolish, and futher, it is a very un-Christian viewpoint. The Christian view is by definition not scared of what may be found out about this world that God created. If all truth is actually God’s truth, then there is actually nothing to fear. Once again, this is not to say that critique of all things, science included, is not important but rather that a Christian is not being a Christian by disagreeing with scientific findings based only on a priori conclusions.

There are historical, though not religious, reasons why many Christians choose to reject methodological naturalism. These three names should shed some light on the matter: Charles Hodge, Thomas Henry Huxley, and Bishop Samuel Wilberforce. Charles Hodge of Princeton was the one who first claimed that evolution was equivalent with atheism. Thomas Henry Huxley was a committed anti-ecclesiast who found in evolution a reason to argue against moral law, and Christianity. In Britain, it was his arguments with Bishop Wilberforce that led strongly to the apparent dichotomy between Christianity and Science. Since methodological naturalism was both equated with atheism, and used to argue against Christianity, it has been a difficult pill for many Christians to swallow. But swallow it we must.

Methodological Naturalism takes seriously the Christian message that God created a rational cosmos and learning about it is worth our time. There is so much more to cover under this topic, but I actually want people to read rather than skim, so I will stop here.

There are many ways that one can approach the interpretation of Genesis, not all of which are warranted by the text or experience. Those today who would wish to forward the view that Genesis has been and can only be interpreted within a particular tradition's view of literalism is patently wrong. There are no portions of Genesis that demand to be taken in a scientific¹, literal view. But to further muddy the waters, those that have a high view of scripture do believe that though Genesis is not speaking scientifically (according to modern views of science), it does make the implicit claim to be speaking historically (even so, not necessarily according to the rules of modern history).

This of course begs that question of how then we should approach this important document written most likely by the Moses of Jewish antiquity? We should approach it as a historical document that claims to be giving a history of the Jewish nation that tied that nation in with the creation of the world. The first important step in placing Genesis according to this approach is looking at its implicit goals.

Though obviously debatable², my brief summary of the goals of Genesis can be separated into two parts. First, the God of Israel was giving to Moses a history of the Israelites that tied them into the original creation of the world. Secondly, Genesis functioned as a more recent history of the Jewish people from Abraham on. Furthermore, the next four books after Genesis chronicle the change from Israel as the sons for Jacob (Israel) to a Nation chosen out of slavery, by God, to be blessed and be a blessing.

Since the overall purpose of Genesis is to discuss beginnings (genesis), it is fitting that it would discuss ultimate beginnings in and through the Creator. This was especially significant because it separated the Jews out from all other cultures on earth. Their claim carried more conceit than any other. Genesis was explicit: their God was the same God that brought this world into existence. This can be called, to distinguish it simply from theism, "Creational Monotheism." This new culture thus redeemed as children of God, through the Exodus, was given divine laws and a history through Moses. This history served not just as an accurate, disinterested history, but as the framework for their society, religion, and life.

The structure of the Creation act has been broken down, dissected, disavowed circumvented and written off, but at the heart it is a narrative, like other creation narratives of antiquity. There are some important notes to keep in mind as approaching the creation narrative in the Torah, for starters, there is repetition, not quite to the point of poetry, but perhaps closer to hymnody. Secondly, the repetition and importance of particular numbers give added and expanded significance. Lastly, there is a key difference between this narrative and all other creation accounts from antiquity: Monotheism.

My belief is that this account should be taken seriously for what it was: a narrative confirming that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob was also the creator of the cosmos. But it should not be taken to refer to the method that God used to create. Using this account as a guidebook for the creation of the world is forcing the text into spaces it was never meant to occupy.

After looking at the purpose and scope of the account of Genesis, I am not forced to delegate all of science to the rubbish bin. Rather, after looking again at Genesis, I can affirm the wonder and beauty of the created world and our unique ability to understand its rationality.

*Though this information is original and I am alone to be blamed for errors, inconsistencies and poor writing, many ideas were gleaned from: Wright, Richard. “Biology: Through the Eyes of Faith,” (1989, New York).

1.Those that attempt to assert that the Bible should be taken literally/scientifically, come to difficulties and of interpretation that necessitate even greater conspiracies about modern science. For evidence, see: http://www.geocentricity.com/

2.If you disagree, please chronicle those disagreements!

Yesterday, I came down pretty hard on dualism, specifically religiously sanctioned dualism. Today, I would like to take a step back and explain one kind of "dualism" that I think is actually important for the religious mind, seeing an action through different lenses.

This specifically addresses the interaction between science and religion. There are those who would say that if evolution, for instance, is true, than God doesn't exist. Interestingly, the same was said about the sun rotating around the earth at the time of Galileo. The biggest reason both then and now for this scientific/religious seeming dichotomy is a fundamentalist/literal reading of the Bible as a religious and scientific book. Now, due to years of incontrovertable scientific data, we no longer believe for instance that the sun literally rises and sets. But liguistically we still call the approximately 24 hour rotation of the earth, a day and we still refer to the "rising" and the "setting" of the sun, regardless of the actual scientific accuracy of the statements. We do have different lenses that we view the world through, in this case linguistically (metaphorically) and scientifically. And both are equally valid when properly understood. The same should be understood when discussing religious and scientific causes. (God sustains the universe/gravity sustains the universe . . .)

There are three reasons I bring up the specific example of Galileo and rotation: the first relates to the way that the Church treated Galileo at the time of his discovery. The trials that he went through used the same kinds of arguments as the current debate about evolution. But all they succeeded in doing was delineated a god who was not the creator of anything as majestic as our solar system, but rather a great illusionist. The second reason I bring up the example of Galileo is because today no one (well almost) would argue against his basic, simple premise about the vastness of creation beyond this earth. The third and final reason relates to a dualism of language. We can say that God created the world all we want, but if the only basis for our claim is the "fact" that evolution didn't happen, than we have created a small god who is slowly being "gapped" out. Each new discovery that shows more of biologically irreducibly complex systems to be reducible will be like one more part of creation God "didn't create."

So how does this dualistic language work out without simple, rational contradictions? The answer has filled many books from "Finding Darwins God" by the respected microbiologist and Catholic Kenneth Miller to a small library written byJohn F. Haught. I can't say anything about Haught's books, but here is a review that I gave on "Finding Darwin's God." Of course there are many other authors writing on this subject as well. (Credit should here go to Chad Is Not Enough, since his blog reminded me that I wished to post on this topic.)

God did create the earth, but just because we can explain physically how that happens does not diminish God's creation, rather the opposite could easily be argued.

Simply saying that because we can't explain . . . and thus God did it, ceases to be either a valid or helpful argument. We have taken science out or its realm and placed scientific limits on God. The god of the gaps may have worked for the greek gods, but it has no place when talking about the creator.