This is the submission (click on link below) we made to the petitions committee in response to Secular Scotland’s attempt to bring creationism wars to Scotland and to use this to attack Christianity. It was good that this was read out at the committee. The petition has now been referred to the education committee – where we will continue to make representations. Prayer appreciated….
Click to access PE1530_TT_Free_Church_of_Scotland_23.01.15.pdf
You can see the short discussion they had and the citation of our letter here – go to 49:30 for the start of it – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFLMM9fjXek
An important point being made is the welfare of pupils and students. Something sadly that elements of both secular activism or religious fundamentalism fail to prioritise. It never ceases to be astonishing how for some their passion for political and personal gain that can be had from winning such arguments outweighs being of service to community and society.
David
Could you please explain exactly what you would have our schools teach? You appear to reject the “young earth creation” model despite the Genesis accounts and more importantly, Luke’s genealogies which both support this view.
You therefore seem to accept the “old earth” model, which is based on a scientific dating timescale espoused by secular humanists, empirical naturalists and militant atheists.
So if God created the universe 13.8 billion years ago, then the earth 9.3 billion years later, at which point did he create man? Did he start a process of guided evolution with the creation of RNA and DNA and then intercede on occasions such as the Cambrian Explosion some 520 million years ago?
If man was not a product of this gradual evolution from a common ancestor, at which point did God create Adam and Eve? Was it in accordance with a Biblical chronology of some 6 thousand years or was it the 350,000 science states for Homo Sapiens?
If the latter, how can the stories of the Fall and the early patriarchs have any validity with the catastrophic implications for Christian atoning theology?
If the former, the SSS are surely right to ridicule the notion of 13.8 billion years of completely un-necessary evolution, mass extinctions and tectonic upheaval for God then to place the very purpose of creation on the resultant earth
Jon – its not too difficult. I would quite like our schools to teach science in science classes not philosophy or religion. Using science to promote atheism is wrong. I would also like people to be free to question, and not have a state approved doctrine for which you get fired if you dare to question it. By the way I reject the young earth accounts BECAUSE of the Genesis account – not in spite of it. I find it very dangerous when Christians start arguing the bible is true because my understanding of science says so – and then when there understanding of science is proved wrong, they are logically compelled to give up the Bible. I don’t see the Bible as a science text book – although I do see it as true in everything it affirms.
David
But what Luke affirms is completely irreconcilable with 13.9 billion years. Allowing for “gaps’ in his genealogy simply makes a mockery of exegesis. The majority of “old earth” Christians are informed by the scientific consensus and we are straight back to whether mankind evolved as part of this, or was created entirely separately.
You cannot avoid the question of religion in a science class so long as you don’t answer directly the obvious contradiction secularists can then justifiably raise.
Jon, What makes a mockery of exegesis is to try and make a passage say something it does not. Luke’s genealogy is nothing to do with the age of the earth. It is not how the Hebrews wrote history.
David
Please explain why Luke cannot be used to date God’s creation. Luke may not have written it for that purpose, but his reliability as a Biblical historian allied with a genealogy that agrees closely with Genesis 5 & 11 means it is a perfectly reasonable tool for such a purpose. If you adhere to an earth history of 4.5 billions years, it is surely informed by secular naturalists or is it just a coincidence your reading of Genesis agrees with this figure.
Jon – because that is not what it does or was intended for. Don’t read into the Bible what is not there. And yes my view of gravity, electricity, atomic particles and the age of the earth is informed by science – not the bible. The bible is not a science text book – nor is an compendium of everything. Please don’t try to make the Bible say what it does not. Adding to the scriptures is as dangerous as taking away from them.