Creation Science Reviews
Creation Ministries International Daily Feature
Is Evolution Driving Clergy to Atheism?
24 April 2014
Review by Greg Neyman
Old Earth Ministries
Review Published 26 April 2014
Creation Ministries International's website published a book review of Caught in the Pulpit: Leaving Belief Behind.1 While it is clear that atheists are using this book to argue against the faith, we disagree with CMI about what is causing the exodus.
As CMI reports, the authors have discovered that many in the church:
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have rejected the historicity of the genesis account including that Adam and Eve were real people
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have accepted long ages and evolution as fact;
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now deny Christ's Diety.
To CMI, these are serious problems within the church. True, it is a problem when people reject the Genesis account and deny Christ's Diety, but one can accept long ages and/or evolution, and belief in the Bible with no problems.
CMI questions why church leaders are, in their words, abandoning the faith. The article gives several excerpts, including the following one from Richard Dawkins:
"If the evidence before your eyes doesn't support a belief, you cannot will yourself to believe it anyway."
Dawkins is referring to clergy who, upon viewing scientific evidence, must deny the Bible in favor of the science. He says the clergy cannot will themselves to believe the Bible. Ironically, this is exactly what young earth creationists do! Despite the evidence against a young earth, YEC's will themselves to believe it anyway. YEC's have been trained to ignore any scientific evidence that is contrary to a young earth (see Morton's Demon).
The article continues on, with many quotes, with the main theme being that clergy belief in evolution is causing them to fall from the faith. Why are these preachers losing their faith over evolution? They have been taught that either you believe evolution, or you believe the Bible, but not both. That's the message that young earth ministries have been promoting for decades. Evolution is incompatible with the Bible...either you believe one or the other.
This is a tragedy that could have been prevented. It is a fact that many Christians believe in both evolution and the Bible, with no conflict. For example, the famous theologian C.S. Lewis was a theistic evolutionist. So is Dr. Bob Bakker, the famous paleontologist seen on many science documentaries (and preacher). Today we have millions of Christians who believe both. Unfortunately, our clergy have fallen under the spell of doubt created by the rantings of young earth creationists. That being said, I'm sure that many of these clergy, when they are faced with this dilemma, have researched theistic evolution, and for some reason have come to reject it as a possibility. While I cannot speak as to why they would reject theistic evolution, I can only guess that the YEC voices in their heads outweigh the theological options of accepting theistic evolution.
This is a problem that has a simple, but not easy, solution...silence YEC within the church, and let people know that they can believe in both evolution and the Bible. If you know of someone who has doubts, start by referring them to the theistic evolution website BioLogos. Or, if they doubt evolution, they may find a belief in progressive creationism to be the answer, in which case, refer them to Reasons to Believe. Bottom line...we need to let people know that you can believe in both the Bible and billions of years.
The answer to the question "Is evolution driving clergy to atheism" is no. Young earth creationism, with its "either/or" teaching, is the real culprit.
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1 http://creation.com/caught-in-the-pulpit
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