In the education section of the Independent this week is this article, about a creationist group trying to push an information pack onto British schools. Now while this is a big problem in America (though fortunately the tide seems to be turning against them), here in Britain we have so far escaped the worst idiocies of this movement*. That doesn't mean we don't have to be vigilant. Unlike the USA, there is no separation of church and state. Anglican bishops sit in the House of Lords. The Queen is Head of the Church, and is therefore a religious leader as well as a secular one. She is the equal of the Pope and the Dalai Lama. The UK is technically a theocracy, though most people will shrug and say, "Whatever." Fundamentalists are regarded as cranks, and creationists are lumped with other loonies such as Flat Earthers, Scientologists and Iridologists**.
Creationists see themselves as doing God's work, which is getting everybody to worship Jesus as fervently as themselves. The Theory of Evolution is a major obstacle because it is logically incompatible with the Creation account in Genesis. Without Genesis, there is no Original Sin, therefore no need for the Crucifixion. This renders Christianity meaningless.
The creationists can't push their literal version of Genesis directly, because most people consider it a myth. Therefore, they must first sow the seeds of doubt by getting schoolchildren to question evolution by putting forward arguments that some biological structures are so complex, they couldn't have evolved naturally and therefore it's reasonable to assume they were designed. By whom? Oh...a creator.
If you press a creationist to define what he means by a creator, it becomes obvious that he's not talking about an Arisian*** or a Flying Spaghetti Monster. There's only one creator he wants you to know about, and that's the one written about in Genesis.
These (dis)Information packs need to be shot down in flames and banned from science classes. If they are included in Religious Education classes, they need to be ridiculed and scorned, as an example of the foolish things some people believe.
*The 'bowel' is implied.
**Sorry, couldn't resist.
***Literary reference to EE'Doc'Smith's Lensman books.
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2 comments:
Hi Deacon
Since you are discussing religion I thught that I should put a few words in being the devil in carnate in Edinburgh.
People who take the bible literally are stupid. And I mean that folks. For example take Revalations and the famoous number of the beast which is 666. Now I am not an expert in this, but I believe that Hebrew letters have numerical values. Working backwards with these numbers towards a word from 666 spells out Nero.
Who was the Roman Emperor just before the writing of Revalations...Nero. Who also had the nickname of Beast ... Nero. Who wiped out ever so many early Christians on the Cross ... Nero.
So perhaps Revalations was a coded attack on the ruling power of the time nb Rome?
But the same folks that would teach us that the world was created in 7 days would probably also tell us that Revalations leads to the end of the world. So lets ask a few questions about Creationists. They decry Darwin. Why because the bible says that the world cwas created in seven days.
But wait the bible does not say this. Our translated bible says this. The origional word that was used in the first bible text simply means period of time. Does this mean that the writer of Genisus was in favour of Darwin - no. But niether was he saying that the world was created in 7 days, only that God made the world. Which with modern science and Darwinism means that in fact we do not have a contradiction as Darwin says that life was created and evolved over a period of time...
Am I a Christian - Yes. That means I believe in God etc. But I thinkl that almost all Religions including my own are completly wrong. They were created by people trying within the context of thier lifes and times to explain everything. You have to look within the context of the time as to what was written. That however does not mean that there was not a creator somwhere, somtime out there. Things are just to complex for there not to be one. Look at how infinite the Universe is, then add in String theory for the Multiverse, then look down as well as up ... Our feeble little minds can't even begin to understand it all. Buut it works like clock work - so order must have somthing behind it.
Mark.
Hi Mark, I agree with you about 666 possibly referring to Nero. I also feel that a lot of the cultural references made by John of Patmos were instantly recognisable to his audience as coded or allegorical references to contemporary persons and institutions, but because we don't share those references, Revelation becomes obscure, and reinterpreted by modern christians as referring to the present day.
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