Creationists unwittingly aiding atheist efforts

Lyzandra Daria
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Creationists unwittingly aiding atheist efforts

 

Creationists Drive Young People out of the Church

 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/karl-giberson-phd/creationists-and-young-christians_b_1096839.html

 

Survey results recently reported by Christianity Today clarify once again the sober truth thatevangelicals are not making much progress in accepting well-established mainstream scientific ideas about origins. Particularly disturbing is the finding that only 27 percent of evangelical pastors "strongly disagree" with the statement that the earth is 6,000 years old. A higher number "strongly agree" that the earth is just 6,000 years old, a conclusion supported by mountains of evidence. Seven in 10 evangelical pastors "strongly disagree" that "God used evolution to create people."

Also out this fall is a survey by the Barna Group, a Christian polling organization, explaining why most evangelical Christians "disconnect either permanently or for an extended period of time from church life after age 15." It turns out that science is a major factor. Barna identified six reasons for the disconnection:

1. Churches seem overprotective.
2. Teens and 20-somethings' experience of Christianity is shallow.
3. Churches come across as antagonistic to science.
4. Young Christians' church experiences related to sexuality are often simplistic, judgmental.
5).They wrestle with the exclusive nature of Christianity.
6. The church feels unfriendly to those who doubt.

Barna elaborates on item three -- Churches come across as antagonistic to science -- as follows:

One of the reasons young adults feel disconnected from church or from faith is the tension they feel between Christianity and science. The most common of the perceptions in this arena is "Christians are too confident they know all the answers" (35%). Three out of ten young adults with a Christian background feel that "churches are out of step with the scientific world we live in" (29%). Another one-quarter embrace the perception that "Christianity is anti-science" (25%). And nearly the same proportion (23%) said they have "been turned off by the creation-versus-evolution debate." Furthermore, the research shows that many science-minded young Christians are struggling to find ways of staying faithful to their beliefs and to their professional calling in science-related industries.

I have been teaching science to evangelical college students for more than 25 years, and all this rings true. The students in my classes have had hundreds of hours of religious education growing up before they came to college. Most of them attended Sunday School regularly, listened to sermons at least once a week, spent time at summer Bible camps and weekends away with their youth groups. They read religious books, watched religious videos and subscribed to religious magazines (or, as is more likely, were given gift subscriptions by relatives).

Many evangelicals grow up in a sort of "parallel culture," running alongside and often at odds with the larger, secular culture. The educational component of this parallel culture, which Randall Stephens and I describe in detail in "The Anointed: Evangelical Truth in a Secular Age," contains strategies and techniques for undermining and even challenging secular culture, particularly science. Young earth creationist Ken Ham is the best and most influential example of this. In videos and writings that are widely consumed by evangelicals, he encourages students to ask their science teachers "Were you there?" when they talk about the past. The biology teacher says "Life first appeared on earth about 4 billion years ago," and the student is to ask "Were you there?" The physics teacher says "The universe originated in a Big Bang almost 14 billion years ago" and the students is to ask "Were you there?"

In a recent piece titled "Nine Year Old Challenges Nasa," Ham blogged proudly about "Emma B" who, when told that a NASA moon rock was 3.75 billion years old, asked "Were you there?"

The suggestion that scientists cannot speak about the past unless "they were there" is a strange claim. The implication is that we cannot do something as simple as count tree rings and confidently declare "This great pine was standing here 2,000 years ago." As a philosophy of science, such a restriction would completely rule out the scientific study of the past. This, of course, is precisely what the creationists want.

Many bright evangelical young people are, fortunately, not impressed with the suggestion that only "eyewitnesses" can speak about the past. Just this past spring I taught an honors seminar on science and religion at an evangelical college. The class included a couple of bright students who had grown up in fundamentalist churches that showed Ken Ham videos in their Sunday School class. Both of them recalled the encouragement to ask their teachers "Were you there?" And both of them, a few years older and wiser than "Emma B," thought this suggestion was ridiculous and wondered what kind of ideas required the embrace of such nonsense on their behalf. These students -- in fact, most of the students I have had over the years -- will graduate from college accepting contemporary science and its various explanations for what has happened in the past. But unless the leadership in their churches does a better job with its teaching ministry, such students will have a hard time returning to their home churches.

The dismissive and even hostile approach to science taken by evangelical leaders like Ken Ham accounts for the Barna finding above. In the name of protecting Christianity from a secularism perceived as corrosive to the faith, the creationists are unwittingly driving the best and brightest evangelicals out of the church -- or at least into the arms of the compromising Episcopalians, whom they despise. What remains after their exodus is an even more intellectually impoverished parallel culture, with even fewer resources to think about complex issues.

 

 

"Faith must have adequate evidence else it is mere superstition"...Alexander Hodge (1823-1886)

"A myth is a religion in which no one any longer believes"...James Feibleman (1904-1987)

Respectfully, Lyz


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Lyzandra Daria

Lyzandra Daria wrote:

FurryCatHerder wrote:

You might want to look up theory regarding the origins of mitochondria --

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endosymbiotic_theory

The rest was tongue-in-cheek.

 

Might not. 

Unless it can be proved that an alien species mated with early hominids...don't care.

 

Unless you're a Biblical Literalist (G-d created Adam, then took a rib from Adam and created Eve ...) , I'm not sure why you don't care what comes before genus homo.

Creationism, as commonly presented, isn't just anti-Science, it's also un-scriptural.  Who are we to declare =how= G-d does a thing?  I think Job 38:21 is the answer to Creationists --

Quote:
Surely you know, for you were already born! You have lived so many years!

G-d can be sarcastic about such things ....

"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."


Lyzandra Daria
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A biblical literalist?

 Sure...right...me a biblical literalist.  

Do I believe that the writers of the Torah and New Testament were literally mentally ill? yes.

Do I believe that the writers of the Torah plagerized myths from Babylonia and included them in their written holy book? yes.

Do I believe that the authors of the New Testament were literally misogynists? yes

Do I believe that some nut job named Mohammed was literally a lying, thief and pedophile, who ordered genocide, murders, rapes, endorsed slavery and the abuse of women and children? yes

Do I believe that Judaism, Christianity and Islam are literally superstitions that all trace their originator as one Abraham? yes

Do I believe that the divinity of all three of these superstitions is a literal figment of imagination? yes

There is no proof of god, yahweh, jehovah, allah, or any of their agents, Jesus, angels, holey ghost.

>>>

 

 

 

"Faith must have adequate evidence else it is mere superstition"...Alexander Hodge (1823-1886)

"A myth is a religion in which no one any longer believes"...James Feibleman (1904-1987)

Respectfully, Lyz


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Lyzandra Daria

Lyzandra Daria wrote:

 Sure...right...me a biblical literalist. 

Work on the reading comprehension.

Normally it's the atheists suggesting someone study Science and the Evangelical Christians saying they won't.

I can usually tell the irrational haters when I say "Here's a scholarly science article" and get told "I'm not going to learn anything about that!!!" by an Atheist.  Well done.  Might I suggest you become a Southern Baptist?  You have that much in common with them.

"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."


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FurryCatHerder wrote:The

FurryCatHerder wrote:

The bigger irony is that neither Judaism nor Islam are as hostile towards Science as the Evangelical Christians are.  There's nothing wrong with a Jew or Muslim believing in the Big Bang =or= Evolution, and once again it would appear that the Church is going to enter a brand new age of Darkness while the other two Abrahamic faiths (ahem) don't ...

Yes they are, even Jews are hostile to science. Anyone who would think terrorizing and defacing an ice cream shop because of licking the cone is always a sexual connotation that should be forbid by law is nuts. Anyone ripping down a poster of a woman not covered up is nuts. Oh, those things didn't happen in Islam, they happened in Israel.

Scientists and psychologists don't see sex in everything. If these nutty Jews had any biological or psychological degrees at all they wouldn't do those things.

NOW again, please don't make this out to be labels. I am not talking about all religious people. I am talking about the fact that these books exist, and because there are people who read them who are not up with the times, and the fact that religious people like you coddle their superstition causes those individuals to stay stuck in the past.

The reason those Jews attacked that ice cream shop, and the Jews who tore down those posters, do it for the same reason Muslims force women to wear burkas. The same reason LDS women and children are treated like cattle and not individuals. Because these books were written by men, for men, for the men in power.

Those books do not teach anything about sexuality, or psychology or biology and they most certainly do not teach that you are allowed to disagree with the gods depicted in them who are male in their written literary sense.

PEOPLE, not gods, science, not gods, defy these traditions because people ignore or reject the social norms of that ignorant past, even if they are religious.

Our progress as a species has always been in spite of religion, not because of it. There have always had to be people dragging religion kicking and screaming into the future. Religion only survives because of marketing, not evidence.

 

 

 

"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog


Lyzandra Daria
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 Brian 37 wrote:"Religion

 Brian 37 wrote:

"Religion only survives because of marketing, not evidence."

>>>

Marketing to include sermons that portray horrific future for those who don't believe; fail to pray hard/loud enough; fail to perform the proscribed rituals on a regular basis (including tithing) or dare to question/use their own mental capacity to discern that the whole 'religion' is nothing but a scam to control the (easily deluded) masses.  

>>>

 

 

"Faith must have adequate evidence else it is mere superstition"...Alexander Hodge (1823-1886)

"A myth is a religion in which no one any longer believes"...James Feibleman (1904-1987)

Respectfully, Lyz


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Brian37 wrote:FurryCatHerder

Brian37 wrote:

FurryCatHerder wrote:

The bigger irony is that neither Judaism nor Islam are as hostile towards Science as the Evangelical Christians are.  There's nothing wrong with a Jew or Muslim believing in the Big Bang =or= Evolution, and once again it would appear that the Church is going to enter a brand new age of Darkness while the other two Abrahamic faiths (ahem) don't ...

Yes they are, even Jews are hostile to science. Anyone who would think terrorizing and defacing an ice cream shop because of licking the cone is always a sexual connotation that should be forbid by law is nuts. Anyone ripping down a poster of a woman not covered up is nuts. Oh, those things didn't happen in Islam, they happened in Israel.

Scientists and psychologists don't see sex in everything. If these nutty Jews had any biological or psychological degrees at all they wouldn't do those things.

I wish what you're suggesting about Jews With Degrees were true, but it's not.  Well-educated Jews have their own forms of nuttiness!

"Obviously I'm convinced of the existence of G-d. I'm equally convinced that Atheists who've led good lives will be in Olam HaBa going "How the heck did I wind up in this place?!?" while Christians who've treated people like dirt will be in some other place asking the exact same question."


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Creation science and the act of repetition . . . .

 

   

Quote:
Fundies grow up in a sort of "parallel culture," running alongside and often at odds with the larger, secular culture. The educational component of this parallel culture, which Randall Stephens and I describe in detail in "The Anointed: Evangelical Truth in a Secular Age," contains strategies and techniques for undermining and even challenging secular culture, particularly science. Young earth creationist Ken Ham is the best and most influential example of this. In videos and writings that are widely consumed by evangelicals, he encourages students to ask their science teachers "Were you there?" when they talk about the past. The biology teacher says "Life first appeared on earth about 4 billion years ago," and the student is to ask "Were you there?" The physics teacher says "The universe originated in a Big Bang almost 14 billion years ago" They are to say . .

 
   I actually sat down and read the ""NewsLetter" of the ICR from 1991-1996 (must have been on a rainy day.).   From within them you saw every "miracle" not only had a Supernatural agency, but was a supernatural event.    No explanations were required.   To paraphrase  an Akkadian source,  sort of: "The ways of the gods are 'deep waters', who can know them?"   Something must have broken down; the process or act of imparting knowledge seemed ever impeded with this stubborn eccentricity (ie - 'Ken Ham'-ian  understanding  to the OT),.  And I unearthed surprisingly the same level of scornfulness was to be leveled at their own christian colleges as well .
 

 
 

 =====

I like pauljohntheskeptic's quote  "the 1st mistake a believer makes is attributing something as not understood to be a miracle in the 1st place "

 

 

 

 

 

 


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Lyzandra Daria

Lyzandra Daria wrote:

 

Creationists Drive Young People out of the Church

 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/karl-giberson-phd/creationists-and-young-christians_b_1096839.html

 

 

Survey results recently reported by Christianity Today clarify once again the sober truth thatevangelicals are not making much progress in accepting well-established mainstream scientific ideas about origins. Particularly disturbing is the finding that only 27 percent of evangelical pastors "strongly disagree" with the statement that the earth is 6,000 years old. A higher number "strongly agree" that the earth is just 6,000 years old, a conclusion supported by mountains of evidence. Seven in 10 evangelical pastors "strongly disagree" that "God used evolution to create people."

Also out this fall is a survey by the Barna Group, a Christian polling organization, explaining why most evangelical Christians "disconnect either permanently or for an extended period of time from church life after age 15." It turns out that science is a major factor. Barna identified six reasons for the disconnection:

1. Churches seem overprotective.
2. Teens and 20-somethings' experience of Christianity is shallow.
3. Churches come across as antagonistic to science.
4. Young Christians' church experiences related to sexuality are often simplistic, judgmental.
5).They wrestle with the exclusive nature of Christianity.
6. The church feels unfriendly to those who doubt.

One of the reasons young adults feel disconnected from church or from faith is the tension they feel between Christianity and science. The most common of the perceptions in this arena is "Christians are too confident they know all the answers" (35%). Three out of ten young adults with a Christian background feel that "churches are out of step with the scientific world we live in" (29%). Another one-quarter embrace the perception that "Christianity is anti-science" (25%). And nearly the same proportion (23%) said they have "been turned off by the creation-versus-evolution debate." Furthermore, the research shows that many science-minded young Christians are struggling to find ways of staying faithful to their beliefs and to their professional calling in science-related industries.

I posted a similar article last year which said Christianity is losing followers at an alarming rate. People are tired of the bullshit being pushed and realize that people who really say the Earth is 6000 years old are nothing more than crackheads.

I predict that as more time passes all religions will eventually die because NONE of them can keep their promises. Those which do not make outrageous claims will also lose followers over time because nothing will be satisfying.

Even those other religions, such as Islam and Judaism will eventually collapse; eventually the world will become completely atheist.