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From: laura@utcsstat.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: Not about abortion
Message-ID: <789@utcsstat.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 18-Jul-83 14:56:13 EDT
Article-I.D.: utcsstat.789
Posted: Mon Jul 18 14:56:13 1983
Date-Received: Mon, 18-Jul-83 18:57:15 EDT
References: <383@qubix.UUCP>
Organization: U. of Toronto, Canada
Lines: 39

Larry Bickford writes:

	"Theistic evolution" is an insult both to creation and evolution. The
	main purpose of evolution is to show God isn't necessary for the
	variety that exists. And if God is so weak that He needs evolution,
	and then tells me in His Book He created things, what kind of God is
	that? I wouldn't want Him! 

This is a very bad thing. It enforces the idea that you must either believe in
God, or believe in evolution, but not both. This simply is not true.

There are plenty of Christians who believe in evolution, and there are also
non-Christians who believe in both God and evolution.

Evolution is an aesthetically pleasing theory which fits the facts of
observed nature. God, by definition, can create the world any way he
wants. If he decided to set everything up and let evolution take over,
that would not diminish from his greatness. Evolution exists as a theory,
like all other scientific theories, to explain the observable universe.
Darwin and Wallace independently came up with the theory of Evolution
based on their own observations in "Natural History" (which is what
science was called at that time). Nobody comes up with a theory to
challenge the existence of God. That the theory of evolution can be
used to disprove the literal interpretation of the Bible is not the very
same thing as saying that the main purpose of evolution is to disprove the
existence of God. You could as easily say that the main purpose of atomic
theory is to blow people to bits with bombs, or to provide efficient
generators of cheap energy.                  

The great harm is in enforcing a belief that you can believe in God or
evolution. By isolating both camps from each other it is no wonder that
the rocks start flying when the camps finally meet up with each other.

I have heard a lot of bad biology from the Creationists, and a lot of
bad theology from their detractors. Please dont continue the trend by
forcing people to decide before they have a chance to read all the evidence.

Laura Creighton
utzoo!utcsstat!laura