As Christian villager Asia Bibi languished in a Pakistani jail awaiting death by hanging for drinking water from a Muslim cup, two suicide bombers killed 85 worshippers in a Peshawar church.
For Egypt’s Copts, who risk having the small cross-tattoos many wear on their wrists burnt off with acid by militant Muslims, the Arab Spring has been wintry. In August it got worse: Muslim Brotherhood supporters, blaming them for the army’s removal of president Mohamed Mursi, attacked more than 100 Christian sites – 42 churches were razed.
In Somalia, al-Shabab, which slaughtered scores of people at a Kenyan shopping mall in September, has reportedly vowed to kill every Somali Christian.

For Egypt’s Copts, who risk having the small cross-tattoos many wear on their wrists burnt off with acid by militant Muslims, the Arab Spring has been wintry. Photo: Nasser Nasser

In northern Nigeria, Boko Haram has butchered thousands of Christians, as well as Muslims they consider inadequately ideological – such as those seeking an education.

Four of every five acts of religious discrimination in the world today are directed against Christians, according to the Germany-based International Society for Human Rights. The secular US think tank the Pew Forum says Christians face harassment or oppression in 139 nations, nearly three-quarters of all the countries on earth.
It is not just Muslims, who themselves often face horrendous persecution, who attack Christians. In the Indian state of Orissa, Hindu nationalists attacked Christians in a vicious pogrom in 2008, killing 500, injuring thousands with machetes, and leaving 50,000 homeless. A nun was raped and paraded naked through the streets, watched by police who arrested no one.
In Burma, Bhutan, Nepal and Sri Lanka, Buddhist militants have murdered Christians, Muslims and Hindus. In 2010 the Burmese military attacked Christian minorities from helicopters, reportedly killing thousands.
These cases are horrific, certainly, but surely they are disconnected and accidental acts of cruelty and violence? Not so, rights observers say: they are all part of the biggest human rights challenge now facing the globe – religious intolerance – and also part of a largely unobserved global war on Christians. Things may be worse now for more Christians than at any time in history, including under the Roman Empire.
”War” does not mean a unified campaign directed by a single co-ordinating mind. But it is no exaggeration, Vatican analyst John Allen argues in his new book, The Global War on Christians, because it represents a ”massive, worldwide pattern of violence and oppression directed against a specific group of people, often explicitly understood by its perpetrators as part of a broader cultural and spiritual struggle”. If we are not honest enough to call it a war, we will not face it with the necessary urgency, he says.
What is happening? Why are Christians especially at risk, and why are Western governments, media and churches so reluctant to acknowledge it, let alone act? And, as some observers suggest, is religious persecution heading back to the West?
Religion is often only one factor in this violence, part of a combustible cocktail of racial, ethnic, economic and linguistic motives, but increasingly – such as with the rising tide of puritanical Muslim Salafists – it is the main or only reason. And in the countries where the problem is most severe, persecution has accelerated and deepened in the past two years.
The international Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need last week launched its 191-page report Persecuted and Forgotten, challenging the international community’s willingness to stand up for religious freedom.
The report calls the flight of Christians from the Middle East an exodus of almost biblical proportions. ”Incidents of persecution are now apparently relentless and worsening: churches being burnt, Christians under pressure to convert, mob violence against Christian homes, abduction and rape of Christian girls, anti-Christian propaganda in the media and from government, discrimination in schools and the workplace.”
Long-time religious liberty analyst and advocate Liz Kendal says when she began monitoring religious violence 15 years ago, ”I was reporting on an attack here or there, usually a militant who came in and attacked a missionary. Now it’s pogroms where people massacre their neighbours with machetes and with impunity”. Kendal is the Melbourne-based advocacy director of Christian Faith and Freedom.
This is a frightening new feature, that neighbours join or lead the brutality. ”One of the disturbing things about Syria is not just all the al-Qaeda-linked groups, but that local Muslims welcome them. They want their Christian neighbours to leave,” Kendal says.
Persecution can be a nebulous term. Both Christians and Muslims in the West have used it to refer to non-life-threatening discrimination. American scholar Charles Tieszen’s definition is a good one: any unjust action of mild to intense levels of hostility, directed at people belonging to a religion resulting in varying levels of harm, in which the victim’s religious identification is the main motive.
Todd Johnson, of Gordon Conwell’s Centre for the Study of Global Christianity, estimates 70 million Christians have died for their faith, 45 million of them in the 20th century.
John Allen notes that ”this boom in religious violence is still very much a growth industry. Christians today are by some order of magnitude the most persecuted religious body on the planet,” suffering not just martyrdom but all forms of intimidation and oppression in record numbers.
The US Commission on International Religious Freedom, which monitors religious persecution and names the worst offenders in an annual report, listed 16 nations guilty of ”heinous and systematic” offences in its 2012 report.
Only one group is under attack in all 16 nations: Christians. (The countries are Burma, China, Egypt, Eritrea, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, North Korea, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Vietnam.)
Open Doors lists 25 countries as most hazardous, 18 of them Muslim-majority nations – six in Asia, seven in Africa, eight in the Middle East, and four in the former Soviet empire. As Allen notes, this shows that it really is a global war.
The Middle East, the birthplace of Christianity, may soon be emptied of its adherents, and of other religious minorities. In Iraq, which had 1.5 million Christians before the first Gulf War, the total is now possibly as little as a 10th of that. Most have fled, but unnumbered thousands have been killed.
Muslims also suffer greatly – in Buddhist Burma and Thailand, in Hindu India and communist China, and in Muslim countries where their particular form is a minority. Hindus are persecuted in Buddhist countries, such as Sri Lanka. Iranian authorities, brutal against Christians, are even more vicious when it comes to Baha’is. Persecution seems an equal-opportunity affair.
Nor are Christians immune from perpetrating violence, as the world has seen in Rwanda, the Congo and Yugoslavia in the past 20 years. Yet when it comes to victims, they are well out in front. Why?
World Evangelical Alliance spokesman Thomas Schirrmacher says a number of factors combine. Christianity is much the biggest religion, so its numbers are likely to be large, and it is experiencing enormous growth in dangerous places where it makes established groups feel threatened. Religious nationalists tend to identify Christianity with Western colonialism. Christians, supported by better international networks, also tend to be more outspoken in advocating rights and democracy and in opposing corruption.
Dictators fear that Christians do not give them the undivided allegiance they demand (think North Korea, China or Vietnam), while some commentators even suggest Christians help bring suffering on themselves because of their willingness to turn the other cheek – militant Muslims might be more wary if they didn’t have impunity, if Christians too adopted suicide bombing.
Why, 1700 years after the Edict of Milan, in which Constantine decreed religious tolerance in the Roman Empire, is religious intolerance so savage? A number of cross currents have come together, including rising religious nationalism, Islamic fundamentalism driven particularly by Saudi Arabia’s petrodollars, victory for Islamists against Russia in Afghanistan, which sent the jihadis back to their various homes with ambitions entrenched, and the loss of American political influence after the global financial crisis.
This has been encouraged by a shameful apathy or denial by First World leaders. When it comes to secular politics, the victims are too Christian to matter much to the left, who are much more comfortable bashing the doubtless legitimate but comparatively minor target of Israel. And they are too brown or too foreign to matter much to most on the right.
Secularists also tend to think of Christians as the oppressor, not the oppressed. When they picture persecution, they turn to history: the crusades, the Inquisition, Europe’s savage 17th century religious wars, and colonial exploitation. But, as John Allen observes: ”Today we do not live on the pages of a Dan Brown potboiler, in which Christians are dispatching mad assassins to settle historical scores. Instead, they’re the ones fleeing assassins others have dispatched.”
He also cites two sets of ”blinders”. Christians in the West can overstate the struggles they face from an increasingly post-Christian state, which diminishes sympathy for the Christians in real danger. Second, Western powerbrokers tend to underestimate the role religion plays in persecution in the Third World, its consistency as a driver.
Liz Kendal says there was a brief period when the US made a difference through its religious freedom bill. Introduced in 1998, it worked well for a decade, but collapsed with the global financial crisis in 2008 when the US economic clout ”evaporated overnight and religious liberty was affected immediately, especially in China and Iran”, she says.
”Now the gloves are off. Persecution with impunity is the order of the day and no one can stop it. America could threaten sanctions, and things would settle down, but those days are over. ”
Kendal is scathing about Western churches, saying they often deliberately avert their eyes. ”The Western church is so happy having a nice time in celebratory worship, they don’t want the burden of this knowledge (of what is happening to their brethren). Pastors feel under pressure to have their congregations leave the church feeling upbeat.”
She says the churches have to stop expecting political solutions. ”The cavalry is not going to come over the hill, and it’s not where the church’s faith should be anyway.”
Her pessimism runs deep. Not only is religious persecution unstoppable in Islamic and other Third World countries, but it is on the way in the West, if in a different form, she says.
Where Christian social conservatism was once mainstream, she predicts Christians will face jail and other sanctions if they do not toe the fast-changing secular line on such issues as condoning homosexuality and same-sex marriage.
Cardinal Francis George, the Catholic Archbishop of Chicago, made a similar prediction, noting in 2010: ”I expect to die in bed, my successor will die in prison, and his successor will die a martyr in the public square.”
And why does mainstream Western media miss the big picture? ”That’s the million-dollar question, and I don’t know,” Kendal replies. She suggests it is a combination of ignorance by journalists about the historical and political context of persecution and a political correctness that will not allow them to criticise Muslims for fear of being labelled racist or Islamophobic. ”It’s just too hot to handle,” she says.
”Turn on your TV and there is a young BBC reporter in Syria saying ‘these freedom fighters are fighting for democracy’. And behind him are bushy-bearded jihadists waving a black flag and shouting ‘Allahu akbar’ [God is great], fresh from cutting throats.”
In Burma, Kendal says, Western journalists believe the regime’s talk of reform and don’t realise Aung San Suu Kyi has been silenced, or the religious hatred that is directed against ethnic minorities. In Sudan, the Islamic regime is running a declared jihad against the African Christians, who are sitting on the last of the country’s oil. ”It’s genocide taking place before our eyes, and we’re not talking about it.”
Paul Marshall, author of Blind Spot – When Journalists Don’t Get Religion, thinks another factor is that so few journalists are Christian. Thus they tend to think that religion doesn’t have any intellectual content, it is merely feelings and emotion, so it’s not worth the effort to learn about it.
Marshall, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute for Religious Freedom in Washington, says the churches, in turn, are not very good at talking to journalists. It’s easy, too, to overlook that opponents such as Osama bin Laden have had a coherent, intelligent view of the world, even if we disagree with it.
Meanwhile suffering Christians might find scant consolation in the knowledge they were warned – Jesus says, in the Gospel of John: ”In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”
Barney Zwartz is religion editor.

Halloween

Posted on 01/11/201329/07/2018 by Mike Lloyd

Interesting devotional article on Halloween from Dare2Share
http://www.dare2share.org/devotions/trick-or-truth/#sthash.0p1glfWM.dpbs

During the years that I served as a Pastor of Student Ministries, I had a definite love/hate relationship with October. One the one hand, students were back in the swing of things, and attendance usually was much more consistent. Yet football, other sports, homecomings, and a host of other activities made it very tough to keep the momentum going. The hardest thing for me to decide each fall was what to do with this mysterious ‘holiday’ called Halloween. The Apostle Paul said: “I try to find common ground with everyone so that I might bring them to Christ.” (I Corinthians 9:22) My purpose in this devotion is not to make a statement about how you should or shouldn’t feel about Halloween, rather to equip and resource you with information so that you can find ‘common ground’ with unbelievers and use October 31st as a way to help bring people to Christ, because this season typically brings a greater openness on the part of people to discuss spiritual issues- so why not take advantage of these two factors to get the Message to the lost? One of the biggest problems we face is the enormous amount of misinformation put out by well meaning believers who have ‘researched’ this topic at an elementary school level or below. So first off, let’s try and make some sense out of the loony tunes literature floating around regarding the history behind Halloween. In North America, the yearly observance of Halloween amounts to a multi-billion-dollar industry, second only to Christmas…selling costumes, candy and food items, party supplies, greeting cards, tours of so-called haunted houses, and other forms of entertainment. But what is the history of this particular day? The story may surprise you. FACT: It’s Old More than two thousand years ago, a people called the Celts lived in what are now Ireland, Great Britain, and France. Among the Celtic people was an elite intellectual class known as the Druids, who served as religious priests, judges, lawmakers, and scientists. They had an elaborate pagan religious festival, along with certain rituals. Chief among these was the Fire Festival called Samhain (pronounced sow-en), observed at harvest time to mark the Celtic New Year. The Celts believed that on this night the barrier between the natural world and the supernatural was removed, and the spirits of the dead were able to move freely among human beings. Samhain was the most solemn and important night in the Celtic year. FACT: Christians had a Part After the Roman Catholic Church brought Christianity to the Celtic peoples in the seventh century, some of their traditional folk customs were Christianized. In 835 A.D. Pope Gregory IV moved the church’s “Feast of All Saints” from the spring to November 1st to replace the observance of Samhain. All Saint’s Day, still observed today by many Christians, honored believers who had died. The night before, which featured a sacred vigil in church, became known as “All Hallow’s Eve,” or Halloween. But the old practices of the Druids died hard and were denounced by the church as witchcraft. This is how Halloween became known as a witch’s holiday. FACT: Today’s Customs are Different Dressing in costumes and going door-to-door comes from a much later tradition in the British Isles, a practice not restricted to Halloween. Masked players would go from house-to-house, putting on a simple drama or musical performance in return for food and drink. Often these performances had Christian themes. The “trick-or-treat” custom we know today is thoroughly American in origin. In the nineteenth century, when Irish and Scotch immigrants brought their Halloween traditions to North America, the night became an occasion for pranks and mischief. Vandals would go through the night, soaping windows, overturning outhouses, and pulling gates from their hinges. These pranks were playfully said to be the work of witches and ghosts, but by the 1920s the joke wasn’t funny anymore. The damage to neighborhoods was mounting. To counteract Halloween vandalism, community clubs like the Boy Scouts began to organize alternatives that are safe and fun. Children were encouraged to go door-to-door and receive treats from homeowners and merchants, keeping the troublemakers away. By the 1930s, the practice was popular nationwide, and young voices crying, “Trick or treat!” were echoing through neighborhood streets. In this way, a combination of pagan, Christian, and civic elements formed the Halloween celebration we know today. In recent decades, however, a renewed interest in the old pagan beliefs has blossomed in North America. Popular entertainment, including television shows like “Buffy: The Vampire Slayer,” and even “Sabrina, the Teenage Witch,” make occult themes and witchcraft seem fun and acceptable. The result is that Halloween today has become strongly associated with the occult and a preoccupation with the dead—two influences that Scripture and the church have always warned against. (source: http://www.october31st.org/) So now that you know the skinny on this scary day, how can we use this odd celebration to introduce people to the Savior? Here are three suggestions: Meet your neighbors. One of the ideas behind Halloween was to give communities a chance to meet each other. It’s kinda tough to ‘love your neighbor’ when you don’t even know his/her name- don’t you think? I know you’re probably too old to trick or treat, so why not go door to door and pass out ‘community service’ coupons (like raking leaves, washing cars etc.). This will probably blow folks away, but what an awesome way to show that believers actually care about showing the love of God! Try to turn conversations to spiritual themes. Hello…this is Halloween! Can you think of a better time to bring up things like life after death, heaven and hell, good vs. evil, etc.? You could even use some of the above mentioned history to show what a smart cookie you are, then make a smooth transition to the gospel. Pass out a tasteful tract with your candy. Be careful with this one, because there is Christian literature out there that quite possibly drives people further from God. However, there are many great tracts out there that convey the incredible message of God’s grace in a way that children can understand. Before you give a tract out, you should read it thoroughly from the perspective of an unbeliever. In other words, if you weren’t saved, what would you think of what you were reading? Above all, use this day as a reminder that your eternal destiny is secure- and evil cannot touch you. The Apostle Paul informs us that: “God disarmed the evil rulers and authorities. He shamed them publicly by his victory over them on the cross of Christ.” (Colossians 2:14) To me, all the wacky symbols and gory costumes are visible evidences that one day Jesus is coming back to make things right. In heaven we will be treated to a universe free from all pain and suffering- and that’s no trick. – See more at: http://www.dare2share.org/devotions/trick-or-truth/#sthash.0p1glfWM.dpuf

Has Science Buried God? Panel 3 August

Posted on 02/08/201329/07/2018 by Mike Lloyd

Share with respect 1 Peter 3:15

But respect Christ as the holy Lord in your hearts. Always be ready to answer everyone who asks you to explain about the hope you have, but answer in a gentle way and with respect. Keep a clear conscience so that those who speak evil of your good life in Christ will be made ashamed. (1 Peter 3:15, 16 NCV)

With: Clinton Jackson, Philip Rodionoff, Michael Lloyd, Troy Haligowski, and Eli Gonzalez

http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/column_no_faith_in_their_hatred/. (17 Mar 2010)
Or
http://mikelloydblog.blogspot.com.au/2010/03/another-interesting-site-on-athiest.html
Atheism is trying to discredit Christian or God based belief – but making themselves look unlovely (Dawkins).

Alvin Plantinga (http://publicchristianity.org/library/reasons-god-alvin-plantinga#.UfNleMsaySN) suggests that Dawkins arguments are not only weak in argumentation, but that his conception of human nature is unlovely and dispiriting (vis column above). That is that human beings are just another animal with just a peculiar way of making money. Plantinga says that the Christian view of humans is that we are created in Gods image and that we are created for fellowship with the first being of the universe. He also says that morality fits in really well with theistic belief but it doesn’t fit with naturalism. Why suffering and pain. Well, this a tough one but we do know that God was willing to join in this pain and suffering and die for us.

Talk with Nola;

Science is a never ending quest to understand – always searching for a solution that will never be fully reached. Must be re-testable and giving the same result. Most things that we know are theories. There are not many laws.

Epi-genetics – that is that recent research has shown that RNA has the same capability in some species as DNA. (Viruses are not considered living – parasidic relationship with a host).

Science and God/an understanding of God are not parallel

Creationism and ‘Evolution’ are parallel paths in striving to understand knowledge.

Survival of the fitness – means working together – survival of ‘the hive’ – without the hive they all die. The ‘pack’ works together.

Great article on the myths and misconceptions of evolution:
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn13620-evolution-24-myths-and-misconceptions.html?full=true&print=true

Great book talking about arguments for and against evolution with a clear explanation of what evolution is in its various forms: Explore Evolution by Meyer, Nelson, Moneymaker, Minnich and Seelke (2009) published by Hill House Publishers.

Lesson from Nola

This activity is reserved for the end of the unit on evolution. It is assumed that the following topics have already been discussed

Natural Selection
Common Descent
Homologous Structures
Theory of Evolution
Fossils and Paleontology
Genetic mutation
Transition Species

I also spend some time discussing “creation science” and why it is not viewed as a science and not taught as a theory. I do this in my school because I have such a strong population of fundamentalist christians, and it is important that they understand that scientific theories cannot verify or deny the existance of supernatural beings. In addition it is important that they understand that science relies on natural processes and cannot be based on supernatural events. How much this concept has sunk in is often determined by the outcome of this discussion.
Essentially, what this discussion does it create an environment where students have to defend the teaching of evolution in the science class. Though some groups may not come to a consensus that evolution should be taught, after some discussion and reading of the articles most do agree that evolution should be taught, though they will vary on degrees.

Quick Comparison Chart

“Creation Science”	Theory of Evolution
Cannot explain processes or make predictions	Used to explain data and make predictions
Gives absolute truths	Answers questions like “how” and “why” things are
Is based on faith	Is supported by evidence
Offers no model, nor tells us about relationships among beings	Used to develop ideas and models regarding relationships among organisms
Can never be disproven	Can be disproven if new evidence is found

The Discussion

Overview: Each team is going to formulate a response from the “school board” to address issues taken by parents and students regarding the teaching of evolution. The concern of the parents is that evolution is teaching students values that do not align with their views on religion. The team of students must read articles and form a response from the school board.

Introduction: The school board is faced with a decision regarding the school’s science curriculum. A group of community members called “Concerned Parents” is asking the board to eliminate evolution from the high school curriculum because they feel it undermines their religious beliefs. Your job is to play the role of the School board and respond to the concerned parents group regarding the issues surrounding evolution, “creation science” and the high school curriculum.

Process: The class is divided into 4 groups, approximately 5 – 8 members per group (depending on class size)

1. Each group as a folder that contains articles regarding the conflict. I’ve listed these links for the year 2001, but I would find new articles each year that are more current. Each member of the group chooses and article to read and is responsible for summarizing and explaining what the article says. (I’ve included a lot here, so that you can pick and choose which ones you want to offer to the groups for reading – or search out your own)

http://www.cnn.com/2000/NATURE/09/21/evolution.enn/index.html
http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/rncse_content/vol18/1656_helping_schools_to_teach_evolu_12_30_1899.asp
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/science/DailyNews/evolution980617.html
http://www4.nationalacademies.org/news.nsf/(ByDocID)/1A28E557587BCEC48525677400635527?OpenDocument
http://www.the-scientist.com/yr1997/oct/opin_971013.html
http://www.al.com/columnists/mobile/fcoleman/10092000-a353105a.html
http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/museum/ucmp_news/2001/8-01/evolution8-01.html
http://www.rethinkingschools.org/Archives/12_02/scott.htm
http://www.usoe.k12.ut.us/curr/science/usta/positionevolution.htm
http://www.religioustolerance.org/ev_hist.htm
http://www.enn.com/news/enn-stories/2000/09/09212000/sclass_31681.asp
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/288/5467/813
http://www.edweek.org/ew/ewstory.cfm?slug=26evolutions1.h19
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/science/DailyNews/evolution000619.html
http://whyfiles.org/095evolution/
http://arnica.csustan.edu/biol3020/courts/court.htm

I think atheists have buried God. They wish to discredit the world view that is different that theirs. (Ref The Philosophers zone – Simon Blackburn – Blackburn is in Brisbane for the inaugural Alan Saunders Memorial Lecture ). Simon is bemoaning the fact that we live in a very commercial and selfish world and that these philosophies drive changes in society for the worse. He gives the example that deregulated markets will look after themselves but that the result is tragic for so many people. He recognises that this is the philosophy of people today and we have to live in the world we are in. Then the interviewer switches to conversation to science. The ideology he is talking about is replicated in science and argued about in books such as The Selfish Gene by R. Dawkins that the world must be a dog eat dog world – survival of the fittest. Especially evident in the rise of Nazism in WWII. The idea that competition is the way of things and that there is no such thing as cooperation. Simon pushes here the concept that science is driven by the ideology of the day and that the ideology of today is commercialism. That is, science is funded by big business and as such borrows its philosophy from this world view. An example is that sciences aim is not to relieve the burden of disease on the world but to make money for pharmaceutical companies. He goes not to say that pure science (without the economy) is a small remnant. Simon goes on to say that science only gives us evidence to work with and no emotion no feeling. Science only finds markers for feelings and emotion. Science only tries to explain things – imperialist ideals too. Interestingly he said ‘You don’t get something from nothing’ in this talk. Blackburn indicates that Dawkins is a valuable ally in the battle to keep our culture educated, reasonable and sane. But now he wants to distance himself a little from Dawkins due to his rather strong views being promoted. Blackburn ‘admires’ the battle that Dawkins has fought against creationism and other ‘foolishnesses’. Blackburn also sees that these people are anti science – what he calls ‘detractors’ from science. Blackburn sees that Dawkins is missing the point and that evolution indicates evidence of cooperation as well as survival (link in with selfish gene). Symbiosis and things like that. So Blackburn suggests that Dawkins has lost his shine.

Thought: If science is the pursuit of understanding – a process which is never complete – then how could God be buried – unless God was disproved. So to insist there is no God is to say that we have proved that God does not exist. Interestingly this is narrow minded – the very thing that people like Dawkins say about people who believe in God – narrowminded. So in essence I guess people who say that there must be a God are as narrowminded as those who say there must NOT be a God.

It is interesting to note that the ABC is pursuing the anti-God/Pro-evolutionist stance as if God is disproved and evolution is confirmed. Why then do they call this open-mindedness. Confusing point.

So… Science is the pursuit of knowledge, striving towards the goal of understanding. To date understanding is never fully reached. We do not know the sum of everything. Christians believe in God who created all things and who knows all things so Science and God are not parallel. Science cannot bury God because Science cannot prove or disprove God. Christians believe that God is the author of all we have around us, science, and as such, Science will ultimately point to God. Naturally atheists look at science is a similar way but believe there is no author. As I see it the problem arises when we look at ultimate origin. So if there is natural selection in a punctuated equilibrium sense then what event or series of events happened before that to start life. Design seems to play a role in that?

Panelists comments:

Troys comments:
Hi Brad (and fellow panelists)

Rather than what questions, I feel the better starting point is to ask what are the take home messages. We can build questions easy enough. My feeling is (and I’d be interested to see what the other panelists think):

1. There is no conflict between science and a belief in God, rather the two answer different questions in life and taken together give us a more full understanding of the world we live in.

Totally agree. But atheists have used the evolution debate to push a wedge between faith and science for their own agenda – to discredit God believers.

2. Atheism has more to do with the worldview you bring to scientific investigation rather than the science itself.

3. What science does provide is clues which support a belief in God but doesn’t set about proving or disproving him. The question of God is not a scientific one ie God is not subject to the nul hypothesis and validation within a laboratory.

Yes the question of God is a faith issue – see video (Plantinga)

4. Evolution does not equal atheism. It is the current popular belief on the origin of living creatures once life commenced. There are many theists (even Christians) high within the scientific community who hold to evolution (Simon Conway Morris, John Polkinghorn, Francis Collins etc). It comes down to what explanation provides the best support to the evidence we have at hand.

Yes. Atheism v creationism is like comparing apples with cars. Diff things.

5. Christains aren’t anti-scientific. we’ve embraced nearly all of what scientific advancement has to offer us (electronics, medicine, air travel etc) however we aren’t just going along with all the metaphysical assumptions being advocated.

Anyway lets get a little dialogue going on this as well trying to green hat what we think may be the common questions raised.

Finally Brad, the topic has Science burried “God” is a good apologetic start. Which God is another question all together with numerous other trappings. We’ll need to ensure we stay on topic and not get dragged away on some other tangent.

Cheers

Troy Haligowski

Comments from Elle:

Hi Panelists

Its great that you got this discussion started, Troy. I speak from a theological/historical perspective. My own views; I have no apologetic can to carry for anyone.

Here are my initial reactions to your points, Troy…

1. Well, theologically, the religion between science and belief is a doozy, from St. Augustine onwards, and there are really no simple answers. My position is that science and a belief in God are not discrete fields of enquiry. Many Christians today treat them as if they are. If they want to know about the world around them they go to science, and if they want to know about spiritual matters, they go to religion/God/the Bible. This works… but only at a simplistic level. We cannot separate the material world and belief in God. The Bible doesn’t do so, and any atheist would tell you that that just doesn’t make sense. Rather than being two discrete fields of enquiry, science must ultimately be understood as a subset of a true knowledge of God. In other words, God is the originator of the world around us, and is greater and beyond the world around us. There will always be an apparent conflict between science and a belief in God, as long as our our brains are smaller than God’s brain. In other words, the conflict would be minimised if we had a perfect understanding of the world around us; but even then there would be an unfathomable gap in knowledge between us and the infinite Mind. I guess I am agreeing with what you say here, but I would nuance it a whole lot more.

2. Quite true. And also in reality true of religion itself. However this mitigates against neither the reality of the natural world around us, nor the realiy of God.

3. This is also true. Although it is interesting to note that throughout history, until the modern period, the question of God has always been a scientific one. All science was fundamentally geared towards addressing metaphysical questions. It is the separation of science and God that allowed the emergence of our secular society. Interestingly, it was Bible-believing scientists in the early modern period who developed objective methods of scientific enquiry, on the premise that they believed in a logical God who could not fail to leave traces of His existence in the world around us, discernible to the objective observer. And so the scientific method was developed. In other words, atheism is an intellectual option today only because of Christianity. Before Christianity there was certainly plurality of belief, but the complete denial of God/the gods was essentially unknown as an intellectual option.

4. I would certainly agree that evolution does not equal atheism in the minds and in the experience of many true Christians today. Many of the greatest defenders of the existence of God today are in fact theistic evolutionists. But when you say that “it comes down to what explanation provides the best support to the evidence we have at hand,” I would raise a few points to be considered, because this is not such a straightforward question. The first question I would raise is “what evidence”? Are we implying here that we must interpret Scripture according to our society’s current interpretation of the evidence in the natural world? Well, this is certainly an interesting issue in the light of the proposition I made in point #1. Do we give priority to the Bible or to science? And of course here it is a question of the interpretation of the Bible… Do we only allow interpretations of the Bible that are consistent with current scientific understandings… (scientific consensus?) If so, is there any role for theology at all? And beginnings have endings; in other words, you have to be consistent and systematically work through your faith position on origins. How many people are really prepared to do this? Or is faith in our culture just a buffet meal of what we find appetising only?

5. Good point. In fact, every branch of modern science was developed by a Bible-believing Christian. Universities and hospitals are essentially Christian inventions. Neither existed before Christianity. So to say that Christians are anti-scientific is ludicrous.

I think perhaps a question that may come up is the whole issue of errors in the Bible.

Eliezer

Comments from Clinton:

Good day to you all,

I am looking forward to this discussion. I think it is going to be enjoyable but also beneficial to the audience.

I have a number of comments, prompted in part from the previous two responses.

1. Methodological naturalism – the working assumption of science that there is a non-supernatural explanation to phenomena is not antithetical to Christian faith. Indeed many daily tasks require a form of methodological naturalism to complete (e.g. driving, flying, sending emails). Naturalism is a challenge to Christian faith when it becomes an ideology.

2. Methodological evolution. Evolution is the paradigm around which biology is organised. For the vast majority of practising scientists this assumption is a purely pragmatic one, e.g. tracing changes in the DNA of a cancer. The idea that by using evolution in their research or that they are research the evolution of some gene is because they are motivated to disprove God would be met with puzzlement by these researchers. Making metaphysical assumptions based on evolutionary theory proves to be problematic.

3. Anthropic principle. I personally find the anthropic principle to be a compelling part of a theistic narrative.

4. Theistic evolution. It is true that many prominent Christians hold to theistic evolution. I had the opportunity to meet the Rev. John Polkinghorne, FRS many years ago and he is a true Christian gentleman, he speaks with clarity and authority but more so with humility. Polkinghorne is, however, theologically far removed from Adventism as the he sees little to no reason to assign causal agency to the devil.

Wentzel van Huysteen, a Reformed theologian narrates the relationship between man and God through a theistic evolutionary framework. He is particularly interested in the stages of when humans became self aware and then creator aware. It makes for interesting reading. Theistic evolution, however, is untenable (at least in any of the standard formulations, and I am yet to see any non-standard ones that work) for Seventh-day Adventists who require a Great Controversy meta-narrative to organise our theology. In particular the notion of original sin is very difficult to accommodate under theistic evolution. It amuses me the fascination of many church members with Michael Behe who is a theistic evolutionist who argues for specific examples of supernatural intervention!

5. Genesis 1 and 2 are not scientific histories. The fact that the creative sequence differs between Gen 1 and 2 is an indicator that the text is trying to say something else. I see in Genesis 1 a compelling redemption narrative, that is God brought order and structure to the formless void (he redeemed it) and the rest of the Bible narrates how God as creator continues to redeem.

6. A critical realism acknowledges the complexity of accessing the multi-faceted reality. It permits a methodological pluralism, as necessitated by the demands of different disciplines, without falling into the trap of ontological relativism found in many post-modern philosophies. In other words, a scientist and a Christian both start from the same premise, reality exists and that it can be understood. As such, as long as there is a shared understanding of the limits each form of inquiry, scientists and Christians have much in common. I personally think the ambivalence towards a realist ontology found in many humanities departments as more of a challenge to Christian dialogue than any of the difficulties science presents.

7. Finally, I find that science helps illuminate my understanding of certain Christian beliefs. For example, I can demonstrate the wave nature and the particle nature of light with ease in a high school classroom. As such I live with the inherent tension of a very tangible phenomena that is both particle and wave. For this reason, I find the doctrine of the trinity to be completely plausible and in line with my experience in the laboratory. That is, three components of the one thing makes sense when I deal with something that is two components of the one all the time. I am sure we could all give examples of similar insights.

Blessings,
Clinton

Other information which may be relevant:
http://publicchristianity.org/library/topic/evolution/

It seems to me that much of the discussion of whether or not evolution conflicts with religion seems to be clouded. Many argue that it is Christianity against Darwin or Science (as if they were the same thing) but neglect to make a distinction between Darwin’s ideas on micro and macro evolution.

There seems to be some in Christondum that are intent on following the beliefs of the current day even if they don’t fit with what the bible promotes. This from the Australian religious reaction to the origin of the species(Larissa Aldridge)

In 1882, the Reverend Robert Potter addressed the Anglican Church Congress, saying that he had ‘always liked the doctrine of evolution,’ due to its ‘approximately true account’ of the way species had developed over time. The warden of St Paul’s College, Canon William Hey Sharp, argued that evolution could not deny the existence of a creator or undermine the natural theological argument from design, although he suggested that William Paley’s Natural Theology needed to be reworked. There were even attempts to understand the history of Christianity in evolutionary terms. For example, Bishop Alfred Barry of Sydney said in the late 1880s that the Apostles’ Creed was established by natural selection.

Sadly the same article goes on to say;
In contrast to the view that Darwinian evolution has always faced universal religious opposition, Tom Frame has shown that the response of Australian Christians was quite positive. Despite some opposition, Darwinism eventually became part of both scientific and theological orthodoxy. For this reason, Australia has witnessed neither a local version of the Scopes trial nor widespread acceptance of Young Earth Creationism. However, there are still religious objections raised against Darwinian evolution. My next article will examine a possible response to one of these objections.

This article would posit that the church and science are complementary. But I find some of the reasoning skewed towards a belief that Christianity and Darwinism can agree;
Darwin and the British natural theology tradition

Hitchen bro debate

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