This post is a challenge to Christians. Do you accept that there is a possibility that man is the result of an evolutionary process?
For the purpose of exploring the implications of this challenge, I’ll take it as read that God exists and that Jesus is who he claimed to be – if those points are not accepted then I don’t think one can consider oneself a Christian. But what might an acceptance of the possibility of evolution mean?
It seems to me, that accepting the possibility that evolution is true then means that one has to accept the possibility that:
- the Genesis account of creation is not to be taken literally, and so must be interpreted in a different way
- not much else
So I struggle to understand logically why so many Christians are so afraid of the theory of evolution. I can of course understand why it is disliked, since certain outspoken atheists make outrageous claims that evolution has disproved God, or that if the first chapter of the Bible cannot be taken literally then you cannot believe the rest, or …. fill in the blanks for yourself. But such claims have no foundation, and we need to be able to discern what is truth and what is simply rhetoric. Sometimes truth comes from the most unpleasant people, but that doesn’t change whether it is true or not.
But if the man in the street hears both Christians and Atheists saying that evolution is inconsistent with God then it seems to me that the vast body of scientific opinion in support of evolution will lead him to think that Christianity must be false. And that would be a tragedy.
So if you are a Christian, my challenge is to entertain the possibility that evolution is true, and try to discern what this would tell you about God, and about how to interpret the Bible. It may be that your current understanding is incomplete; might that be possible, or are you so certain that you are right…..?
Related posts:
https://philhemsley.wordpress.com/2013/03/03/information-dna-and-evolution/
https://philhemsley.wordpress.com/2013/04/14/proof-of-god/
Thoughts from a Minimalist Christian 