> Part of Johnson's problem is that he doesn't seem to know much
>about theology. As a lawyer, he may excuse me for jumping on a small
>lapse in his rhetoric as an indication of this. The second paragraph
>cited above raises serious doubts about whether or not he knows what
>"original sin" means.
Dick Fischer replied:
I wonder how many, like me, regard "Johnsonism" as ever bit as much a
threat to the overall effectiveness of our Christian witness as Darwinism.
His brand of deception is slick, subtle and sophisticated, but still leads
gullible adherents down the same primrose path with the YECs. Armed with
more creationist propaganda they can assail the walls of science and
academia with added, though misguided, vigor. That's all we need is more
creationist zealots, ill-equipped and ill-advised.
Gene adds:
I imagine that any ill-equipped and ill-advised zealots would be
detrimental to whatever cause they were serving. I think Johnson would be
better if he kept to attacking the wrong-headed philosophical
underpinings of evolutionism.
I have a question that I have kind of implied in several forums and nobody
has called me on it. I ask it here explicity: If you have evidence that
certain organisms are descended from certain other organisms--related
through an evolutionary pathwa--does this then mean for the theist that
you have figured out how God created all life? Just because you can show
the former, it seems presumptuous to declare the latter. Humility seems
to dictate that you say that in such and such cases it seems very likely
that evolution happened for such and such reasons. Outside of these
cases, it should be admitted that we aren't sure what happened. Anybody
have a problem with that?
There is a systematizing impulse that humans have that leads one to want
to make conclusive statements about things that one doesn't have anywhere
near conclusive evidence on. I see this in both science and theology.
Gene
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