On Thu, 26 Aug 1999 10:44:25 -0500, Steve Clark wrote:
SC>Oh grow up.
[...]
I thank Steve Clark (and also Stan Zygmunt-see next post) for their ad
hominem responses, and particularly their trying to construe the issue as
just a "petty, personal agenda".
This `shoot the messenger' response just serves to confirm my thesis that
the "E" in TE/EC has an adverse effect on otherwise fine Christians, due
to the conflict it causes by them `trying to serve two masters' (Mat 6:24),
namely Christian theism and scientific naturalism.
It seems that when faced with a gross breach of Christian ethics by a fellow
TE/EC (namely secretly telling a demonstrably false story against a fellow
Christian who is a creationist, with the evident intent of discrediting him
so his message is ignored), the response of TE/EC is not to remonstrate
against their fellow TE/EC, but to attack the creationist for having the
temerity to protest!
This response (or rather lack of response) by other TE/ECs is itself such an
obvious departure from ordinary Christian ethical standards (and indeed
even the world's ethical standards), that it is in itelf a fact which cries
out for an explanation.
I can see no alternative but to conclude that *in the area of
Creation/Evolution*, TE/ECs have been taken "captive through [a] hollow
and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic
principles of this world..."(Col 2:8), namely scientific materialism-
naturalism, so that they no longer recognise such things as a departure
from Christian standards.
It seems that to TE/ECs, *in the area of Creation/Evolution* evolutionist
`blood' is thicker than Christian `water'!
I make this claim, *only* in the area of Creation/Evolution. I assume that
TE/ECs are otherwise fine Christians. I do not claim that TE/ECs realise
this problem that I am calling their attention to.
Paradoxically, if my analysis is correct, I would expect TE/ECs to continue
to react with hostility and personal attacks, even maybe trying to have me
banned from the Reflector or `sent to Coventry' (which has in fact been
tried by one TE/EC before). But if OTOH TE/ECs reacted with Christian grace,
and patiently listened to what I said, calmly pointing out where they think
I am wrong, then I would have to reconsider my position.
What I am doing here is no different to what Phil Johnson is trying to do,
namely issue a `wake up call' to those theists who have tried to marry
Christian theism with the non-theistic philosophy of scientific naturalism,
resulting in the sterile hybrid Johnson accurately calls "theistic
naturalism":
"Obviously I offended Van Till with that phrase "theistic naturalism." In a
way I am sorry for that, for he is a decent and honorable person whom I
would like to have for a friend. But it is necessary to send a wake-up call to
a Christian academia that has complacently assumed that mild protests
against the most explicitly metaphysical claims by scientists are all that is
needed to maintain an intellectually respectable place for theistic religion.
The situation is far more serious than that. Metaphysical naturalism has
taken over mainstream science, not in a superficial sense but in a profound
sense." (Johnson P.E., "God and Evolution: An Exchange", First Things,
34, (June/July 1993): 32-41.
http://www.origins.org/ftissues/ft9306/johnson.html).
Steve
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"...we have proffered a collective tacit acceptance of the story of gradual
adaptive change, a story that strengthened and became even more
entrenched as the synthesis took hold. We paleontologists have said that
the history of life supports that interpretation, all the while really knowing
that it does not." (Eldredge N., "Time Frames: The Rethinking of
Darwinian Evolution and the Theory of Punctuated Equilibria", Simon &
Schuster: New York NY, 1985, p144).
Stephen E. Jones | sejones@iinet.net.au | http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
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