This Lie Is Spreading RAPIDLY Among Christians and It’s VERY Dangerous

 

Answers in Genesis Canada

Aug 14, 2026

Many Christians say they believe in Jesus and the Bible, but also believe in evolution and millions of years of Earth history. This video breaks down why that combination causes a serious problem, using history's own words from one of Darwin's most famous defenders.

David Bass: Christian J. Pinto Interview | Vatican II Spiritual Evolution & Luciferian New Age

The Real Reveal

May 25, 2026

What is the connection between Vatican II and the New Age Movement?

Tonights guest is Christian J. Pinto, director and producer of American Jesuits: A History of Jesuitism in the United States.

We draw on his expertise in research about the Jesuit order to determine why Jesuit author Teilhard de Chardin was known as the “Father of the New Age”. How did his alleged involvement with the “missing link” hoax in 1912 (known as The Piltdown Man) relate to the overarching agenda to connect science with spirituality and push the gnostic belief in Spiritual Evolution beyond the Creator.

This episode also covers:

Vatican II

Globalisation

Ecumenism

Adam Weishaupt (Enlightenment beliefs)

Jesuit Theatre and Tactics

Transhumanism (Evolutionary Materialism meets Mysticism)

And more…

You can watch Chris Pintos documentary’s on DVD or online streaming services. Here is a full list of the in-depth films he’s made:

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm2281033/

Noise of Thunder Radio: 

http://www.noiseofthunderradio.com/

ChatGPT Admits to Willingly Spreading Verifiably False Information

Exploration Films - Life's Story 01

Neil deGrasse Tyson concurs: Catholicism is the science-friendly religion

01/17/2018 at 3:56 PM

Posted by Mary Anne Hackett



By Matthew Becklo | Jan 12, 2018

Despite lazy narratives, the Church’s enthusiasm for scientific research and discovery is actually enshrined in its Catechism.

On a recent episode of The Late Show, host Stephen Colbert and frequent visitor Neil deGrasse Tyson joked about the astronomical insignificance of New Year’s Day.
Before long, Tyson was talking about the role the Catholic Church played in creating the calendar as we know it. “The world’s calendar is the Gregorian calendar after Pope Gregory,” Tyson explains. “Put that into place in 1582, because the previous Julian calendar was messing up in the year. It was off by ten days. And the pope said, ‘We got to fix this…’ There’s a Vatican Observatory to this day. At the time, before telescopes were invented, these Jesuit priests were put into the service of figuring out why the calendar was shifting in the year.”

Colbert, known for his openness about his Catholic faith, then asks Tyson if it’s true that a Catholic priest formulated the Big Bang Theory. “Yes,” Tyson responds. “Georges Lemaître. Using Einstein’s equations … he deduces that the history of the universe must’ve started with a bang. So Catholics have been in there in multiple places.”

This little exchange might have seemed uninteresting in another era, but not today. The rise in the new atheism and Biblical literalism have made it a commonplace that science and religion are in conflict, and young people are absorbing the idea as axiomatic. In her recent book iGen, about the least religious generation in U.S. history, Dr. Jean Twenge quotes one young person as saying: “I knew from church that I couldn’t believe in both science and God, so that was it. I didn’t believe in God anymore.”

CHRISTIAN GROUP CLAIMS DINOSAURS ARE A LIE, WANTS THEM EXTINCT FROM SCHOOLS

SOCIETY

This stock photo shows a female teacher explaining dinosaur skeleton parts to students in biology class. (Shutterstock)




Thursday, February 12, 2015 12:20PM

A parent, who's part of a group that believes dinosaurs are one big lie, is getting international attention after making an angry post on a parenting site.

The writer starts the rant with, "I am getting sick and tired of dinosaurs being forced on our children."

The page long diatribe against dinosaurs on the popular parenting site mumsnet.com quickly set off a flurry of mockery and went viral, the Mirror reports.

The writer thinks the scientific evidence for dinosaurs is scant and also claims they set a bad example for children. The writer illustrates the point with an anecdote:

"At my children's school, several children were left in tears after one of their classmates (who had evidently been exposed to dinosaurs) became bestially-minded and ran around the classroom roaring and pretending to be a dinosaur. Then he bit three children on the face."

The writer even opposes toy dinosaurs:

"Recently my sister foolishly gave my two youngest some dinosaur toys for Christmas. After telling her to get out of my house, I burnt the dinosaurs. My children were delighted because they know that dinosaurs are evil. I am fortunate that my family has been very supportive, and has disowned my children's former aunt."

The writer is part of a Facebook group called "Christians Against Dinosaurs" which has nearly 4,000 members. The writer claims to be working to remove dinosaurs from school curriculum.

In the United States, many Evangelical Christians believe in dinosaurs, but they believe dinosaurs shared the Earth with humans. However, scientific evidence indicates a mass extinction event wiped out most dinosaurs 65 million years ago. Humans didn't start evolving until six million years ago.

Most of the other parents on mumsnet found the anti-dinosaur post funny. One other writer posted, "Hahahaha... Maybe the big skeletons are the scientific community having fun with papier mache?"

Another writer said, "But what about Barney? Will nobody think of Barney???!"

The original poster responded to several posts leading to additional mockery.

You can read the original post by clicking here.

Source: http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_classics/a2301982-Im-getting-sick-and-tired-of-dinosaurs-being-forced-on-our-children

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The Full History of La Sierra University vs. Louie Bishop

APRIL 4, 2013


. MY STRUGGLES AS A CREATIONIST AT LA SIERRA UNIVERSITY Louie Bishop . Members of the Seventh-day Adventist Church leadership have encouraged me that laymen in the church, especially those alumni with first-hand experience like me, should be actively involved in bringing about change to the crisis at La Sierra University. It is my hope [...]

Read more


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David Coppedge, Ex-NASA Worker, Claims In Lawsuit That Agency Axed Him For 'Intelligent Design' Views

GILLIAN FLACCUS 03/11/12 04:23 PM ETAssociated Press

LOS ANGELES — NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory has landed robotic explorers on the surface of Mars, sent probes to outer planets and operates a worldwide network of antennas that communicates with interplanetary spacecraft.

Its latest mission is defending itself in a workplace lawsuit filed by a former computer specialist who claims he was demoted – and then let go – for promoting his views on intelligent design, the belief that a higher power must have had a hand in creation because life is too complex to have developed through evolution alone.

David Coppedge, who worked as a "team lead" on the Cassini mission exploring Saturn and its many moons, alleges that he was discriminated against because he engaged his co-workers in conversations about intelligent design and handed out DVDs on the idea while at work. Coppedge lost his "team lead" title in 2009 and was let go last year after 15 years on the mission.

Opening statements are expected to begin Monday in Los Angeles Superior Court after two years of legal wrangling in a case that has generated interest among supporters of intelligent design. The Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian civil rights group, and the Discovery Institute, a proponent of intelligent design, are both supporting Coppedge's case.

"It's part of a pattern. There is basically a war on anyone who dissents from Darwin and we've seen that for several years," said John West, associate director of Center for Science and Culture at the Seattle-based Discovery Institute. "This is free speech, freedom of conscience 101."

The National Center for Science Education, which rejects intelligent design as thinly veiled creationism, is also watching the case and has posted all the legal filings on its website.

"It would be unfortunate if the court took what seems to be a fairly straightforward employment law case and allowed it to become this tangled mess of trying to adjudicate scientific matters," said Josh Rosenau, NCSE's programs and policy director. "It looks like a pretty straightforward case. The mission that he was working on was winding down and he was laid off."

Coppedge's attorney, William Becker, says his client was singled out by his bosses because they perceived his belief in intelligent design to be religious. Coppedge had a reputation around JPL as an evangelical Christian and other interactions with co-workers led some to label him as a Christian conservative, Becker said.

In the lawsuit, Coppedge says he believes other things also led to his demotion, including his support for a state ballot measure that sought to define marriage as limited to heterosexual couples and his request to rename the annual holiday party a "Christmas party."

"David had this reputation for being a Christian, for being a practicing one. He did not go around evangelizing or proselytizing. But if he found out that someone was a Christian he would say, `Oh that's interesting, what denomination are you?'" Becker said.

"He's not apologizing for who he is. He's an evangelical Christian."

In an emailed statement, JPL dismissed Coppedge's claims. In court papers, lawyers for the California Institute of Technology, which manages JPL for NASA, said Coppedge received a written warning because his co-workers complained of harassment. They also said Coppedge lost his "team lead" status because of ongoing conflicts with others.

Caltech lawyers contend Coppedge was one of two Cassini technicians and among 246 JPL employees let go last year due to planned budget cuts.

While the case has attracted interest because of the controversial nature of intelligent design, it is at its heart a straightforward discrimination case, said Eugene Volokh, a professor of First Amendment law at the University of California, Los Angeles School of Law.

"The question is whether the plaintiff was fired simply because he was wasting people's time and bothering them in ways that would have led him to being fired regardless of whether it was about religion or whether he was treated worse based on the religiosity of his beliefs," said Volokh. "If he can show that, then he's got a good case."

Coppedge, who began working for JPL as a contractor in 1996 and was hired in 2003, is active in the intelligent design sphere and runs a website that interprets scientific discoveries through the lens of intelligent design. His father authored an anti-evolution book and founded a Christian outreach group.

He is also a board member for Illustra Media, a company that produces video documentaries examining the scientific evidence for intelligent design. The company produces the videos that Coppedge was handing out to co-workers, said Becker, his attorney.

His main duties at JPL were to maintain computer networks and troubleshoot technical problems for the mission. In 2000, he was named "team lead," serving as a liaison between technicians and managers for nearly a decade before being demoted in 2009.

He sued in April 2010 alleging religious discrimination, retaliation and harassment and amended his suit to include wrongful termination after losing his job last year.

Coppedge is seeking attorney's fees and costs, damages for wrongful termination and a statement from the judge that his rights were violated, said Becker.

_____

AP Science Writer Alicia Chang contributed to this report.

Source

Birthplace of evolutionary theory now inhabited by creationists

Slideshow: Galapagos Creationists

BY THE WORLD ⋅ AUGUST 30, 2011

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Perhaps the most famous animal endemic to these islands, the Galapagos giant tortoise can live to be over 100 years old and weigh nearly 900 pounds. (Photo: Tony Azios)

Audio: Play | Download

By Tony Azios

Perhaps no place on earth is more closely linked to the theory of evolution than the Galapagos Islands. It was here, off the coast of South America, that Charles Darwin found evidence that new species can evolve through natural selection.

But these islands have undergone major social changes in the last twenty years, and a growing number of people who now call the Galapagos home do not believe in evolution.

“We base ourselves on the Bible,” says Esther Tacuri, a Seventh-day Adventist missionary. In front of the Adventist church on the Galapagos island of Santa Cruz, along bustling Charles Darwin Avenue, a large wooden sign reads: “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”

“We don’t believe at all that man came to be by sheer chance, or that man evolved from monkeys,” says Tacuri. “We really believe that God created man in the image and likeness of God.”

Another Adventist missionary, Lucrecia Cobos, says the vast majority of people who live here share this view.

“It is said that this is the center of evolution, but in my experience visiting with people in their homes, I never hear them talk about it,” she says. “On the contrary, the people here are much more accepting of the word of God.”

This point of view represents a big change for the Galapagos.

Jack Nelson moved to Santa Cruz Island from the United States in 1967, when only a few hundred people lived here. He says back then many of the residents came from North America and Europe, and many had some involvement with biological research.

“The local people were much more in contact with visiting scientists,” he says. “The people who live here now overwhelmingly have come from a very different kind of history.”

The Galapagos Islands belong to Ecuador, and roughly thirty thousand Ecuadoreans have moved here from the mainland in the past twenty years. They have come in search of jobs in fishing and tourism. Nelson says many of these newcomers haven’t had much science education.

At the Charles Darwin Research Station, where tourists and schoolchildren come to learn about the unique animals found on the islands, Park Service guides are hesitant to talk about evolution.

Víctor Carrión, a senior official with the Galapagos National Park, says that to stay on good terms with the community, the Park Service does not overtly promote Darwin’s theory. Instead, it focuses its message on conservation efforts, which “one hundred percent of the public supports,” he says.

But even if people say they support environmental protection, the growing population here has caused serious environmental damage.

Fishermen illegally harvest sea cucumbers and shark fins to sell to China. Locals import invasive plant species for their gardens, and those plants then spread into the wild where they threaten native varieties.

Jack Nelson – the American who moved here in 1967 – believes these environmental problems can be traced, in part, to the local population’s waning appreciation for the science of evolution.

“This is a national treasure,” he says, “and that it’s being managed rather carelessly in a lot of ways is not helped along by the fact that you have a really large population that doesn’t get it.”

But another longtime resident of the Galapagos sees it differently.

Marco Antonio Aguirre moved here with his family forty years ago to serve as a Jehovah’s Witnesses missionary. He now owns a bed and breakfast on Charles Darwin Avenue called La Peregrina (The Pilgrim).

Aguirre has also seen environmental destruction in recent years, but he argues that a belief in God’s creation may inspire people to help with conservation efforts.

“In my case, for example, it causes me to show much more respect for what we have,” he says. “And so I think that believing in a creator would be positive in that regard.”

While Aguirre does not believe in the theory of evolution, he does respect the scientist behind it. He says Darwin was a brave and insightful man who struggled to reconcile his ideas about life on earth with the Bible’s creation story.

Even those who disagree with Darwin are often grateful for what he did for the Galapagos, bringing world attention, tourists, and pride to the islands.

Source

http://www.pri.org/stories/politics-society/religion/birth-place-of-evolution-theory-now-inhabited-by-creationists5711.html

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Blasphemy of a Different Kind

June 15, 2011


Things have gone from bad to weird at La Sierra University.

The university, which is affiliated with the Seventh-day Adventist Church, has been dealing in recent months with a controversy over the teaching of evolution that has its Adventist benefactors threatening to withdraw its religious accreditation — and the $4 million per annum that comes with it. Now the university faces a scandal in which a trustee, a vice president, a dean, and an adjunct professor were asked to resign over a recording made, purportedly by accident, of the four men talking informally about the church and university leadership.The president of La Sierra’s board of trustees on Friday asked for the resignations of Jeff Kaatz, the vice president for university advancement; Jim Beach, the dean of arts and sciences; Lenny Darnell, a trustee; and Gary Bradley, an adjunct professor of biology, according to a campuswide note from the administration.

In recent years, La Sierra has been at the center of an imbroglio over the teaching of human origins that was sparked when a website published e-mails between a biology student and Bradley, the adjunct caught up in the current debacle.

Bradley had rejected a student paper for failing to demonstrate an adequate understanding of mainstream evolutionary theory before advocating for a creationist alternative. That led to an investigation by the board into the biology curriculum. In April, the Seventh-day Adventist Church North American Division voted to extend La Sierra’s religious accreditation by a single year and advised the university to rededicate itself to Adventist principles. (One of the church's "fundamental beliefs" is that God created all human things in six days, as described in the Bible.)

In a note to the campus on Monday, the university’s public relations office said that “these resignations have no connection to the biology controversy.” But according to an account published Tuesday in Spectrum, an Adventist publication, the recording that prompted the resignations was made following a meeting between the Adventist accreditors and the La Sierra faculty.

Darnell, the La Sierra trustee, was present at the meeting and decided to record the proceedings using an application on his smartphone.

According to the Spectrum article, Darnell met up afterward with Beach, Bradley, and Kaatz at a private home, where they watched a National Basketball Association playoff game and discussed the meeting. The recorder kept running, unbeknownst to the four men. It captured “foul language, references to alcohol consumption and unflattering comments being made about board members, administrators, and church leaders,” according to the article. Darnell then sent the recording to a number of key members of the Adventist community, including The Spectrum, reportedly without knowing that it contained more than just the audio of the meeting. Eventually, the recording made its way to Ricardo Graham, chair of the board of trustees.

La Sierra has declined to offer its own version of events. But Larry Becker, a spokesman for the university, confirmed the basic details of this narrative to Inside Higher Ed. He could not confirm the content of the recording, however, because, he said, he has not personally listened to it. Neither Kaatz, nor Beach, nor Darnell, nor Bradley responded to messages from Inside Higher Ed.

In an e-mail to colleagues, Bradley confirmed that he had admitted on the recording that he drank “a small glass of an alcoholic beverage during this conversation” — a fireable offense for faculty members at La Sierra, which has a strict temperance policy. Bradley also said the recording was made by accident, despite speculation that he was the target of sabotage based on his role in the evolution controversy. “It was more ‘Three Stooges’ than ‘James Bond,’ ” he wrote in an addendum to the e-mail.

In a statement on Tuesday, the university reiterated its stance that the situation has nothing to do with the conflict over the biology curriculum.

“Because La Sierra University has been the center of the biology debate in the Church for several years, it is also easy for people who do not know the facts to jump to the conclusion that these resignations must be related to that issue,” it said. “Some have taken it further, blaming the Church for carrying out a biology-related ‘witch hunt’ by asking these individuals to resign. This is simply not true. The ‘convenient’ explanation is sometimes the wrong one.”

Bradley, the biology adjunct, said in his e-mail that he was devastated by the turn of events that has led to his resignation, though he gave no explicit indication that he plans to fight the termination on legal grounds. “I’m not ready to quit…. I have many important projects underway here now and many other people will be inconvenienced by my sudden departure,” he wrote.

“If you are among those who welcome this transition, I request that you celebrate with dignity,” Bradley added. “If you are among those who find this transition upsetting, I ask that you not turn it into a war.”

For the latest technology news and opinion from Inside Higher Ed, follow @IHEtech on Twitter.

— Steve Kolowich


Source
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Spectrum Magazine article named above:

On the La Sierra Resignations: The Privacy Issue (i)
James Coffin

On April 20, 2011, a member of the La Sierra University Board of Trustees uses his cell phone to record a highly important faculty meeting. He then forgets to turn off the recording device, meaning that later in a private home he inadvertently appends to the initial recording an extended conversation that includes himself, two university administrators and a university professor.

Read More
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La Sierra Removed From Michigan Conference Approved Seventh-Day Adventist Universities

Posted by Luther Blanchard on May 27th, 2010

spectrummagazine.com and EducateTruth.Com are reporting that the Michigan Conference of Seventh-day Adventists executive committee has voted to remove La Sierra University from its “list of Adventist Colleges and Universities which qualify for employee subsidy” on Tuesday. Both websites have published a letter by Jay Gallimore, president of the Michigan Conference that was emailed to them by a Michigan Conference employee.

Adventist conference employees receive a subsidy when their children attend Adventist institutions, thus this removal would mean that children of the Michigan Conference will no longer receive this subsidy when attending La Sierra.

Some teachers at La Sierra, an Adventist institution, have been accused of teaching evolution which some leaders believe is contrary to the principles of the church. Evangelist David Asscherick wrote an email to General Conference Leadership protesting the teaching of Evolution at La Sierra in 2009 which started a lot of the agitation over the issue.

“With sorrow we feel it is our spiritual responsibility to notify Michigan Conference members that we do not believe that La Sierra can currently be trusted to be supportive of Seventh-day Adventist spiritual values especially in reference to faith in the biblical understanding of creation, and thus the authority of Scripture in the life and practice of the believer,” said the statement from Gallimore.

The statement defended Adventist Higher Education, but felt that all Adventist Education should be based in “the principles of Scripture and the Spirit of Prophecy.” The Spirit of Prophecy is seen by many Adventists as including the writings of the Adventist prophet Ellen Gould White.

Finally, the statement called for the upcoming 2010 General Conference session to support fundamental belief number 6 which calls for a “literal, recent, six-day Creation” by requiring all Seventh-day Adventist colleges and universities to support and defend “creation science,” which according to the statement is “seven ordinary, literal, historic, consecutive, contiguous twenty-four hour days of divine creation and rest as described in Genesis.”
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Possibly Related Posts

La Sierra University Responds To Michigan Conference of Seventh-day Adventists

South Central Adventist Conference Hires Two Female Pastors

Adventist General Conference Is More Than Business

Adventist Church General Session

Source: http://www.powernewsnetwork.com/la-sierra-removed-from-michigan-conference-approved-seventh-day-adventists-universities/731/

The Greatest Conspiracy Theory

(Image)http://www.sliceofscifi.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/02/nc_evolution_080103_ms.jpg

For the last few years I've noticed a growing popularity in the use of the term "Conspiracy Theory", for everything that certain interested parties would rather permit to remain a mystery. With this paramount classification the powers that be attempt to explain away all the strange phenomenon that thinking individuals can see the facts don't jibe with the flimsy fabrications provided by the media and propaganda outlets.

Some wonder what is the greatest conspiracy that there ever was?

It was not the single bullet, single gunman theory of the John F. Kennedy Assassination? Or, the Warren Commission's findings?

It wasn't the unwarranted collapse of WTC Building no. 7? Or the 911 Kean - Hamilton Commission's conclusions?

Those that are suspicious of the cheesy investigations and excuses are called "Conspiracy Theorists", or "Conspiracy Nut Cases". Besides all the bum data that passes for truth in the world, the real Conspiracies are in plain sight for all to see; and no one even notices them. Such is the case of the greatest Conspiracy Theory that there ever was: The Theory of Evolution; It first reared it's ugly head in the early Twentieth Century in United States Public Schools; since then it has spread like melaleuca:


Melaleucas were introduced to Florida in the United States in the early 20th century to assist in drying out swampy land and as garden plants. Once widely planted in Florida, it formed dense thickets and displaced native vegetation on 391,000 acres (1,580 km2) of wet pine flatwoods, sawgrass marshes, and cypress swamps in the southern part of the state. [It is prohibited by DEP and listed as a noxious weed by FDACS.[7].]... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melaleuca


It's gone viral

While modern society has fundamentally rejected the thought of the existence of God and Creation; Charles Darwin's Theory of Evolution has been accepted as gospel truth. We see it in every school, museum, magazine, text book, the media, and even in the pulpit. Yet, it can never be proven by the scientific method; therefore it isn't true! This is why I believe that the Theory of Evolution is a fraud, a sham, and the greatest Conspiracy Theory ever perpetrated on mankind.

Evolution = Evilution

Arsenio.

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EducateTruth.com promoted on 3ABN

Uploaded October 30, 2009

educatetruth

About This Video

This video is Public

David Assherick and Sean Pitman appeared on 3ABN Today Thursday 29, 2009. In a two hour special, "The Science of Faith--Seeing God Through His Creation," they discussed questions regarding creation and evolution. This clip is of Asscherick and Pitman responding to a viewer's question about EducateTruth.com and their petition.

http://www.viddler.com/explore/educatetruth/videos/3/


'>http://

Creating Controversy

September 1, 2009

Ever a thorny issue, the teaching of evolutionary biology at a small Christian university in California has sparked debate on the campus and within the Seventh-day Adventist church.
Now-public e-mails between a recent La Sierra University graduate and his biology professors provide a firsthand glimpse of a debate no doubt playing out at many colleges, where students of faith struggle to reconcile their beliefs with scientific theories on the origins of humanity. Unlike so many such academic discussions, however, the private interchange between Carlos Cerna and his professors has moved beyond the campus walls -- thanks to the Internet -- and generated a review within the church about the appropriateness of evolutionary studies for Seventh-day Adventists, a Christian denomination that embraces the six-day creation story outlined in the Book of Genesis.

Cerna butted heads with professors in a capstone biology course when he sought to insert his creationist beliefs into a paper about evolutionary theories, the e-mails indicate. One of two professors who taught the course had “reluctantly” agreed to Cerna’s approach in principle, but found the final product “unacceptable.”

“The paper you sent me is unacceptable in its present form,” Gary Bradley, a professor of biology, wrote to Cerna May 12. “You said you would address the geological issues presented in class, demonstrating that you understand the data and the mainstream interpretations. Only then would you attach a paragraph taking issue with that interpretation. You have not done this. You have demonstrated only superficial knowledge with what was presented in class and even that was done with clear apologetic skepticism.”

Cerna responded, saying he was “flabbergasted” by Bradley’s e-mail.

“I don’t see why I’m ‘getting the shaft’ for questioning these [scientific] methods, especially at an Adventist university,” he wrote.

The e-mails, as well as Cerna’s paper and other related documents, were leaked to a Web site called EducateTruth.com. Shane Hilde, a La Sierra alumnus critical of what he describes teaching “against the Bible” at the university, is the site’s creator. Hilde says Bradley and Lee Greer, who co-taught Cerna’s class, should both resign because their clear belief in evolution is contradictory to the teachings of the church that founded the university.

“For me it just comes down to employee misrepresenting an employer,” Hilde told Inside Higher Ed. “Someone employed for Pepsi is not going to retain their job promoting Coca-Cola. It’s pretty black and white.”

Hilde’s site, which he says attracts about 1,000 unique visitors each day, has spread the debate about La Sierra among Adventists. But it was an e-mail from David Asscherick, a popular evangelist, that appears to have pressured church leaders to weigh in on the issue. Asscherick, who appears regularly on a 24-hour radio and television station called Three Angels Broadcasting Network (3ABN), wrote members of the church’s General Conference urging them to “do something.”

“It is a matter of incontestable fact that naturalistic evolution is being taught at La Sierra University,” Asscherick wrote in the e-mail dated April 30, “This is not in and of itself a bad thing. Evolution should be taught at our denominational universities. But it should be taught as a competing and inimical worldview to the biblical worldview. We need our young people to know what it is they are up against, yes, but when naturalistic evolution is taught as fact or as the preferred and normative worldview, then we can be sure that the enemy has breached our lines.”

By June 19, the president of the worldwide church had written a letter affirming the church’s belief in a “literal, recent, six-day creation” and that “the Flood was global in nature.” Jan Paulsen, the church's president, went on to say that church-sponsored colleges and universities should teach students about evolution, but mindfully steer them back toward the church’s contrary view.

“As part of that exercise [in teaching] you will also expose them to elements and concepts of evolution. That is understood,” he wrote. “As your pastor, however, I appeal to you that when you take your students out on the journey, you bring them safely back home before the day is over. And their home must always be in the world of faith. You owe it to the students, you owe it to God, you owe it to their parents, you owe it to the church, and you owe it to yourself as a believer to safely guide them through difficult moments on their journey.”

Jay Gallimore, president of the Seventh-day Adventist Michigan Conference, also wrote about the debate on the conference's Web site.

"Adventist parents should be able to trust their colleges and universities to build the faith of their young people," he wrote. "They should not have the additional burden of trying on their own to figure out whether their youth are going to be taught evolution rather than creation."
Cerna, who graduated from La Sierra with a biology degree, said he was not opposed to evolution being taught, so long as it wasn't depicted as the lone viable explanation for the origin of of human beings.

"We should all be very aware of what the leading theory of the origin of life is," he said. "What I have strong feelings about is the way it's being taught. If you’re going to come out at an institution that is a Bible believing institution and say evolution is the only logical theory that makes any sense, then that’s what I have a problem with.”

Professor Not Changing Course

Bradley, who is semi-retired after 38 years at La Sierra, has seen evolution debates erupt on campus before -- and his traditional response is to “dive under the desk and wait for them to blow over.” In this instance, Bradley says he has the backing of his president, who wrote a letter to faculty, staff and trustees affirming the university’s role in the “important conversation of science and faith.”

“We at La Sierra University are continuing to examine how we teach the science relevant to origins in supportive, Adventist, Christian environment,” wrote Randal Wisbey, the university’s president. “We continue to welcome input made in a spirit of constructive Christian fellowship and which is respectful of scientific integrity -- recognizing that while we may not fully agree on everything, our mutual concern is always for unity in love to our Lord and service to His children.”

Wisbey did not respond to interview requests Monday.

The university plans to add a seminar for biology students in which theologians and scientists will discuss the intersections of faith and science. The university has also updated its Web site, listing “important reasons to study biology” on the campus. Students can expect to “study with professors who all deeply believe in God as the Creator of everything,” the site notes. While biology students will be expected to learn theories of evolution, they also “will be introduced to Seventh-day Adventist understandings of Creation, centered in the Genesis account, which reveals the Creator as a personal and loving God,” according to the site.

Bradley says he’s felt no pressure to change anything about his course, and says bluntly that he doesn’t plan to turn his class into a theological seminar, or to present evolutionary theory only to then dismantle it for students. While he’s fine with helping students work through struggles of faith, Bradley says he won’t undercut decades of peer reviewed scientific research in the interest of religious consistency.

“I am not OK with getting up in a science course and saying most science is rubbish,” he said.
Neither Bradley nor Greer have the protections of tenure. Bradley had tenure, but willingly gave it up in a deal to scale back his responsibilities in a phased retirement. Greer, who did not respond to an interview request Monday, is on the tenure track.

Faculty at La Sierra do not have to be members of the Seventh Day Adventist church -- unless they want tenure.

“I hope this will change,” Bradley said. “One cannot be tenure-track if they’re not a member. I’m embarrassed to say that, but it is true.”

Bradley joined the church as a boy, but when asked if he was a practicing Adventist, he said “On record, yes. You can read into that whatever you want.”

“It’s very, very clear that what I’m skeptical of is the absolute necessity of believing that the only way a creator God could do things is by speaking them into existence a few thousand years ago,” Bradley added. “That’s where my skepticism lies. That’s the religious philosophical basis for what I call the lunatic fringe. They do not represent the majority position in the Church, and yes I’m skeptical of that. But I want to say to kids it’s OK for you to believe that, but it’s not OK for you to be ignorant of the scientific data that’s out there.”

— Jack Stripling

Source:http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/09/01/evolution

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Note: Rubbish used to substitute for a vulgar expression.

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Religion and science: “isolation is not an option”

Sheila Liaugminas Monday, 27 April 2009

Religion and science: “isolation is not an option”

The Vatican recently invited friends and foes to an unprecedented conference on evolution. Our correspondent captures the intellectual drama of the week-long dialogue.



This was an all-star gathering nearly unprecedented in character. The Pontifical Council for Culture, the Pontifical Gregorian University and the University of Notre Dame assembled some of the world’s leading scientists, philosophers and theologians for a week-long conference in Rome called ‘Biological Evolution: Facts and Theories’ sub-headed ‘A Critical Appraisal 150 Years After "The Origin of Species"’. Throughout the five days, just about each of those words was challenged or parsed.

On the first morning of the March 2-7 gathering, evolutionary biologist Douglas Futuyma said that though conferences on the different disciplines are frequently held and attended by those assembled at the Gregorian, this one was different. And he looked forward to it immensely, he enthused, as potentially the best week of his life. What made this occasion so extraordinary was its nature as an interdisciplinary meeting of physicists, biologists, molecular geneticists, paleontologists, mathematicians, philosophers and theologians – some in the higher reaches of Vatican offices – to professionally exchange ideas about Darwinian evolution. They do not engage in dialogue often, some perhaps never before. And whatever gulf may actually exist between and among them has been deeply exacerbated by popular media and pop culture, creating an unnecessary "Creation-Evolution" divide.

In 1988, in a compelling letter to Fr George Coyne SJ, Director of the Vatican Observatory, Pope John Paul II eagerly encouraged this kind of dialogue. "The matter is urgent", John Paul said, and "the options do not include isolation." We have unprecedented opportunities today "for a common interactive relationship in which each discipline retains its integrity and yet is radically open to the discoveries and insights of the other... Christians will inevitably assimilate the prevailing ideas about the world, and today these are deeply shaped by science… We must ask ourselves whether both science and religion will contribute to the integration of human culture or to its fragmentation. It is a single choice, and it confronts us all. For a simple neutrality is no longer acceptable."

Nor is it popular. Celebrity atheists and neo-Darwinian scientists assail religion on perpetual book tours promoting their bestsellers. High-profile believers scorn atheistic science in their burgeoning movement to put God back in nature. They talk at but not with each other.

So when this conference opened with a welcoming address by Cardinal William Levada, head of the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, international media were present to cover it. Levada said the Catholic Church acknowledges the "wide spectrum of room" for belief in both the scientific basis for evolution and faith in God the Creator. Modern science cannot disprove the existence of God, Levada said. And Christian doctrine does not explain the physical processes by which creation took place. "We believe that however creation has come about and evolved, ultimately God is the creator of all things," he affirmed. Pressed to comment on the debate over creationist theory, the prelate said the Church would not take a stand on a properly scientific issue. "The Vatican listens and learns," he said.

Since Pope Pius XI instituted the Pontifical Academy of Sciences in 1936, the Church has relied on certain scholars to keep the Holy See current on developments in scientific research "to serve the truth", as John Paul put it in 1996 when he addressed its plenary assembly. "How do the conclusions reached by the various scientific disciplines coincide with those contained in the message of Revelation?" the Pope probed in that address. "And if, at first sight, there are apparent contradictions, in what directions do we look for their solution? We know, in fact, that truth cannot contradict truth."

But few know what the Church teaches regarding evolution. In fact, very little has officially been said about evolutionary biology and the theistic understanding of man. Pope Pius XII’s 1950 encyclical Humani generis was a marker that opened the way for scholars to develop thought along with advancing science. Church teaching on the doctrine of evolution, Pius XII said, remains something of an open question. He called it "praiseworthy" to take science into account, "in the case of clearly proved facts…" However "caution must be used when there is rather question of hypotheses, having some sort of scientific foundation, in which the doctrine contained in Sacred Scripture or in Tradition is involved," (emphasis added). So, the Pope said, the Church allows research and discussions between scholars in science and theology "with regard to the doctrine of evolution, in as far as it inquires into the origin of the human body as coming from pre-existent and living matter -- for the Catholic faith obliges us to hold that souls are immediately created by God."

In John Paul’s 1996 address to the Academy of Sciences, he took such openness further, saying that since Humani generis was issued, "new knowledge has led to the recognition of the theory of evolution as more than a hypothesis."

Those papal excerpts capture much of the March 2009 Rome evolution conference.

Facts and Theories

It was an intense week. Even the terminology in the presentations was continually challenged. "Can we claim that any statement is a fact?" mused Futuyma, reframing a participant’s question. "What do we mean by fact? It’s not something I know with unshakeable certainty, but something with so much supportive evidence that we must treat it as if it were true." Roman anthropologist Giorgio Manzi questioned the term "theory" in presentations of science, philosophy and theology. "Perhaps we should refer to possible approaches instead," suggested Gennaro Auletta, Gregorian Science Director. Provided they have solid grounding as science, philosophy or theology, was the underlying predication.

One participant took advantage of the Q&A session opening morning to launch a lengthy argument for the "Intelligent Design" theory. He got exactly the attention he intended when his colleague recorded the incident and posted it on YouTube. Though media reported that Turkish surgeon Oktar Babuna was denied a right to speak, that’s not true. He was in fact given the same ability as any participant to frame a question briefly and allow presenters to respond. He elaborated the "Intelligent Design" challenges to the evidence for biological evolution in the fossil record, but after repeated attempts failed to get him to pose a single question, conference organizers turned off his microphone and asked him to return to his seat. He continued to filibuster, but eventually was escorted off the floor. Futuyma personally spoke with Babuna on the side, explaining scientific evidence for evolution and transitional forms. Two Vatican officials also spoke personally with Babuna, and listened to his views.

Conference organizers say they intended to present "the facts of evolution" by scientists, hear philosophical reflection on them, and conclude with theological considerations of the nature of man. "Religious belief can exist with the sciences without losing itself," said German philosopher Jurgen Mittelstrass. "There is a bridge to Darwin. One only has to know how to walk on it without giving up on religion or giving in to science completely."

The problem, or one of them, is who controls the narrative. That was one point of agreement here. "Public relations encounters science in news and views these days with unfortunate consequences," said one presenter. He called for some epistemology on the "theory of everything"… which was essentially what they were doing there in the first place.

Both mathematics and philosophy are needed

Which made a roomful of such diverse experts, who see things dramatically differently, so fascinating. The first couple of days were devoted to science: random mutations, "the common ancestry of diverse species", evolutionary biology, natural selection, and slides on jaws and skulls and bacteria and the human eye. Early presentations relied on the necessity of mathematics for doing science. Later ones turned the philosophical corner. "The mathematical model describes everything and explains nothing," said Belgian philosopher of science, Dominique Lambert, warning that such models can trap and limit thought. "Kant’s question ‘What is man?’ can only be considered after asking ‘What can I know?’, ‘What ought I to do?’, and ‘What may I hope?’ said Mittelstrass. "Nature gives no ethical lessons."

Cardinal Georges Cottier, former theologian to the Pope, calmly said "the need for metaphysics has to be recognized," to a significant number of conference participants who have not considered it either necessary or relevant. "Everything exists from God, the first and universal cause," continued Cottier. "Everything."

That ex nihilo concept of making something from nothing invokes Thomas Aquinas, who believed the existence of something rather than nothing proves the existence of God. But the Catholic Church doesn’t embrace creationism and never did, he specified. Aquinas drew a distinction between creation and change, and saw God’s providence in the natural sciences. The changes in nature that move and can be perceived and measured by science, Cottier said, comprise the relationship between creation and God.

He talked about the soul, and the human nature of Christ. Cottier spoke of the immortality of the soul and the meaning of the resurrection. And about parents as God’s collaborators in creation. The room was respectfully attentive. Some participants who had taken furious notes during scientific presentations were politely listening. Many who had leaned on their hands earlier in the week were taking notes as fast as they could write. "This debate required the Church to speak out, and many times to address the incorrect understanding of the imago Dei," Cottier continued. "The human soul is directly created by God. But the concept of soul is not widely considered today." That was a grand understatement, given the audience.

Cottier said the soul is "an antiquated concept that brings a smile to faces today," but it’s more like a snicker or frown or worse… complete disregard. He challenged philosophers to fix that.

"The spiritual soul doesn’t proceed from the accidents of nature, but from being," Cottier continued. "With the infusion of the spiritual soul by God, man is created. Thomas says species should be considered in the ‘order of things’. The perfection of this order is human. All elements of the cosmos tend towards man."

Establishing a dialogue

Just two days earlier, conference participants had heard an evolutionary biologist declare "the Darwinian revolution consisted of removing man from the center of the universe and making him just one in an assortment of species, just one more among more than 10 million." Such was the dynamic tension of the proceedings. So after Cottier’s lecture, Auletta asked all present to respect the constraints of each field and discipline. "We ought to confront ourselves and challenge our opinions," he urged. "I invite you all to try to understand each other in a mutual way."

Science wasn’t ‘doing God’, but scientists were listening, and some were taking notes. Like Futuyma. In a coffee break conversation, he dismissed the doctrine of original sin and ‘the Fall,’ but Futuyma was at least willing to engage the question, obviously enjoying the weeklong engagement.

"All we can do is compare beliefs with beliefs, but not directly to a known reality," Massimo Stanzione suggested in the next lecture. Some experts "don’t believe in objective truth, but believe in being honest in these discussions," he said. That’s an encouragement to "bring home all aspects of this great debate."

French philosopher Jean-Michel Maldame returned to clarifying terms, at times in bullet-point form. "Theories are the considerations of facts," he stated. "What are facts, first of all? Facts can’t be challenged. Theories or principles should. They lead to a philosophical debate. There is no spontaneous generation—that has a temporal nature. Scientific research investigates fossils and places them in a continuum of time… The theory of evolution presents itself as an historical exploration. But we can’t go back and experiment on origins."

Maldame probed further, parsing the ideas of "origin" and "beginning". "In Genesis, ‘In the beginning’ can also be translated as an origin rather than just the beginning." What’s the difference? "Origin is a constituent of what appears on a continuum. Beginning does not. An origin is not a beginning. Be careful of referring to origin as beginning…. Science applies to change or energy. Philosophy applies to reasons for change, and for life itself."

The conference was indeed provocative.

"God’s role in causality can be understood as interactive," Maldame said in setting up an analogy. "Take, for example, the music produced by a musician playing an instrument. All is produced by both, and if you eliminate either you lose it. This allows us to understand God’s action in the forces of nature. Everything comes from both God and nature. My explanation of God is not to negate science."

However….

Tension between science and religion

There is "tension still between science and religion, with a lot of skeptical bystanders," said French philosopher Jacques Arnauld. He invoked the "render unto Caesar" analogy. "We can have discussions with scientists, inviting but not obliging them to consider the things that are of God," said Arnauld. "Just take God into account. Don’t blow out the candle or the lamp post saying ‘Stay here.’ But instead, say ‘Go out’, and encourage the journey of finding the way."

Even before it ended, these final lectures brought the conference full circle, venturing where the Pontifical Council for Culture and partner sponsors intended it to "journey".

To those who believe the Church tortured Galileo and abhors science, this would all be rather stunning. Auletta, a professor of philosophy at the Gregorian, told the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano that the Church is rich in scientific scholarship and pointed to Cardinal John Henry Newman as a supporter of Darwinism.

"This is one of the many reasons that in my opinion make all the efforts to recover or rehabilitate Darwin superfluous, because neither the Catholic Church nor her most important exponents have ever condemned Darwinism or the theory of evolution," he said.

In that 1988 letter to Vatican Observatory director Fr George Coyne, Pope John Paul II emphasized the importance of diverse disciplines converging for a unified vision of humanity and humanism. But he qualified it, with keen awareness and insight: "Yet the unity that we seek… is not identity. The Church does not propose that science should become religion or religion, science. On the contrary, unity always presupposes the diversity and the integrity of its elements. Each of these members should become not less itself but more itself in a dynamic interchange… We are asked to become one. We are not asked to become each other."

On that occasion, the 1988 tri-centennial of Sir Isaac Newton’s Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (philosophy of mathematical principles of natural philosophy), John Paul said the benefit from this exchange is mutual. "Science can purify religion from error and superstition; religion can purify science from idolatry and false absolutes… Only a dynamic relationship between theology and science can reveal those limits which support the integrity of either discipline, so that theology does not profess a pseudoscience and science does not become an unconscious theology.

"You are called to learn from one another, to renew the context in which science is done and to nourish the inculturation which vital theology demands. Each of you has everything to gain from such an interaction, and the human community which we both serve has a right to demand it from us."

Whatever the other evolution conference participants do with the proceedings in their own particular disciplines, it’s up to the Pontifical Council for Culture to tell the culture that they’re working on it.

Sheila Gribben Liaugminas is an Emmy Award winning journalist who reported for Time magazine for more than 20 years. She blogs at InforumBlog.com and on MercatorNet.



Source:http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/religion_and_science_isolation_is_not_an_option/



P.S. Highlights added for emphasis.

Vatican rejects atheism; also, fire is hot

Paul Fidalgo

DC Secularism Examiner

Vatican rejects atheism; also, fire is hot
March 5, 4:59 PM

According to the AP, Cardinal William Levada, head of the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, said during a seminar at the Vatican commemorating the 150th anniversary of On the Origin of Species, that while the church did not reject evolution, it insisted that God was its progenitor.

"We believe that however creation has come about and evolved, ultimately God is the creator of all things," he said on the sidelines of the conference.

But while the Vatican did not exclude any area of science, it did reject as "absurd" the atheist notion of biologist and author Richard Dawkins and others that evolution proves there is no God, he said.

"Of course we think that's absurd and not at all proven," he said. "But other than that ... the Vatican has recognized that it doesn't stand in the way of scientific realities."


This is big news, folks, and it's a good thing it was picked up by the Associated Press (with almost all headlines used for this article being some form of, "Cardinal says atheist's theories 'absurd'"). Else, how would we ever know that the Catholic Church as an institution had not yet dismissed the existence of God? Here was me, just sitting here thinking that His Holiness was having pow-wows with Sam Harris and Penn Gillette, readying to dismantle the entire organization, when it is reported that in fact atheism was not a tenet of Catholic dogma. Amazing.

In related news, Republicans on the Hill think taxes are bad, a survey of American mothers finds that almost all of them love their children, and recent focus group studies show that people are wary of touching open flames because of an alleged "hotness" associated with fire.

Okay, I kid the AP. I kid 'cause I love. The whole conference sounds like it was a positive thing, with evolution being supported and intelligent design in science classes being rejected. All very good stuff, with no complaints here.

One side note to this same article, though, notice that "the atheist notion" is attributed almost exclusively to Richard Dawkins. I know he's one of, if not the most famous nonbeliever these days, and it was in the context of a kind of biology summit, but I still find it curious that right now our culture is equating atheism with Dawkins. It's not as though he just came up with atheism! We might as well call it "Dawkinsism" as far as a lot of folks are concerned.

I think that's a little hard to say, frankly. Just try it. Dawkins-ism. You see? It would never fly.

Source: http://www.examiner.com/x-4275-DC-Secularism-Examiner~y2009m3d5-Vatican-rejects-atheism-also-fire-is-hot

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