Michael Dowd On God In Big History, Evolutionary Christianity, And The New Atheists As Prophets

[M4rio]

I recently read Michael Dowd's book Thank God for Evolution, and was fascinated by his ability to reconceptualize, or perhaps just properly explain, what "God" or "gods" are. Essentially, he says all gods are personifications of nature, or reality itself, but are *not* literal Persons (see his blog post http://thankgodforevolution.com/node/2010.) And, he believes today's religions must embrace Darwinian evolution and the 13.8-billion-year Big History of the universe.

 

I'm starting this thread for one purpose: To discuss his views with people who spend, at least, the 3 hours watching his content from here: http://thegreatstory.org/god-in-big-history.html

 

Please do not dismiss him without at least viewing those videos.

 

For my own quick summary and more resources:

 

Dowd channels scholar Loyal Rue in saying religion is about people interpreting "how things are", and "what things matter". It's about reality as a whole and people relating themselves to reality. His thesis is that all the major religions *must* embrace Darwinian evolution and re-interpret themselves in light of that and the 13.8 billion year Big History of our universe, or else they will either perish *or* lead to great peril through the combination of stone-age dogma with modern weapons (channels Sam Harris there).

 

Aside: Big History is a subject all to its own! See the last link below for a free online course.

 

He recognizes all religious language as mythological, but he doesn't denigrate all religious ideas wholesale. Yet, he has also preached a sermon called The New Atheists as Prophets in which he expresses gratitude to Sam Harris, Hitchens, Dawkins, Dennett, and also Michael Earl (Bible Stories Your Parents Never Told You). He says that they rightly attack fictional, otherwordly views of God that deserve to be mocked. See this: http://thankgodforevolution.com/node/2018.

 

He explains evolution well and he says that for him the word God means Ultimate Reality/Nature but he doesn't claim this as pantheism or panentheism, but he does discuss both briefly in the book. Humorously, he calls himself a creatheist, as does his wife. He pronounces it crea-theist, but she pronounces it cre-atheist. They travel the country and tell the story of the 13.8 billion year evolution of the universe all the way to human beings.

 

I know there have been posts about him before, as far back as 2008, in which he was dismissed quickly as an intelligent design advocate in sheep's clothing. Having read his book, watched many hours of his talks on TED.com and YouTube, I do not believe this is the case. Not at all. He accepts Darwinian evolution, and does not even speak of "theistic evolution". In fact, he is calling himself a Christian naturalist who has "no otherworldly, supernatural beliefs". He cites a paper from the 70s by Benson Saler (see http://thankgodforevolution.com/node/2024) in which Salem says the idea of supernatural didn't really exist in the ancient world.

 

I could go on, but let me just say this:

 

I don't know how many of you struggle with finding common ground with religious people in your lives. I certainly do. I've watched the first three videos in God in Big History so far with my girlfriend, who grew up in a very strict bible tradition. The third episode, Reality Rules, she said she really liked. Granted, she's been quite liberal for a while now, but by no means ex-Christian. This episode calls all gods personifications, not Persons, and even describes Jesus as "unnatural" and the gospel miracles about him as fictional. I am not claiming that all Christians would take kindly to his approach, but he does present 90% of it in a way that doesn't denigrate religious people or religion in general.

 

Again, without being quick to dismiss him just because he still utilizes the word "God", I'd like to discuss his views with others.

 

Here are more links:

 

Biblical Christianity is Bankrupt: http://thankgodforevolution.com/node/2070

 

Thank God for Evolution book: http://www.amazon.com/Thank-God-Evolution-Marriage-Transform/dp/0452295343

 

America's Evolutionary Evangelists podcast: http://evolutionaryevangelists.libsyn.com/

 

The Advent of Evolutionary Christianity interview series: http://thegreatstory.org/ec-participants.html

 

More podcasts (Inspiring Naturalism and Evolving Faith): http://thegreatstory.org/audio.html

 

Evolutionary Parables for teaching children: http://www.thegreatstory.org/parables.html

 

Not by him, but from Bill Gates and David Christian and others:

 

https://www.bighistoryproject.com/chapters/1#intro