Anglicans Back Darwin Over 'noisy' Creationists -Times Online

[Major Tom]

From The Times Anglicans back Darwin over 'noisy' creationists -Times Online September 13, 2008 <H1 class=heading>Anglicans back Darwin over 'noisy' creationists</H1><H2 class="sub-heading padding-top-5 padding-bottom-15"> The Church of England expressed deep concerns last night about the spread of creationist views as it prepared to unveil a website promoting the evolutionary views of Charles Darwin.</H2>Anglican leaders fear that “noisy” advocates of a literal interpretation of the Bible - especially in the United States, where even the Republican vice-presidential candidate, Sarah Palin, is a vocal supporter - are infecting the perception of Christianity worldwide.

 

The Church will launch the website on Monday, a few weeks after the 150th anniversary of Darwin's first public proposal of natural selection and amid growing controversy over the teaching of creationism in schools. The Rev Professor Michael Reiss, a biologist and director of education at the Royal Society, provoked a furore this week when he called for creationism to be treated in science lessons as a legitimate “world-view”.

 

function slideshowPopUp(url) { pictureGalleryPopupPic(url); return false; } The Church of England weighed into the debate yesterday when a Church House spokesman admitted that the treatment of Darwin's theory of evolution by Victorian clerics was wrong.He said that science and religions were “perfectly compatible” and attacked creationism as a strand of Christianity that created a false impression of the Church as a whole.

 

The Rev Dr Malcolm Brown, one of the inspirations for the website, said: “We felt there would be public interest, particularly because of the rise of creationism in the US.

 

“Christian attitudes don't have to be either a complete swallowing of Darwin and everything that has been done in his name, on the one hand, and, on the other, the complete rejection of scientific method with a literal interpretation of the Bible.

 

“A culture that doesn't have a great deal of historic understanding of the Christian faith can easily characterise all Christians as being like the most noisy ones.”

 

A church spokesman added: “Creationism should not be taught as a scientifically based theory but could be included in discussion of the development of scientific ideas down the ages or in RE.”

 

Rasmandala Das, of the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies, said that the Hindu approach was to teach all different views of the creation across the curriculum.

 

Members of the humanist movement dismissed creationism as “simply wrong” but agreed that religious believers must be engaged by science teachers rather than ignored.

 

Andrew Copson, director of education for the British Humanist Association, said that Professor Reiss was right to think it was better to take the opportunity to debate the issue than to belittle children by telling them: “Shut up, that's for RE. Should a teacher say, ‘Shut up, that's for RE'? Obviously not,” he said. “If a child raises it in a classroom you don't say, ‘Shut up'. You say, ‘That's not a scientific perspective.' It can be an opportunity to demonstrate what a scientific perspective is.”

 

Tahir Alam, of the Muslim Council of Britain, expressed concern that there was a rising trend of intolerance towards religious beliefs and said: “Secular atheism is getting very dogmatic.” Mr Alam said of creationism in science lessons: “In any educational context, if children raise questions and have beliefs which are different to the teachers, people should not be dogmatic about not discussing it.”

 

However, Rabbi Dr Tony Bayfield, head of the Movement for Reform Judaism, expressed doubts: “It would be as unacceptable for Judaism for schools to teach creationism in science lessons as it would be for them to teach the Dawkins secular fundamentalist view that Darwin and God are incompatible.”

 

 

[ContraBardus]

Yet again, Science wins the argument, and Christianity tries to pretend that it was their position all along.

 

How typical.

 

It only took a hundred and fifty years and the weight of an entire mountain of evidence.

[Vomit Comet]

I've never respected such accomodationist backpedaling. I'll say it the politically correct way: what a bunch of wimps!

 

I've always had, and still have more respect (for lack of a better word) for the ones that fought and continue to fight against modernity tooth-and-nail. "We ain't goin' nowhere, motherfuckers!" The stubborn hard-ass tree that stays upright in the storm even if it should snap in half as a result, rather than the flexible tree that bends with the winds.

 

Now, here's an analogy!

 

1. See, in premodern times, Christianity was basically a giant vat of ethanol that flared up frequently. People often got burned.

 

2. But then you had the 30 Year War, Enlightenment, the French Revolution, and the rise of modernity. Christianity was reduced to a barrel of whiskey. Pretty stiff stuff, but palatable enough for those who were compelled to drink.

 

3. And then Darwin and the gang came along and unceremoniously cracked open the barrel with an ax. Thus commenced much of Europe's lapse into post-Christianity.

 

4. The mainliners/liberals took a highball glass and filled it with Zima on the rocks. Every few years they tip the glass a little bit and pour some out, and then top it back off with soda water. Fizzy, yes. Potent, no. They're trying to appease the scientists and critics. "Have a sip! It goes down real smooth and easy, we promise!" Weak.

 

5. The fundies said "fuck you motherfuckers!!!" and they've been working feverishly to distill a big ol' batch of straight-up fucking Everclear. And if they somehow became capable of distilling enough of that shit, you're goddamn right it could power a fleet of fucking hot rods just like in the good ol' days! Get 'er done!!!

[qec]

I've never respected such accomodationist backpedaling. I'll say it the politically correct way: what a bunch of wimps!

 

I've always had, and still have more respect (for lack of a better word) for the ones that fought and continue to fight against modernity tooth-and-nail. "We ain't goin' nowhere, motherfuckers!" The stubborn hard-ass tree that stays upright in the storm even if it should snap in half as a result, rather than the flexible tree that bends with the winds.

 

Now, here's an analogy!

 

1. See, in premodern times, Christianity was basically a giant vat of ethanol that flared up frequently. People often got burned.

 

2. But then you had the 30 Year War, Enlightenment, the French Revolution, and the rise of modernity. Christianity was reduced to a barrel of whiskey. Pretty stiff stuff, but palatable enough for those who were compelled to drink.

 

3. And then Darwin and the gang came along and unceremoniously cracked open the barrel with an ax. Thus commenced much of Europe's lapse into post-Christianity.

 

4. The mainliners/liberals took a highball glass and filled it with Zima on the rocks. Every few years they tip the glass a little bit and pour some out, and then top it back off with soda water. Fizzy, yes. Potent, no. They're trying to appease the scientists and critics. "Have a sip! It goes down real smooth and easy, we promise!" Weak.

 

5. The fundies said "fuck you motherfuckers!!!" and they've been working feverishly to distill a big ol' batch of straight-up fucking Everclear. And if they somehow became capable of distilling enough of that shit, you're goddamn right it could power a fleet of fucking hot rods just like in the good ol' days! Get 'er done!!!

 

Yeah well, I used to be one of those hard asses you are talking about and I can assure you that what I was a part of was about as hard ass as it fucking gets. I can also tell you that what "breaks" those hard asses isn't the "forces of modernity"-and my former group wants to return Western Europe to Pre-Enlightenment and setup the Monarchies again- what breaks you is the those types of people. I don't know what Nietzsche was smoking when he said "Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger" but I have tried repeating that and it doesn't work; I am fucking broken. Those "hard asses" will use you and use you like a paper towel and then throw you the fuck away after you are done cleaning up their dirty stuff. What breaks the "hard asses" is not the forces of modernity, what "breaks" them are each other. If anything the "forces of modernity" has a slow gradual creeping effect that the hard asses can't deal with, and that's exactly why they have been losing up till now. They might "win", but I doubt it; even if we wound up with Dark Ages II I wouldn't chalk it up to a "win" for those people, I would just say it was the result of the "forces of modernity" getting cocky and thinking they could lick everything that came their way while conning people at the same time due to corruption creep.

 

It's all a goddamn joke, every last fucking bit of it, the liberals too. Someone just the other day told me that "There are good people in the world" (she was a liberal) and then had then told me right after that "It's a Dog eat Dog World out here". Riiiiiiggghhhhhttt... Dog eat Dog means there are really only two classes of people in the "real world": Victims and Victimizers. Seeing as how I plan on being neither, I don't think I'll be getting the "Real World" anytime soon. Fuck "Dog eat Dog". Fuck it, and fuck naive liberals too who still eat other Dogs and think they can fucking trick people into becoming victims. Oh yeah, fuck the conservatives too; they are far more evil and only a tad more honest about it. Fuck 'em all.