I think it’s helpful to ask where the heat comes from in this conflict.

In my opinion Genesis 1-3 is a polemical piece standing against the competing creation myths vying for the hearts and minds of the Hebrew people. It was essential that they divorce themselves from the gods of Egypt, Canaan and Mesopotamia and their supporting mythic narratives in order to rightly understand the creator God, what we were made to be and how we were made to relate to that God and to the creation. How they understood their origins would greatly impact the trajectory of their lives with respect to this God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and how they would live out this relationship in the world created by this narrative.

The polemical nature of the Biblical creation story continues today to stand against competing creation myths. I think it is worth a moment to ask how and in what way contemporary scientific assumptions, conclusions and connected models do and don’t compete against the Biblical narrative. Is what science has postulated about the origins of the universe essentially similar to the Egyptian, Canaanite and Mesopotamian myths? I think we have to say, “yes and no”.

The scientific community generates working hypotheses about origins which are connected with a myriad of models and projects in use to pursue their work. It is important to be a bit precise as to what the scientific project is and the way that is it used towards various ends.

The primary purpose of ancient creation accounts was to local the critical actors of their times (kings, men, women, the gods, etc.) and answer the questions “who are we? Who governs this world? Where do we fit into this world? How are we to make our way in this world? What is this world about?”

I watch a lot of science educational TV and I noted that nearly every program opens with these big sweeping questions as a sort of a hook to get your interest and pull you in. Is this hook, however, really central to the scientific project? I don’t think so. Science develops models and hypotheses in order to answer the question “what is” and “how does it work”. Science is completely unable to answer the questions “what does it mean?” It seems to me that the meaning questions are the really interesting ones and that many scientists just can’t help but wander into someone else’s domain and take a stab at things. That’s fine. One thing you get used to as a pastor is that everyone is always trying to do your job for themselves. I suppose we should be flattered.

Back to the heat generated by the debate. It is fully native for preachers and religious people to zealously defend their polemical narratives. They are making a variety of assertions that involve history, meaning, but most of all they are using these texts for what they were designed to do, to orient people in terms of where they fit into the scheme of the cosmos, who humanity is and how one lives out these realities in faithfulness to their creator. We should expect this group to be hot, jealous of what they possess, and motivated to defend it.

The more curious source of heat comes from the scientific community. What I hear from them, however, are two distinct motivations for passion, and I would argue that one is right and the other alien to the scientific agenda.

Those scientists who are using their systems and structures as a polemic against ancient origins narratives should reconsider their field of inquiry. Do the hypotheses and working models of which they are experts really answer the questions of whether all this stuff is infused with meaning and purpose, of where humanity fits into the grand scheme of things in terms of his purpose and what it means to live faithfully and meaningfully within this context? It would seem to me that it cannot. This group instead perhaps has taken science and turned it into a religion of their own and is pushing their own religious agenda. We have freedom of religion in this country and they are well within their rights to do so, but they should also admit that they are then playing a different game. Questions of meaning, ought, responsibility and faithfulness to a reality beyond the physical cannot be addressed by the physical sciences.

From what I hear from others in this debate, often from Christian scientists is a different message. What I hear them warning pastors like myself to be careful about wandering into their fields of expertise. I am not one to say that there is a big bright line between Biblical creation narratives and hypotheses and conclusions drawn from contemporary science. I believe the Biblical record bases meaning in history, within the literary expressions it employs, and so there will be a lot of discussion and likely unresolved conflicts between some of what the scientific community is doing and what the pastors are doing with the Bible. The Belgic confession says we’ve got two books and in today’s world of specialization pastors work hard to learn one and science types work hard to learn another and our notes don’t always compare well. This shouldn’t surprise us because often our notes within our own professional communities don’t always compare well. There will be problems. What I hear Christians scientists saying, however, is to be careful in educating the young regarding these issues. Beware of attempts to stack the deck too early in these conflicts which too often set up young people for crises of faith in one sphere or the other. If you really pound the “all-or-nothing” pulpit, and you get that message across, what if that young person one day has serious doubts that the earth’s age can’t be arrived at by summing up the genealogies of the patriarchs and that seeing the light from stars shining millions of light years away might just mean that things are a bit older and more complex than the Genesis genealogies.

Since I have homeschooled my kids, I have had to think about this a bit. What I have decided to do is to simply allow the two books to grow in front of my children as they are and trust that as they grow when the crises arise between these two communities interpreting the two books that they will begin that process of working two ends that don’t quite fit together as they come across them. I read them the Bible stories as is. I don’t try to alter them or tailor them according to questions that arise from the scientific sector. I also expose them to science type stuff that talks about long periods of time and processes that result in the world as we see it today. I don’t try to wrap up these contractions prior to finding them on their own. Let them grow together and work on the little skirmishes with humility as they arise, being open to things we know and things we don’t know.

One thing that I think is important to think about is what they need to know when they need to know it. What they learn from the Bible is in my opinion far more important for their lives and their development than what they will learn from science. Why is that? How many people really have a deep and in depth knowledge of the scientific basis for the conclusions they reach regarding origins? People know Christianity because Christians belief that the story they tell is of utmost importance for everyone’s life, yet because of historical processes not everyone has had an opportunity to hear about it. How much more true is this not of science? The areas that the Biblical creation narratives push are in fact universally applicable and helpful. Who made the world? What is he like? Can he be trusted? Where do I fit in? Science can’t answer any of these questions.

If people will go into the sciences they will have to learn the language and skills of this communal project. Just like anyone desiring to be in an orchestra will need to learn the skills, the essential repertoire, and the ways of the violin in order to participate, so also those heading in the field of science will have to master what they need to participate in this community. Science, however, is a subset of the larger human project and its body of information is a specialized one. All peoples need to learn who they are and how they relate to the broader world.  pvk