Christianity Today Sits on Fence

Creation Evolution Debate CHRISTIANITY TODAY SITS ON FENCE
Christian News, June 20, 2011

“The Search for the Historical Adam” is the title of the cover of the June, 2011 Christianity Today. The subtitle is “Some scholars believe genome science casts doubt on the existence of the first man and woman. Others say the integrity of the faith requires it.”

At one time Christianity Today defended the inerrancy of the Bible, the historicity of the Genesis account of creation, and opposed evolution. Now Christianity Today maintains that those who deny the inerrancy of the Bible and promote evolution should be permitted to remain in their denomination and not disciplined.

Christian News has frequently shown that no major denomination ever since it began has insisted on the absolute historicity of the Genesis account of creation, one man and one woman, and opposed evolution more that The Lutheran Church-Missouri synod. Until the 1950s no LCMS pastor or professor publicly promoted evolution or denied the inerrancy of the Bible. In the 1950s some LCMS professors and pastors began denying the inerrancy of the Bible and historicity of Genesis account of creation. They supported evolution. Although the LCMS continues to publicly oppose evolution, no pastor or professor in the LCMS who supports evolution has ever been removed from the LCMS. Since the 1950s all LCMS administrations, including the present LCMS administration, have refused to take action vs. evolutionists or even consider charges of false doctrine brought against evolutionists. Only those who dare to file charges of false doctrine against any evolutionists are kept off the LCMS clergy roster.

“The Search For The Historical Adam” by Richard Ostling in the June Christianity Today says:
“Secularist brows furrowed in 2009 when President Obama chose prominent atheist-turned-Christian Francis S. Collins to be the director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).”
“Collins, one of the most eminent scientists ever to identify as an evangelical Christian, staunchly defends Darwinian evolution even as he insists on God as the Creator. And he now stands at the epicenter of a dispute that increasingly agitates fellow believers. At issue: the traditional tenet (as summarized in Wheaton College‘s mandatory credo) that ‘God directly created Adam and Eve, the historical parents of the entire human race.’”

“In a recent pro-evolution book from InterVarsity Press, The Language of Science and Faith, Collins and co-author Karl W. Giberson escalate matters, announcing that ‘unfortunately’ the concepts of Adam and Eve as the literal first couple and the ancestors of all humans simply ‘do not fit the evidence.’”

“Foundational confessions of faith from the Protestant Reformation assume a historical Adam, and official Roman Catholicism defined this teaching at the 1546 Council of Trent, in the 1950 encyclical Humani Generis of Pope Pius XII (who cautiously allowed leeway for humanity’s bodily evolution), and in the 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Church. The broader public is intrigued, more so than by many other biblical topics; a 2005 Gallup Poll found that 40 percent of Americans think the various competing concepts of human origins matter ‘a great deal.’
“So, is the Adam and Eve question destined to become a groundbreaking science-and-Scripture dispute, a 21st-century equivalent of the once disturbing proof that the Earth orbits the sun?”
“But even the late James Montgomery Boice, founding chair of the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy, which insisted on a historical Adam, thought various scientific findings make it ‘hard to believe’ in a recent creation.”

“A second competitor, the ‘old earth’ version of creationism, is far more prevalent among evangelical intellectuals. It basically rejects evolution but affirms science’s longstanding and lopsided support for the planet’s vastly ancient age.

“A third alternative is the newer ‘intelligent design’ approach, which deems the Darwinian ‘natural selection’ model of evolutionary theory to be improbable and posits that some designing force lies behind nature, but does not explicitly define this as the God of Judaism and Christianity.

“Collins and his colleagues dismiss those three views in favor of ‘theistic evolution,’ which affirms that the biblical God was the creator of all earthly organisms, humanity included, and used as his method the standard evolutionary scenario of gradual natural selection among genetic mutations across eons. A non-random Internet survey of teachers at evangelical seminaries in 2009 showed that 46 percent accept that concept. Giberson estimates that ‘the overwhelming number in biology departments at Christian colleges would be fine with this,’ though a 2005 survey found that only 27 percent identified as evolutionary creationists. In a mail survey of ASA scientists last year, 66 percent of respondents affirmed that ‘Homo sapiens evolved through natural processes from ancestral forms in common with primates,’ while 90 percent agreed that the Earth is some 4.6 billion years old.

“In late 2007, Collins launched the San Diego-based BioLogos Foundation to promote theistic evolution, especially among evangelicals. He sought not only to embrace what he considers to be the best evidence, but also to bolster Christian credibility among people who are knowledgeable about mainstream scientific . . . . continued in Christian News, June 20, 2011, Vol. 59, No. 23