Defying the Logic

I'm a product of a Catholic education. A couple of years ago a childhood buddy that I grew up with on the NW side of Chicago told me that he envied my schooling while he attended the Chicago public schools. I got through college without much effort (and my grades reflected that) while he struggled because, as he now admits, his school experience didn't prepare him very well. He made it eventually.

The Sisters of St. Francis and the Christian Brothers taught religion right alongside the science, math and liberal arts material of a traditional education. They never seemed to have a conflict between religious dogma and the rigors of scientific method. I never heard anyone discounting geology, anthropology or paleontology because it disagreed with the seven-day-creation story of Genesis. That was explained as metaphor while science was accepted as logical. The creation acknowledged that a Supreme Being was the "First Cause" that caused it all and He was a "mystery."

The 700+ year life-span of Methuselah was not an issue, as unusual as it might sound. Dinosaurs weren't mentioned in the Bible, but clearly appeared in the science books. No conflict noted. Man evolving from invertebrates was reasonable over geological ages, even though the Bible could only account for about 6000 years from first stroke of God to the current day.

That's why the "Creationists" confound me. Read this interesting piece:

Origin of a Weird Species

They've really got a problem with ol' Darwin. How many times have you heard them say, "it's only a theory"? Well, yes it is. That is an application of scientific method. You observe phenomenon. You then postulate a relationship. If your theory matches what you observe, it could be acceptable. Darwin in the Galapagos had an evolutionary Petri dish before him. He tried to explain what he saw. His explanation fits a lot of what we observe particularly when we root around and dig up dinosaurs and trilobytes. When they occur in layers of strata before any evidence of man you've got to accept that man wasn't around then. When carbon dating indicates an age of several hundred thousand years you've got to think maybe we are older than 6k.

Creationists start with the dogma. They believe in literal interpretation of the Bible. Seven days is all it took. Then they demand that what we actually observe, measure and discover be force fit into the pre-existing framework of Biblical explanations. When the methodology is ridiculed they repackage it as "Intelligent Design."

To accept science and its explanations of observed phenomenon should not be an either/or situation for a religious person. At some point even a scientist gets to a point where he admits that there is no explanation for a causative factor beyond that limit. There is where a Supreme Being comes into play. It shouldn't be that hard.