Why I Didn’t Watch the Debate

 

I chose not to watch the debate between Bill Nye the Science Guy and Ken Ham of the Creation Museum. Why? There really wasn’t a debate. Ken Ham is arguing that the universe we live in is 6000 years old. It isn’t. We know the earth we live on is billions of years old. We have overwhelming fossil evidence. The age of our planet is not really subject to debate at this level. Maybe a 100 million here or a billion there, but going from billions to 6000? No.

Bill Ham is bringing us to the world of Fred, Wilma, and Dino. Dinosaurs and people did not inhabit the earth together. I was a small child at the Natural History Museum in New York City seeing the fossils of ancient dinosaurs. I knew that people and these creatures did not inhabit the earth simultaneously. That is not an opinion. It’s well documented science that Mr. Ham denies.

I can be incredibly cynical and say that Mr. Ham has $35,000,000 reasons to deny this. He has invested a large amount of money in a museum that is dedicated to his perspective that the universe is 6000 years old. He claims that he is advocating his Christian faith and belief in the Bible. Sadly, very sadly, he’s actually doing great damage to Christianity and to people approaching the Bible.

The universe is at least billions of years old. Scientists have demonstrated why this is true and when I encounter facts I accept them. They have also demonstrated things like gravity and personal experience has told me, when I drop something and it hits my foot, that gravity exists. I have tripped far too many times in my life to be happy about it and I have never once, tripped UP. I always fall down. Always. When people drop trash out the window it never hangs there in the air or goes up. Gravity is a fact in the same way the dating of the universe is a fact.

Mr. Ham made this debate seem like it was a debate between the Christian faith and science and that he, Ken Ham, had to defend Christianity. In fact, I dare so, he did more to discredit Christianity than he did to defend it. He made it appear that Christianity does not believe in science and that all Christians, all REAL Christians, agree with him.

I believe I am a real Christian. I am very imperfect at my faith. I question things. I sin. I wrestle with all sorts of things with my faith, but, at the end of the day, I am a Christian. I also read the Bible, find God’s Word in the Bible, and even preach from it. I actually really love the Bible. I love it enough to not take everything in it literally.

In Genesis between the first and second chapter, there is an obvious change of authors and two quite different creation stories. The two authors tell different stories and actually have different names for God. For people who read Hebrew, the difference is very pronounced. If you don’t, I’d recommend the New Jerusalem Bible translation as it uses the Hebrew names for God. The change of authors is quite pronounced and visible. I love both authors and both of them are trying, theologically, to explain the world around them.

The first author speaks of creation rolling out over seven days and the second author speaks about human imperfection. They were theological narratives that attempted to explain what the people of the era had no way of explaining. They were written in a response to other ancient writings by a people who had a faith in a God they were trying to understand. Whereas everyone else saw creation and the universe as something flawed and ugly, and coming from ugly things, these writers saw beauty and goodness. They shared with faith and they wrote about it.

It was not science. It was never suggested to be science and the people of Judaism have always known that and through most of Christianity people knew that. In the 13^th century, Thomas Aquinas articulated that quite well. He knew the creation narrative as not a story of science, but a theological narrative.

Do I believe God created the universe? Yes.

6000 years ago in seven 24 hour days? No.

Do I believe in evolution? I sure do, as I believe God is a creating God who created and set things in motion and things remain in motion. To me, Ken Ham’s view of creation is static and I do not believe in a static God!

I do not believe in a static God….

Those words, to me, help define my view of creation. I see God as one who created and is creating and who is not static. I love the passage from the United Church of Christ Statement of Faith that reads, “God calls the worlds into being, creates humankind in the divine image, and sets before us the ways of life and death.” I love the premise of “God calls.” It is active. It is present.

Ken Ham, to me, is anti-science but he believes in a God who is static and limited. God did it and it’s done. To me, it’s not done. God lives. God breathes. God creates. God speaks. God is alive and well.

For me, there was no reason to watch the debate. One person advocated science and I have no problem seeing God in science. One person advocated a static God and I do not believe in a static God. Period.