Let us keep intelligent design out of biology class rooms.
By Peter Sellick
There has been a bit of a ruckus about how biology is taught in our schools. Instead of us teaching just the theory of evolution according to Charles Darwin, it has been proposed that we also teach the idea that evolution did not happen by chance but was aided by a guiding hand. It is thought that that guiding hand was and is God. Now you would think that the church would embrace this idea since it seems that it is on our side, life on earth was designed by the creator; this is why this theory is called intelligent design.
Intelligent design theory is different from old fashioned creationism in that it does not attach itself to the detail of biblical creation stories. Instead they say that the world, especially life, is just too complicated to be produced by pure chance as the theory of evolution would have it and that it needs the guiding hand of God. They reach the conclusion that the universe was made specifically for us.
The assumption is that this guiding hand has something to do with the God we worship in church, even thought this disembodied hand seems to have nothing to do with the history of Israel as it struggled with God and the life and death of Jesus. It is clear that intelligent design is a way of proving the existence of God to a society who thought it had done with God once and for all. The question is, does the church want this kind of support?
What is central, and most important for us in the church, is a proper understanding of the basis of our faith.
The OT reading for the 27th August begins:
Thus says the Lord:
“Listen to me, you that pursue righteousness,
you that seek the LORD.
Look to the rock from which you were hewn,
and to the quarry from which you were dug.
Look to Abraham your father
and to Sarah who bore you;
for he was but one when I called him,
but I blessed him and made him many. (Isaiah 51:1-6)
In other words, in our pursuit of justice and of God we are to look to the for-father of faith, Abraham. We are to look to the troubled history of Israel with its God and in no other direction.
The medium of the revelation of God is not the world or nature for..
“ the heavens will vanish like smoke,
the earth will wear out like a garment,”
In our time, in which science rules the way we understand the world, which has given us so much useful technology, which has revealed to us the vast depths of the universe and the marvelous complexity of biological life it has become very hard indeed not to look at nature and our own accomplishments. The “here and now” of science and the future it promises has displaced the “back then” of the bible.
We are dazzled by space exploration and new medical technology, we expect the new to deliver the goods, so it is very hard to take a book compiled over 2000 year ago seriously. But that is just what the church tells us to do. God speaks to us in the particular event, the escape from Egypt, the desert wanderings, the experiments with kingship.
Finally the gospel bears witness. (Matt 16:13-20) Caesarea Philippi was a showcase of Roman and Greek culture, there were temples to all kinds of gods. It is in the midst of this that Jesus asks his disciples; who, among all these grand others with their sumptuous temples and religious cults, do you say I am? And Peter answers “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”
Similarly, in our situation, surrounded by all kinds of idols as they were in Caesarea Philippi, our particular modern gods of progress and science and technology we are asked the question “Who do you say I am?” We are to answer with Peter and this answer is exclusive. We are not to look as the beauty of the world in order to see God even though we know that the heavens proclaim his glory. We are not to seek God as guiding hand in evolution. For how could we sing and dance before such a one. How could we worship him, can we even be sure that he is present? We are to look to Jesus, Emmanuel, God with us.
We are not to look for cracks in the fabric of the universe in quantum physics or in physical indeterminacy so that we can find God a place to be in an otherwise mechanical universe. We are to look to the Messiah, the Son of the living God.
A God who can be proved is no God but an idol of our own creation. I think we should leave science to the scientists. If we want our children to learn about God let them be taught from the bible not from a pseudo theology that has conformed itself to the world of science. Let us tell them the stories of old, about Noah and the ark, about Moses and the burning bush, about slavery and escape from Egypt. Let us tell them about the healing of the blind and the opening of the ears of the deaf. Let us bring them into church and teach them about the celebrations and the festivals.
I for one would be sorry to see the theory of intelligent design taught in schools alongside the theory of evolution. Rather than support belief in God it would distract us from the God we worship each Sunday, the God we meet in hearing the Word preached and the sacraments celebrated.
Peter Sellick is Senior Research Officer at the Department of Physiology, University of Western Australia and Deacon Associate at St Andrew’s Anglican Church, Subiaco, WA.
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