BioLogos is not a denomination. You have Catholics, Evangelicals, Baptists, Lutherans and so on. For example I am in the Churches of Christ. My religious views are very different from many in here. The process of salvation to me is very different from the process of salvation for others in here. Some of the views in here , and I mean non scientific views such as what role baptism plays in a Christian’s life is so different from mine that in my congregation it would get someone disfellowshipped.
However what I do have in common with others in BioLogos
Is a a general acceptance of real science and accepting that the Bible is not infallible, not scientifically or historically accurate and employs a wide range of literary techniques and genre.
I’m sorry Adam, but you’re the one who is playing games round here.
Following @jpm’s post yesterday, I decided to give you another chance to demonstrate to me that you were willing to approach these discussions in good faith. Accordingly I spent over an hour last night watching and responding to the video you had posted, despite the fact that you were refusing point-blank to do what I asked and provide a summary to the key points with timestamps. You responded by saying that is not what YECs believe and accusing me of “telling white lies,” despite the fact that I had just told you exactly what the video said.
There are two ways we can approach this, Adam. We can either stick to discussions about what the video says, with respect, evidence-based reasoning, and sincere questions to clarify anything that you don’t understand, or I can revert to my previous position that you are not approaching the matter in good faith and are only here to point fingers, make accusations, and act like a jerk, and accordingly decline to take any further part in this discussion. Which approach we take is entirely up to you, but this is your final chance.
I’m actually not sure what a BioLogos ‘member’ is … but I guess as a long-time moderator here, I probably qualify. If all it takes is enthusiastic and persistent participation in the forum, then does that make you a member too, Adam? I’m guessing you would probably disavow that as you seem to imagine you are here to preach to misguided folks.
But just speaking for myself here (and not anybody else in the forum, much less BioLogos itself), I would have to say I no longer strongly claim “evangelical” as a label for my identity - at least for what evangelicalism has come to mean here in the U.S. To the extent that evangelical identity has been dragged into the partisan rocks that so many leaders here in the U.S. have shipwrecked their faith on, I would have to turn my back on Christ and the teachings of scriptures in order to follow them. I will not do that. So I guess I don’t neatly fit your ‘evangelical’ categories (if I ever did) to the extent that it has been hijacked away from focus on Christ. And make no mistake - that break has been happening for quite a long time now - and not just during recent political upheavals or administrations. Our recent morass is merely partisan politics (especially the right, but also the left - both are flip sides of the same coin as far as I’m concerned) further being revealed for what it really is, and always has been - never anything that should even remotely be confused with Christian pursuit itself.
All that said, I’m pretty sure that most mainline believers around here are trying to faithfully serve from within their own traditions, many of which will include some form of evangelicalism - and in fact they may be working to try to redeem that evangelical identity onto a Christocentric focus where it needs to be. I can really respect and get on board with all of that.
That is NOT “Secular” that is atheistic. “Secular” means “not religion” or “pertaining to the physical world”. Saying “what I primarily study is not religion” or “God does not seem to randomly change fundamental behaviors of his creation” is not the same as saying “God does not exist”.
Yes, and I agree that God created the heavens and the Earth, and all that is in them. I just differ in looking at the contents of the heavens and the earth, and coming to the conclusion that he seems to have done so over a long period of pre-human history, and primarily using non-physically detectable guidance, rather than direct miracles.
Well, first, there is no membership, but I know forum participants in all those groups, as well as others. I suspect the majority of Christian participants are indeed evangelical or something close, but it may just be a large minority, as the group is pretty diverse.
Just saw Merv’s post, so what he said is more complete.
The problem is that you portray evolution as if it is a theology that one can choose to believe or not. That’s not how it works. Evolution is how reality works. It is a fact of the real universe.
The evidence says otherwise.
No, it hasn’t. There are thousands and thousands of Christian scientists who do secular science, and they believe there is a God. Secular doesn’t mean there is no God.
That’s your opinion. The issue is here is the facts from reality. If reality conflicts with your opinions, it isn’t reality that is wrong. If a Flat Earther holds the opinion that the Earth is flat it doesn’t cause the Earth to flatten out. Reality doesn’t conform to our beliefs.
YEC’s, including yourself, often write as if science is at war with Christianity, and is motivated by spreading atheism. Other than a vocal minority, most scientists do their work without thinking of theology at all. When dating data returns 40,000 years in age, researches give it no more thought than one which yields 4,000 years. It is just data like any other data. It is not that scientists are thinking, “take that YEC”; they are not concerned with YEC period. Theology is not in their thoughts in the least.
When a mechanic, secular or Christian is changing the oil in your vehicle, is she thinking about the implications for your beliefs? Are Christian framers any more concerned about the theological implications of nail guns than secular framers. Christian engineers follow the same best practices as secular engineers. Christian scientists use the same apparatus, techniques, obtain the same results, and draw the same conclusions as secular scientists. To a great extent, experimentation and obtaining data is a vocation. One becomes skilled at it, diligent effort progresses the project, job done. It is routine. No more thought is given to YEC than by the fellow changing your oil. They would be perplexed that you expect them to.
You have no issue with other professions doing their job. What really is so different about scientists?
I think the thing we need to understand is that there is not just one evangelicalism, but two.
On the one hand, there is the sensible evangelicalism – the kind typified by BioLogos, Christianity Today, Tim Keller, N T Wright, the Alpha Course, and The Chosen. These are Christians who work out their faith and take the Bible seriously in ways that are responsible, informed, kind, politically neutral, and grounded in reality. Their teaching is generally well thought out, carefully fact-checked, and reliable. It is people such as these who make me unashamed to describe myself as an evangelical.
On the other hand, there is the kind of evangelicalism that a visiting preacher in our church once described as “the Christian Taliban” – the kind typified by Answers in Genesis, The Daily Wire, Ray Comfort, Mario Murillo, and the people who keep trying to predict the date of the Rapture. These are the partisan and authoritarian anti-intellectuals who hate science, deny covid, idolise Trump, invent their own alternative reality, and weaponise the Bible to try and intimidate and bully Christians into going along with it. It is people such as these who make me want to say that if that is evangelicalism, then I want nothing to do with it.
The Mature Earth concept has some serious problems with it. If you are going to try and explain away radiometric dating using this concept then you also have to claim that the Earth was created with fossils already in the ground. This is because rocks with hundreds of millions of years of radioactive decay sit above these fossils. Those rocks had to be deposited after the fossils because they are above the fossils.
Volcanic eruptions don’t change the decay rate of the isotopes used for radiometric dating.
In my experience, YEC’s who use the Mature Earth concept are aware of the problems with the Omphalos hypothesis (i.e. Last Thursdayism), but they end up running into the very same issues. As soon as you start dealing with geology at the Precambrian and beyond the Mature Earth just doesn’t work. You still have to deal with igneous rocks that were made after the alleged creation week. It becomes even more difficult when distant starlight is considered.
A note on denominational terminology: Reformed with a capital R refers specifically to those Protestant denominations that originate in the branch of the Reformation associated particularly with John Calvin, e.g., Presbyterian, Huguenots, Dutch Reformed. Although some of the workers associated with John Wesley were Reformed, Wesley himself did not follow that tradition, so Methodism doesn’t overly fall within that. Baptists vary - there are Reformed Baptists and others as well.
Keep in mind that anyone can make comments on the forum, whether they agree with Biologos or not.
To argue credibly, you (and anyone else) need to present a specific argument and listen to critique. If you simply jump to another argument and don’t pay attention to corrections, that strongly suggests that you’ve already decided on the answer and are just seeking self-justification, rather than actually seeking to learn anything. Such an approach is all too common in social media. “Go watch this video” is generally not too promising - how long is it? just what part of it are you citing? Plus, many of us have already watched several young-earth videos and found them to be completely unreliable and usually slanderous as well; that doesn’t make us eager to sit through another one - “this video proves a young earth” inspires a similar level of confidence as “this video shows a space alien marrying a two headed Elvis clone”. You need to work at making a good case for your position; poor arguing harms your position.
Since Adam @adamjedgar hasn’t posted for seven days, we may have lost one of the YECs of the month. (@Shannon and @Kelli haven’t posted very recently, either.)
P.S.: my mom characterized my parents as ‘deep water Presbyterians.’
