The Church, the Schools and EvolutionConant, J. E. (Judson Eber)
Religion
The Church, the Schools and Evolution
Conant, J. E. (Judson Eber)
Evolution; Religion and science
The reader knows as well as the writer that the whole attitude of the
Christian Church, and therefore of true Christian education, challenges
those words and hurls them back at their author for proof. Both the implied
and the direct accusations are utterly without foundation. Indeed, the
thing Dr. Mathews charges is the one thing true Christian education does
=not= do.
When did the Church ever try to force a man, educated or ignorant, to give
up what he knows to be facts in order to become a Christian? When was a man
ever asked by Christian schools to choose between the assured results and
methods of scientific investigation and loyalty to Christ? When has that
institution which, above all others, has fought ignorance and fostered true
scientific investigation used a method that put a premium on ignorance as a
prerequisite for faith?
It is not =facts= that the Church either fears or refuses to accept, but
such an =interpretation= of them by evolutionists and rationalists as to
deny the scientific accuracy and therefore the inerrancy of the Word of
God. It is altogether beside the truth to intimate that the Church is
fostering an education that has to withhold assured scientific facts for
fear their knowledge would ruin faith in any theological beliefs whatever
"for which the schools stand." It is not the =knowledge= of scientific
facts that true Christian schools ever withhold, but such =theories= and
=speculations= concerning their meaning as would destroy the schools as
Christian institutions if the logic of them were followed to the end. And
as for the Church ever abandoning the assured results and methods of
scientific investigation, this is precisely the thing the Church is
=fighting to maintain= against the efforts of evolutionists and
rationalists. It is rather the =Schools= that have been abandoning
scientific methods of investigation, thereby reaching "assured results"
that invalidate not only the doctrine of an inerrant Bible, but every other
fundamental doctrine of the Scriptures. Indeed, this is the very reason why
the controversy between the Church and the Schools is now on, and Dr.
Mathews' article is typical of the attempts that are being made to make it
appear that faith in evolution and the Bible can be combined--an attempt
toward which all believers in an infallible Book will always be
irreconcilable.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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