A popular example of the ongoing struggle with biblical language comes from Galileo in the early 17th century. Galileo, often called the father of modern astronomy, championed heliocentrism, the belief that the sun was at the centre of our universe. In light of his findings and in response to backlash from certain — though not all — members of the Christian church who wanted the earth at the centre of the universe (Joshua 10:13 or Psalm 104:5), Galileo famously says, “The Bible teaches how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go.”
On his website, Lamoureux has re-written this famous phrase in light of the current debate over evolution. He says, “The intention of the Bible is to teach us that God is the Creator, and not how the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit created.”
The Bible tells us that God created, not how he did it.
To describe how he currently understands God’s relationship to the world, Lamoureux uses the term “evolutionary creation.” The term points out that the world was created and designed and purposed by God through natural processes, not intermittent divine interventions like those in the Intelligent Design camp believe.
The Bible tells us that God created, not how he did it.
Evolutionary creationists use the analogy of an embryo to explain the mysterious nature of life. The development of a life in the womb is observable here and now — not millions or billions of years ago — and yet it still remains a mystery. Who can say when God breathes his spirit into a developing baby or when He stamps this embryo with His image?
As Christians, all we know and all we can really say is that the development of an embryo is an uninterrupted natural process that is sustained and maintained by the work of the Holy Spirit. And, interestingly enough, that is pretty much all we know and all we can say about the development of life through evolution too.
Lamoureux is indeed a rare person. There are not many people who have not one, not two, but three doctoral degrees in subjects as diverse as dentistry, theology, and evolutionary biology. But he remains humble about how far his expertise can take him.
“I don’t know everything, I still don’t know everything and I will never know everything,” says Lamoureux. “But God’s got me on a process, an intellectual voyage, and my job is to be as clean and as competent as I can with the data in front of me.”
One can only hope that all of us, atheists, young-earth creationists and evolutionary creationists alike, strive to do the same. It may force us to actually learn something from those we disagree with.
Photo (Flickr CC) by Kevin Doole.
Originally published in Issue 18 of Converge Magazine.
