God for you is where you sweep away all the mysteries of the world, all the challenges to our intelligence. You simply turn your mind off and say God did it. - Carl Sagan The difference between creationists and scientists is that we are happy to change our views/opinions when new evidence comes to light! I love these quotes not because of how they generalize Christianity, but because of how they speak to sects of Christianity. Many Christians ignore the unknown and cast it on God, which halts progress because they never seek to understand the unknown. The other quote addresses the same group for being unwilling to shift their opinions and views in light of new evidence. Any time new evidence comes to light; they respond with ignorant claims such as If its not in the Bible, then I dont believe it! and other stagnant claims. This is something that Christianity has always struggled with; the church always seems to be the last to recognize a new truth. When Galileo endorsed Copernicus heliocentric theory, the Pope was quick to quote scripture against him. When Copernicus introduced the theory, many Christian leaders condemned him with scripture. Martin Luther said, This fool Copernicus wishes to reverse the entire science of astronomy; but sacred scripture in Joshua 10:13 tells us that Joshua commanded the sun to stand still, and not the earth. John Calvin stated an excerpt from Psalms 93, The earth also is established. It cannot be moved. Who will venture to place the theory of Copernicus over that of the Holy Spirit? Melancthon, a close ally of Martin Luther, quoted Ecclesiastes 1:4-5, The sun also rises, and the sun goes down and hurries to the place from which it came. and then proceeded to say, It is part of a good mind to accept the truth as revealed by God and obey it. This was his way of saying that the Bible is right whether science agrees or not. As a result of this mindset, Copernicus was condemned and Galileo was named a heretic and placed under house arrest for the rest of his life. Later, Pope John Paul II admitted that the science was right and the church had been wrong to interpret the Bible literally. My point? As knowledge increases, your views should change because if the knowledge conflicts with your views, then your views are probably wrong. If your views are based on the Bible, then you are probably interpreting it wrong just like Calvin, Luther, and Melancthon did on the heliocentric theory. Now a question: Does the Christian sect I am referring to leave mysteries to God so that they dont have to change their views?
Posted on: Sat, 19 Apr 2014 03:08:53 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015