Moabosaurus and Me

Last updated on: April 27, 2019 at 12:31 am by Dan Peterson

Moabosaurus and Me 2019-04-27T00:31:26-06:00 Dan Peterson

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The town of Moab lies in the southeastern portion of Utah.
(Wikimedia Commons public domain photo)

I’m reliably informed, by a number of people who don’t know me but who serve as my spokesmen online (they’re all men, so far as I’m aware), that I’m a young-earth creationist. So the only possible explanation for my enthusiasm for such finds as this one from a while back must be that I’m simply too stupid to realize that 125-million-year-old dinosaur fossils don’t fit very neatly with my dogmatic conviction that the Earth is only six thousand years old:

http://news.byu.edu/news/byu-profs-discover-moabosaurus-utah’s-gold-mine

In 2013, Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship published an article by Dr. Gregory L. Smith entitled ““Endless Forms Most Beautiful”: The uses and abuses of evolutionary biology in six works.” It is a review of:

Michael Dowd. Thank God for Evolution. New York: W. W. Norton, 2004. 336 pp., with index. $13.95.
Karl W. Giberson. Saving Darwin: How to be a Christian and Believe in Evolution. New York: HarperCollins, 2008. 239 pp., with index. $9.98.
Daniel J. Fairbanks. Relics of Eden: The Powerful Evidence of Evolution in Human DNA. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2007. 281 pp., with index. $15.86.
Howard C. Stutz. “Let the Earth Bring Forth”, Evolution and Scripture. Draper, UT: Greg Kofford Books, 2010. 130 pp., with index. $15.95
David C. Stove. Darwinian Fairytales: Selfish Genes, Errors of Heredity, and Other Fables of Evolution. New York: Encounter Books, 1995. 345 pp., with index. $18.95
William A. Dembski. The End of Christianity: Finding a Good God in an Evil World. Nashville, TN: B&H Publishing Group, 2009. 229 pp., with index. $22.99

This is the epigraph to the article:

The position of the Church on the origin of man was published by the First Presidency in 1909 and stated again by a different First Presidency in 1925:

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, basing its belief on divine revelation, ancient and modern, declares man to be the direct and lineal offspring of Deity…. Man is the child of God, formed in the divine image and endowed with divine attributes…

The scriptures tell why man was created, but they do not tell how, though the Lord has promised that he will tell that when he comes again (D&C 101:32–33). In 1931, when there was intense discussion on the issue of organic evolution, the First Presidency of the Church, then consisting of Presidents Heber J. Grant, Anthony W. Ivins, and Charles W. Nibley, addressed all of the General Authorities of the Church on the matter and concluded,

Upon the fundamental doctrines of the Church we are all agreed. Our mission is to bear the message of the restored gospel to the world. Leave geology, biology, archaeology, and anthropology, no one of which has to do with the salvation of the souls of mankind, to scientific research, while we magnify our calling in the realm of the Church.… Upon one thing we should all be able to agree, namely, that Presidents Joseph F. Smith, John R. Winder, and Anthon H. Lund were right when they said: “Adam is the primal parent of our race.”

—First Presidency Minutes, April 7, 1931

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