A Reply to an Open Letter (RJS)

Last updated on: September 7, 2010 at 5:04 am by RJS

A Reply to an Open Letter (RJS) 2010-09-06T07:28:59-05:00 RJS

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Patheos is developing a forum for conversation exploring many areas of faith in our culture. Inevitably this will touch at times on issues of science, reason, and faith – an article by James Hannam on his book God’s Philosophers, a Veritas Forum lecture by Dr. Collins Learning the Language of God, and an atheist bemoaning the accommodationist tendencies of many, including the National Academy of Sciences, in The War Between Science and Religion are just a few examples.

In one recent contribution David Moore, (founder and president of Two Cities Ministries), posted an open letter to Karl Giberson regarding his recent exchange with Dr. Mohler. Now I do not know either Dr. Giberson or Dr. Mohler and I have no desire to defend Dr. Giberson’s approach to the science faith discussion. I have presented some of my response to Dr. Mohler in a couple of earlier posts (Houston, we still have a problem and Houston, here’s the situation.)

Mr. Moore’s generally excellent letter, though, raises an important question. In his penultimate paragraph he notes:

My own position on the age of the earth is agnostic, so I guess I don’t agree with either one of you. I do believe in a literal Adam and Eve. Here’s why I am agnostic about the age of the earth and related matters: Kurt Wise, as you well know, received his Ph.D. at Harvard under Stephen Jay Gould. Wise is no dummy and he is an early earth creationist. You received your Ph.D. at Rice (a great academic institution and a growing powerhouse in football) and you hold a polar opposite view from Wise. When I teach theology or church history, I constantly alert my students to an important reality. If two scholarly Christians who genuinely seem to be seeking the truth on some issue come to different conclusions, you can be certain about one thing: the issue isn’t crystal clear.

The sentiment and reasoning in this paragraph is something I come across frequently in the discussion of science and faith. But it has serious problems worth some real discussion.

How do you approach and make decisions on complex issues requiring expert knowledge?

What do you do when two intelligent Christians who have studied the issues genuinely disagree, and disagree diametrically?

There are a number of problems with Mr. Moore’s reasoning here.

First, competing views among experts is not sufficient reason for agnosticism. Agnosticism in such a situation is often either a sign of intellectual laziness or a sign that the issue is viewed to be of secondary importance, not worth real investigation. From the tone of Mr. Moore’s letter I rather expect his position is the latter, but I cannot agree. While there are large groups of people for whom it will be secondary, there are increasingly large groups for whom it decidedly is not secondary. This discussion has become or is becoming a serious stumbling block for faith and for witness. We need Christian leaders who take the time to truly understand the basic issues.

Second, when scholars disagree the first order of business is to figure out why. I certainly expect that Mr. Moore teaches this in his theology or church history classes as well. If the reason is found in the precise interpretation of an esoteric Greek phrase and a disagreement about it’s Semitic roots it is a matter best left to specialists, often of secondary (or tertiary) importance. But if the discussion is important then teachers and leaders, students in a field, must make a best effort to understand the issues. Part of this requires reading the arguments carefully enough to understand the framework and basic suppositions of an argument. Christian leaders and teachers cannot simply count experts and declare the issue to be a draw or beyond discernment. This leads to my third point.

Third, the evidence for the age of the earth is rock solid. If there were any real scholarly debate regarding the evidence for the age of the earth I would have sympathy for Mr. Moore’s position. In the face of true expert debate with significant groups on each side sometimes the only sane approach for the non-expert is an open agnosticism waiting for a consensus to appear. But this is not the case here. The only people I know who hold to a young earth do so on theological or philosophical grounds. The data are solidly on the side of an old earth and an even older universe. Even Dr. Wise as far as I know does not dispute the strength of the evidence, rather he continues a search for new evidence that he trusts will bolster a position he holds on theological and scriptural grounds; he finds that his faith requires it. For more details on the evidence for an old earth see: The Bible, Rocks and Time: Geological Evidence for the Age of the Earth (I posted on the book here) or a short discussion on issue regarding the age of the earth here: An Ancient Earth.

Where does this leave us? If the average person in the pew takes a position of agnosticism – this is understandable. When Christian leaders and apologists use this approach without carefully considering the issues we have a problem. When Christian leaders and apologists declare an impasse based on the theological (not scientific) view of one well trained paleontologist over and against the consensus view of hundreds (more likely thousands) of Christians active in the sciences we have a disaster. Don’t bother assembling a few more names – the ratio won’t change, only a handful hold a young earth position and the position is held on theological, not scientific, grounds. There is more genuine discussion, disagreement, and debate on details of evolution and the nature of Adam and Eve.

Scot posted an excellent discussion from Alister McGrath’s new book The Passionate Intellect: Christian Faith and the Discipleship of the Mind asking the question: What good’s a theologian? This post has bearing on the issues here. In the church we need Christian thinkers in all areas in dialog with each other, theologians, scientists, biblical scholars, historians, and more. We need to listen to each other and trade in the realm of ideas not dogma and camps. One of the strengths of the internet is the forum it can provide, when properly moderated, to bring experts to the table in conversation. I post and comment here to participate in this conversation. Perhaps, I pray, it will have a little impact.

What do you think? When is agnosticism a valid position?

More importantly when is it a valid position for a Christian leader or teacher?

And that brings me to one final thing – Patheos has, for some good reasons, limited the rss feed to excerpt only on this blog. Because I would like to make my posts as widely available as possible, and because I’ve traveled enough to know that web-only access on a big site can be a real hindrance, I am going to repost on Musings on Science and Theology and provide mobile formatting and full rss feed. All comment, conversation, and interaction will remain on the Jesus Creed site alone.

As always you can contact me directly if you wish at rjs4mail[at]att.net

Science and Faith

Previous Post

September 7, 2010

Almost Christian 5

Next Post

September 7, 2010 Our Common Prayerbook 32 - 2

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Acts of the Apostles Adam Advent Anabaptism Angels Anglican Apologetics Atonement Baptism BCP Prayers Bible Biblical Studies Birds Blogging Bloglossary Bonhoeffer Books Calvinism Christianity Church Church History Coffee Colossians Commentary Recs Conversion Creation Creeds Culture Death Ecclesiastes Economics Education Embracing Grace Emergent Emerging Movement Eschatology Essays Ethics Eucharist Evangelicalism Family Fasting Fathers Fellowship of Differents Footsteps Tour Fun and Whimsical Gospel Grace Happiness Heaven Hell Holy Spirit Irenaeus James Jesus Jesus Creed Job Justification Kingdom of God Law Lectures Lent Liberalism Love and Marriage Mabanteneni Manhood Mary Miracles Missio Alliance MissioLife Missional Missional Jesus Movies and Film New Perspective Northern Seminary OneLife Origins Project Orthodox Parables Pastor's Spouse Pastoring and Leading Pastoring and Preaching Patristics Paul Paul-John Tour Pharisees Pietism Political Theology Prayer and Formation Preaching Problems for Faith Psalm 119 Psalms Public Issues Purgatory Religions Resurrection Revelation Romans Rule of JCreed Science and Faith Sermon on the Mount Sports Ten Commandments Theology Third Way Top Ten Lists Translations Uncategorized Universalism University Ministry Way Out Weekly Meanderings Wisdom Women and Ministry Work Worship Writing & Blogging Youth Ministry

Select a Month July 2021 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 0000

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What destroyed Pharaoh's army as they pursued the Israelites?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Fire from heaven Earthquake The sea Plague of locusts