GolfHos

http://abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/06/25/1960875.htm?section=world

That must mean that the Colorado River was "planted" to test one's faith.

Well, I'm convinced.

I find that number difficult to believe.

'Cuz you're a non-believer.  :P

I'm probably a middle of the road type guy.  Don't go to church more than a couple of times a year and usually because my wife asks me.  I struggle with my faith and vary from having very little to believing most of them have it about half right.  However, I send my kids to a Christian school because (a) I think they get a better education, (b) public schools in Utah provide varying degrees religious indoctrination anyway and I prefer our version to theirs, (c) standards I find very acceptable are strictly enforced and (d) we're allowed, encouraged even, to be involved at a very high level. 

I fully believe there's a creator though.  No way all this happened by chance.  Not saying I'm certain it's the Christian God or if it's a He, She, They or It.  I suspect 20% of that 86% total are just like me plus believers, agnostics and apathetics all fall on the 86% side of that equation.  The 14% are determined atheists right?  They've made up their minds.  They explicitly believe there is NO creator.

I bet that 26% morans fall in the 43% moran camp.

Something tells me two of our regular members might hold those particular beliefs about creation.  Perhaps if we can avoid explicitly insulting them it would be a good thing.

And the sooner we can get back to insulting TFT and stroh.

You're right my bad.  I shouldn't have insinuated they approve of Shrub. [sm_shock] ;)

Seriously I'm focusing more on the humans are only 10,000 years old belief.  I guess the other 43% not menioned believe some hybrid in which God played a roll in the evolution of humans over thousands of years.  I did not mean to call those beliefs moranic nor any such beliefs by our membership relating to religion. 

Not necessarily. You can believe in a creator and still believe that there was no "divine involvement" in evolution. If the Christian religion can contemplate the concept of human freewill and allow for the randomness of human behavior and its resultant events because of it, then why couldn't human evolution have occurred due to random genetic mutations? Why does our mere existence as humans have to be so orderly and divinely-manifested, yet the way we live our lives need not be?

Do any Creationists bother to look up where and when the idea of Creationism got its start?  Why are these people uninterested in their own history, or in any sense of where their beliefs sprung?

It is one thing to ignore and/or deny self-evident matters (geological age, evolution of life) that are scientifically certain by any rational analysis because one has difficulty grasping concepts like that.  I mean, I understand there are people out there who 'don't get' science intuitively and sort of 'freeze up' when people start throwing around scientific principles and jargon.  Fine, science isn't everybody's cup of tea. 

But it is an entirely different matter to not bother looking into the history of an idea, to see where it might have started and who might be behind it. 

The record shows that this widely spreading literal interpretation of Genesis didn't emerge until the late 19th/early-20th century.  It is almost completely and solely rooted in the reactionary American revivalism of the Protestant reformation that we now know as The Fundamentals.  Even Martin Luther himself, the godfather of modern baptists, evangelicals and fundamentalists, viewed Genesis as entirely allegorical work.

In essence, Creationism is little more than a very modern, re-interpretation of a nearly 3000 year old text that in virtually all its previous history was never taken literally.  It was always interpreted with color and flair and generality precisely so that it could have meaning to the widest possible audience.

Even 3000 years ago, someone had the intuitive notion that 'it all had to start someplace' and that that idea alone would have enough legs to carry the day.  So he set down to write an imagined tale to glorify both humanity and the God of humans, with great stories of gardens, and sacrifices, fratricide, floods and the interpretative hallucinations of great prophets, the unshackled men of vision of their time.  Like CEO's of privately held companies, but not exactly.

Hey, this was the Final Jeopardy question (or "answer") yesterday! The clue was something like "This early 20th century Protestant movement was based on 5 basic elements..."

I answered "Pentecostal". I was wrong.  :sad3:

The bolded portion is a HUGE point.  These writers were in the business of creating a religion that could one day grow some legs.  It seems to reason the original advocates of Genesis purposefully positioned their product by not making it literal. 

They must of said to themselves, "Let us write a story of origin that conveys such deep truths, it will attract persons from all societies in the known world.   Even those crazy, carpetbagging Persians.   It must be a story that is so astounding and unthinkable, that nobody will take it too literally! We must write a story where truth resonates deeply in accord with each own's unique world view."

my bad