My buddy Tom and I have been doing a little Facebook debating, which is pretty cool considering I’m in LA and he’s in Uganda! The current topic is Intelligent Design (ID) and evolution (which all got started when he asked me what I thought about Sam Brownback and one of the “cons” for me was that he doesn’t believe in evolution and wants ID to be taught in public schools [as a sidenote: I am nonpartisan]). I have said that God can work through evolution and that evolution is a scientific theory based on scientific fact, while ID is founded upon metaphysical propositions (the “why” and “who” questions, as our friend Matt put it).
Tom says that he is somewhat comfortable with God working through evolution, but it raises some theological questions for him: “Where then did sin come from? How is man hence any more ‘special’ than the animal kingdom if we evolved from ape-like creatures? Where, when, and how did man get his ‘eternal spirit’ in this process?” [Here I have to pause and razz Tom for not using gender-inclusive language... maybe "man" got his eternal spirit from woman!] He also says that while ID is metaphysical, it is also firmly based in science. And then Tom asks about whether I read a book about this back in our college days that helped me with the idea that God could use evolution.
Hmmm… well, I can’t recall a book I read about it. What happened for me was more of a revelation that the whole evolution thing is science, not theology. Theology can ponder about scientific discoveries and/or theories, but they’re not the same thing. The turning point for me was realizing that the opening chapters of Genesis are not about science, but rather about the power of God to create out of nothing and without chaotic violence (unlike the other creation stories of the Ancient Near East). It is also about the reality that this powerful God is intimately connected with the creation, particularly humanity.
Regarding Tom’s theological questions, I just have to say that theological questions are inherently speculative. That doesn’t mean that theology is false, but that it is an attempt to articulate what cannot fully be known on this side of the eschaton. I am not really a systematic theologian, but I can imagine some first steps in answering his questions. For example: Why is humanity more “special” than other species? Because God chose humanity, just as God chose the Israelites. I can imagine the same kind of answer for when humanity received an “eternal spirit”: whenever God chose to bestow it. (Then again, there are those Christian philosophers like Nancey Murphy, who believe that our “souls” or “spirits” are really just part of our minds. This philosophical point of view is called nonreductive physicalism, as I understand it.) Where did sin come from? Well, I don’t hold to a view that needs sin to start at one particular point. I imagine that evolution itself contains our desire to sin: survival of the fittest. Survival turns into egocentrism and selfishness and thus could easily be the root of our sinful nature. But God calls us out to counter those survival instincts in serving and loving those who cannot survive on their own, as well as those who oppress us in their own attempt to survive.
In the end, the bottom line is: I don’t need Intelligent Design. I view those scientists who try to promote ID as needing their theory to explain their theological and biblical interpretations. I think they miss the point of the early chapters in Genesis and are on a wild goose chase. So, for me, they can go on trying to fit the science into their theological point of view and I don’t really care all that much, truth be told. I say, let the scientists do the science. Leave the metaphysical questions behind the science to the philosophers and theologians. They can certainly talk to each other, but I just don’t want them telling each other what to do.
