I'm a pretty staunch theist, but I'm also an engineer and I think there is room to believe that creation could have taken longer than six 24-hour days. It all hinges around how we define "literal" vs "true". Language can contain great truths while being expressed different ways. For instance, it's impossible to translate the phrase "how do you like them apples" into any language other than English and have it retain it's original meaning. That doesn't mean it's incomprehensible, it just takes a LITTLE bit of digging and wisdom to understand it. My grandfather might say "back in my day", without meaning that he owned a 24 hour slice of time all to himself at some point.

I think the events outlined in Genesis portray a creation story not at odds with what we can observe. First came light and energy, then matter, then a planetary surface, followed by water and land, plant life, then animal life, then man. At some point Satan intervened and tempted Man to sin, sadly corrupting his basic nature forever. At some point we stopped being innocent creatures and became humans, with all the good and bad that entails. Christ is the only thing that can rescue us from this. Why would the Genesis author make up something so close to what science says, when all other world religions have wacky creation myths about giant turtles or springing from the head of Chronos?

I don't know that eating fruit is taking life so much as it is consuming the byproduct of that life. There's a world of difference between biting into an apple versus killing a deer so you can consume its meat.

There is a world of difference between the two, but it's a philosophical and moral world of difference, whereas I'm speaking in terms of plain physical death, the breaking down of the organism's physical makeup for purposes of fueling the physical makeup of the consuming organism. The body's processes don't distinguish between "deer" and "apple" beyond the different substances they contain. Both are consumed in the same fashion.
The point I'm trying to make is that there was physical, biological breakdown in Eden, ie: death, pre-Fall. Even though Adam and Eve and all the predatory animals didn't actively hunt other self-aware creatures, they did actively consume the non-sentient life.

(And this is something of a tangent, but if predation is an aberration of God's plan, why did he create predatory animals with the tools for the job? Or did lions and wolves in Eden have no claws and flat teeth, and develop the necessary parts for survival later?)

...Perhaps stargazer could give more input on this.

Did someone call my name?

I see the topic of distant starlight seems to have come and gone, so I'm a little hesitant to return to it - but just a little. I think it's one of the biggest hurdles to a young-earth creationist viewpoint.

A few thoughts:

And when did Science become a matter of consensus rather that relying on hard data?...

This point is well-taken, though Gandalfs Beard makes a good point about the scientific establishment sometimes operating as a sort of club in which outsiders (those with a differing viewpoint) aren't always welcome - but yet, sometimes one of those radical viewpoints can take root and start a revolution (or at least force reconsideration of long-held hypotheses).

In theory at least, peer review is one of the self-correcting mechanisms in science: a hypothesis is published, along with its supporting data and experiments, and other scientists attempt to replicate those results. Errors or misinterpretations can be caught this way, and the entire body of knowledge can be advanced.

This methodology won't work in some fields, like origins, because the initial conditions can't be duplicated in the lab. But peer review - which seems to have been aplied to Humphreys' white hole cosmology - still plays an important part in cases like these, pointing out possible errors in mathematics or consequences unanticipated by the original proponents of a theory. Again, this can result in advancement of knowledge. As I recall Humphreys himself has commented that peer review has allowed him to refine his theory.

Still, peer review has been applied to earlier attempted explanations (or claimed evidences) for a young universe, such as the shrinking sun and the decay of the speed of light c.

...So if the universe is expanding, that means everything used to be closer. We don't know what the rate is, so we can't go backwards to say how close, but it is not unreasonable to suggest what is now millions of lightyears away was only a few thousand light years away at the time of creation if given a particular expansion rate....

This makes sense, if I understand correctly. If the universe is expanding then it was 'smaller' in the past, and things would not have been as far away as they are now.

However, this doesn't really solve the distant starlight conundrum. As a general rule, other galaxies are indeed getting farther away from us and hence were closer long ago. However, galaxies themselves are gravitationally bound collections of objects that span far more distance than a young universe would allow. That is, the Milky Way is about 100,000 light years in diameter; the objects in it on average are not getting closer or farther from us, but are rotating around the galactic center of gravity. The expanding universe doesn't apply here, but only on a much larger scale. But even this smaller scale is too large for a 6000- or 10,000-year-old universe.

Also, while there is still some debate about the value of the Hubble Constant (which correlates red shift values and the rate of expansion of the universe), no observational value has been seen that would allow for a universe only 6-10,000 ly across. Again, it only applies to other galaxies' redshifts, for the reason mentioned above.

Apologies if this is too much geek speak, or (conversely) unclear because I'm trying to keep it from being too technical.

Also, while there is still some debate about the value of the Hubble Constant (which correlates red shift values and the rate of expansion of the universe), no observational value has been seen that would allow for a universe only 6-10,000 ly across. Again, it only applies to other galaxies' redshifts, for the reason mentioned above.

The universe is vast in scope, far larger than our minds can really fathom. This is why traditional theories like c decay just don't work. Humphries' theory is the only one I've been able to find that adequately explains how it could work (in theory) while still adhering to the Bible. That's key. Now I'm not going to sit here and say, "That's it! That's how it happened!" because we simply don't know all of the facts, but I have to admit it sure feels right. If it's not the method God used then it must be pretty close to it.

Oh my! So much has gone on whilst I was at work! I hardly know where to begin. That is if you don't mind my being here. So I'll begin with FencerforJesus's argument:

Actually Darwin wasn't a scientist at all. His degree (look it up) is theology.

It doesn't matter, really. I actually visited both Oxford and Cambridge Universities, last 22nd September. Did I say something in one of my previous posts about how education systems differ from one country to the other? According to our guide on the bus, both Oxford and Cambridge are principally organised by colleges rather than by faculties and career interests, unlike the University system in Australia. According to the guide, it doesn't matter which college you are at as they all teach the same subjects.

Seemingly, it matters more how you got in, what your field of interest is, and how the appropriate College can help you attain what your potential is. Charles Darwin graduated from Christ's College in Cambridge University, a collegiate University. So a theology degree might actually contain much that is scientific, especially as it was rival Caius College which later on produced the blokes who split the atom plus those ones who discovered DNA. Significantly, Cambridge University has called one of its colleges Darwin, also the name of the capital city of Australia's Northern Territory, previously called North Palmerstone. But I wonder why the guide didn't tell us, since I have photos of adjacent Queens and St Katherine's Colleges as well as Kings?

I subscribe to a literal 6 day Creation view (no surprise, eh?) and it boggled me for some time how God pulled it off. I do a little amateur astronomy from time to time and used to ponder how, if the Earth is only 6,000 to 10,000 years old how we can see stars, clusters, and even the Andromeda Galaxy as light travels at a fixed speed. If we accept a relatively young age for the Earth then by rights we shouldn't be able to see much of anything save for a handful of stars.

And I can relate to much of this. The ancients would have seen the same starry sky we did, but did the position of the stars and planets change in the interim? What would the Chaldeans who first measured days, weeks, hours and minutes have seen? Wouldn't the same reasoning which enable us to see the stars also apply to them? And saying this, on a starry night, free from the city's light pollution, how could anyone not believe in God to see such an awesome sight?

I hope you have all noted my avatar, made from a joke I found in a University of South Australia publication. But then many a true word is spoken in jest. The joke is based on Genesis 1 verse 3 if you read any bible, no matter whether they be Douay-Rheims, Good News or KJV. In the Hebrew version it comes in at Genesis 1 verse 2, which is slightly more illuminating. I've already said somewhere on this site that I believe God speaks through the laws of mathematics, biology, chemistry, physics and astronomy, and that it is for men to measure, discover, observe and try to understand. And so, I defy you now to tell me that it wasn't God who pulled the switch to create the so-called 'Big Bang', when he said "let there be light!" That there isn't a a great deal more behind those words than the actual words themselves. Think about it next time you ask someone to switch on a light, and the wiring, building plans, electricity dadedah, plus everything else behind that simple request? And as Puddleglum would have said, our lights are only a pale imitation of the stars, moon and sun.

And as much as some of you don't like Kent Hovind, he stil has a quarter million dollar donation to the one that can scientifically prove evolution to be true. No one's claimed it.

There is a very good reason why not. If God made the world through Evolution, then any attempt to duplicate His efforts would not only be 'playing God' but might very well destroy us all and far more quickly than Climate change might. Like detonating an atom bomb. I don't think a quarter million dollar donation to whoever was silly enough to try it would be worth having, if the said turkey couldn't spend it, especially if Kent Hovind, whoever he might be, was so equally dead he couldn't cough up. Please see what I said earlier about men being there to observe and measure, not to mess around with God's Creation more than we have done already.

The purpose of mosquitoes pre-Fall still leaves me flummoxed.

Agreed! What about viruses? Did someone further up on the thread say they wanted evidence of something evolving? Look no further than flu or the common cold. In the 1980's we had HIV, there have been since Ebola and Hendra viruses to contend with and now H1N1 or Swine Flu. Not even slaughtering pigs in Egypt has stopped its spread.

By the by...anyone have that mysterious formula for deciding which passages are poetic and which are literal?

I think it might be very similar to the formula which decides which passages can be kept as written in stone, whilst others, even the very next chapter, can be quietly ignored if it keeps stiff-necked and eminently unsuitable men in charge of things and even suitable women marginalised into 'their proper place'. And what about selective preaching? When was the last time any of you ever heard a pastor preaching on the more ignored passages of Genesis? Such as what happened to Noah? Or Judah's treatment of Tamar, his daughter-in-law? Or Rachel's and Leah's rivalry in who was the apple of Jacob's eye? Or how he got his comeuppance for getting Esau's birthright on his first wedding night? Or most importantly, why does the Koranic version of Abraham's treatment of Ishmael and Isaac differ so much from the Genesis we all love so much?

I'd have liked to comment on Elvenholm's posts as much of what he says makes marvellous sense. But I haven't time right now. Before I go, I do have a suggestion to make about those six or seven days. In Maurice Gee'swords, why not reread the disputed text "with different eyes"? A day is only a human measure of time, a Chaldean measure at that, a concept which technically does not exist if it weren't for human needs to measure time. What is a day in God's sight? The eternal God of Time and Space who, in Aslan's words, just might call 'all times soon"? As Isaac Watts said:

A thousand ages in thy sight
Are like an evening gone
Short as the watch that ends the night
Before the breaking dawn.

Well, viruses wouldn't have existed pre-Fall. They're a result of sin entering the world.

W4J makes a good point about viruses. There is an argument of whether they even qualify as life or not.

Agreed! What about viruses? Did someone further up on the thread say they wanted evidence of something evolving? Look no further than flu or the common cold. In the 1980's we had HIV, there have been since Ebola and Hendra viruses to contend with and now H1N1 or Swine Flu. Not even slaughtering pigs in Egypt has stopped its spread.

Viruses are funny things. They're not really alive, they're not really non-alive. They're more like little...self-automated machines, really. I'm not really sure that this is a case of Evolution rather than it is the virus simply adapting itself. Take Ebola, truly one of the scariest viruses I've ever read about. You've got Ebola Zaire and Ebola Sudan (I think Zaire was discovered first, but I'll have to check my books) which are super deadly, although one of them (I think it may be Zaire again) has a 90% + chance of killing its host. Then along came Ebola Reston, which popped up in a lab animal processing facility in Reston, Virginia. This strain is harmless to humans but absolutely lethal to monkeys, and I want to say it can be transmitted airborne, versus Zaire and Sudan's transmission which is via bodily fluids or infected surfaces, like bowls or cups an infected person has used. There's another strain that blew up in Africa, Ebola Gabon (I think that's what it was called, I'm rusty on this ) and killed some people and so it had jumped back to humans again. It's truly frightening stuff...it mutates and adapts so quickly through an unknown means that I'm halfway convinced that it'd be Ebola, not the A-bomb, that would prove to be the bigger peril to humanity. And they're still not really sure what the original carrier of this stuff is, but suspect it's some particular kind of bat one finds only in the deepest parts of Africa. All of the patients that they could get information from typically die before the pathologists can get to them, usually. So questions like "what bit you? Was it a bat? A monkey? Did you eat any unusual plants?" will continue to be the order of the day until the little critter is tracked down.

Ebola enters the human body, typically by direct contact with an open wound or sore, kissing, or other contact with a contaminated person. The virus, a single strand of RNA, starts very small, infecting a few cells and turning that cell's internal machinery into manufacturing more virus. When the cell runs out of steam the virus basically "erupts" having produced dozens of copies of itself (I suspect this is where the mutations come, but I'm not a virologist so I'm not really qualified to say for sure). At some point the victim will start getting headaches, backaches (infection of kidneys, one of the first organs Ebola goes for) and feel nausea. The victim's body is actually being turned into virus at this point and as more copies of virus are "born" they seek out new cells to infect and make more Ebola. The process actually begins to liquefy organs and turning them into giant virus pools. I could go further, but it's truly horrifying stuff and it scares the daylights out of me.

Whatever viruses started out as in Eden they are absolutely terrifying now. I hear the word "Ebola" and I'm headed to the local store to pick up a haz-mat suit.

I actually have to say that there are still no evidences of what is known as macro-evolution even in the cases of viruses and bacteria. Never has any new DNA been created through adaption or mutation. Micro-evolution has occurred and all that is is reshuffling the data that is already there. Drug resistant bacteria and viruses never evolved the resistance. It's just the drugs killed off all the ones that weren't already resistant to it. So the only ones left are drug resistant. This is being interpreted as evolution, when in reality they were there all along. Just before we couldn't tell the difference. I'd strongly recommend you check out Dr. Charles Jackson at Creation Truth. This guy truly is a scientist (with four MS degrees in science) and he helps his audience to truly think about what's going on.

I also heard a really interesting report recently that about 1/3 of all the dinosaur species that have been identified so far are not really a new species but rather young ones of an already identified species. I'd have to search in depth through my e-mail archives to find the link, but it certainly would make you think about what life was like back in the days of Adam and Noah. I'm inclined to wonder (speculation here) if the archaeoptryx is really just a young velociraptor. Just guessing on that one, and won't put any weight on it whatsoever.

The Swine Flu is not a new species of flu. It's just a new variant of the flu. It's possible that this flu has been around for some time and science now has been able to make a distinction between them. It may be a mutation from the regular flu, but it's just a reshuffling of the data that was already there. This is what Mendell's trait table (yellow and green peas) shows. It doesn't show new DNA showing up. It shows what's already there while revealing the possible combination of dominate and recessive genes.

Wagga, I fully agree that God does speak in terms of science and math. He is a God of logic and he created the rules of physics, biology, chemistry, geology, etc. But science != evolution. Could God have used the evolutionary process to bring the world to being and initiate the Big Bang? Yes, he could. Could he have done in a literal six-day even just 6,000-10,000 years ago? Yes, he could. I've heard this argument before. By saying God could have done it this way and by saying otherwise we are putting him into a box, you are actually doing the same thing. The truth of the matter is evolution and creation are completely incompatable. Theistic evolution is a desperate attempt to reconcile the two and it works even less than the theory of evolution itself. I stand by a literal six-day creation because it is what Genesis 1 says and it is the only beginning of the world account that is compatable with God's character as described in the Bible. Theistic evolution is contradictory to God's character and the Theory of Evolution states flat out that there is no God period. If there is another theory out there that is completely consistant with God's character, I haven't heard of it yet.

Here's a question: Why would Humankind's fall from grace affect the rest of the Animal Kingdom? Why did some go from vegetarianism to predation?

Or did Predators Sin by eating from the Tree of Knowledge Too?

EDIT: By the way Fencer, since Genetics has been used to map the genomes of related species today, and members of the Hominid family in the past (including Neanderthals) we have conclusive evidence both through Mitochondrial DNA and Cellular DNA that Speciation occurred. Not to mention plenty of Paleontological evidence for branching species.

GB

Good question, GB! And here's another: Bacteria are among the lowest forms of life. Some forms are harmful and can kill, but how do you account for animo acids and the forms of bacteria we need to help us to survive? Or the effect on humans of vitamin deficiencies like beri-beri, scurvy or rickets? What happens when we do not eat enough proteins in our diet? Or how our behaviour can be influenced by wine or other foods and drinks?

By saying God could have done it this way and by saying otherwise we are putting him into a box, you are actually doing the same thing. The truth of the matter is evolution and creation are completely incompatable. Theistic evolution is a desperate attempt to reconcile the two and it works even less than the theory of evolution itself.

No I can't agree with you that I am attempting to box God in. You do agree with me that God is the one who created the laws of all what I understand to be Science - all Melville Dewey's pure science subjects in the 500 DDC in short. According to Genesis' account, He created the world in 6 days, 6 human days, you insist, in what some bishop or other calculated to be 6000 years, from the calculated lives of such antediluvian men the Bible mentions, such as Enoch or Methuselah. The Bible, itself, never said anything about 6000 years, or how long ago Creation took place, only God saying that he worked for six days and rested the seventh. And all I am saying is that an Eternal God's idea of a day might be very different from what our idea of a day is, especially as our current idea of how Terrestrial time is measured has largely been defined by the measurements used by Chaldean astronomers during the Babylonian captivity. After all, a day on Venus has been calculated as the same as its year, or that on Jupiter a day is less than 10 hours.

After the Fall, until Noah's Flood, the Bible only mentions some descendants of Adam and Eve, and how long some of them lived, in particular Methuselah. Noah's Flood undoubtedly occurred as some kind of cataclysmic event, probably more horrific in the Middle East than the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami in the Indian Ocean. Such deluges could easily have happened anywhere at any time in history. Unlike the continuous desertification of the Sahara, which also apparently started around 10,000 to 6000 years ago. Civilization in the Middle East as we know it, only sprang up about then, about 6000 years ago, including Egypt and the Pyramids and the ability to write about it. The Old Testament of the KJV Bible has little or nothing to say about what was beyond, in China, India, nor even a lot about Europe, even though Alexander the Great and the Roman empire were predicted in Daniel's interpretation of the King's dream of a statue, and the Greeks, perforce, were mentioned in the Apocrypha. The Mormons tell of a golden tablet found in America, to justify their beliefs, but nowhere in the real Bible is the Americas, let alone Australia, even hinted at.

I think the events outlined in Genesis portray a creation story not at odds with what we can observe. First came light and energy, then matter, then a planetary surface, followed by water and land, plant life, then animal life, then man. At some point Satan intervened and tempted Man to sin, sadly corrupting his basic nature forever. At some point we stopped being innocent creatures and became humans, with all the good and bad that entails. Christ is the only thing that can rescue us from this. Why would the Genesis author make up something so close to what science says, when all other world religions have wacky creation myths about giant turtles or springing from the head of Chronos?

Thank you, I do have to agree with you 100%. So far as I can see, all the observable, measurable evidence in Geology, in Astronomy and everything else, shows that the Universe is much, much older than 6000 years, including the World, itself, even Man. And both Genesis and Evolution agree that Man is a relative latecomer. How would you account Biblically for the estimated 40,000 year stay of the Koori and Murri in what they call their Dreamtime, which only finished, according to them, on 26th January, 1788, which is when modern history began for them? The completely different flora and fauna on either side, which cannot swim or fly, on two different sides of Indonesia, sometimes divided by straits of only a few miles? This phenomenon, in particular, was something observed by not only Darwin, but also Wallace, and the earlier William Dampier, the so-called Buccaneer Explorer, who also wrote about his journeys. Lions, Elephants and other beasts were traditionally put on the Ark, but where were the marsupials and monotremes, like kangaroos, koalas and echidnas included? And what about still-surviving Cretaceous era flora like the Wollemi pine?

Yes other Creation stories can be wacky, indeed! Pyrrha and Deucalion, the Roman or Latin Adam and Eve, sprang from stones on the ground, as related in Ovid's Metamorphoses. Whilst the Australian Aborigines attribute various aspects of Creation to the ever encircling Rainbow Serpent, or spirit ancestors.

I've got a question to ask: If it wasn't for the Genesis account of Creation, do you think anyone would have ever thought to discover and identify what really happened?

I was working on a post and I lost it all! An ad just popped up and replaced my screen! I'll talk later. I'm too mad right now.

I don't like having ads on the right side of the NW screen! What if I accidentally click on it while I'm writing something, or switching between windows?

We have a different system here and I can't say I understand how the American one works. Children start school as early as 4 1/2, which relieves the need for expensive day-care for busy mothers. Primary school finishes at the end of the calendar year in Year 6, and secondary school begins the next calendar year, with Year 7 at a high school. Ideally Senior High School stops in Year 12 after successful completion of one's HSC, after which students can go to work, go into vocational training at a suitable college, or go to University or even combine all three.

I’m always interested in learning about other countries’ school system. When the students start school at 4 ½ do they start at Year 1 or do they have some kind of before Year 1 class? How old are the students when they start learning to read?

I’ll try to do my best to briefly explain the US system of education. Many students attend some kind of a preschool starting as early as 2. Most schools are in session from late August or early September to the end of May or early-middle June. Generally, if children have turned 5 by the first day of school they start Kindergarten, although parents can decide to start their children a year later if they don’t think they are ready yet. I think each school district can set their own cut off or maybe each state. When I started school the cut off was that the children need to be five by the end of September, so I started Kindergarten at age four. In my case that was too young so I got to do Kindergarten twice. After kindergarten, the students start 1st grade. Our school system goes up to 12th grade, although students are only legally required to attend through age 16. The grades can be split between different buildings in many different ways. High School is usually 9 or 10th grade – 12th grade. Elementary schools can be K or 1 – 3, 4, 5, or 6. 7-8 or 9 can be junior high. 5 or 6 – 8 can be middle school. Sometimes there is an intermediate or upper elementary school 4 or 5 -6. K can be in a building by itself or in a building with preschool. Basically how the grades are split into buildings is the decision of the school district. Students may or may not have to pass some kind of standardized test(s) to graduate from high school (testing varies by state and the U.S. has been going through (and is still going through) education reforms. In order to get into most (if not all colleges) students need to get a certain score or above on a test (we have two major ones the ACT and the SAT). After high school, students can go to a four year college or university, a technical school (2 yrs), or work. Hope that helps and isn’t too confusing.

I think you also mentioned wondering how students have time to party and stuff and about Press. I really don’t understand how students have the time. I never did. Of course, I was very fond of my sleep and was usually caring a heavy course load. At least in the town I am in the press often criticizes the college students and many people complain about the college students.

RE: sex-ed, drugs, education. I am the sort that tends to think that sheltering in itself is not necessarily a wise thing, but it shouldn't be completely shunned. One day, kids are going to out in the real world, and they are going to be confronted with these issues one way or another. If you send your kid to a public school, you have to simply accept the fact that thier peers talk about this stuff, are exposed to it, and hear about it on a pretty regular basis. If you send you kid to a private school, even a Christian one, don't think it won't happen there. I was in a small Christian private school growing up and the Jr High and High School were about 95% public school rejects. Drugs, language, sex, and all of it were pretty prevalent, in spite of the relatively strict rules.

But I am also of the type that believes it is not the school responsibility to teach about these things. Nor is it the church or church youth group's responsibility. Should they teach about it? Yes, but it is the parents' responsibility to instruct their kids in what is right and wrong with this stuff. The church youth pastor will spend about 2 hours (sometimes 3) a week with the kids. There are 168 hours a week. Teachers, depending on school format, so I will use a 3-credit hour class per teacher for example will spend 3 hours per week with the students. Of course multiply that by 7 or 8 classes in high school and you get 24 hours a week. Who do kids spend the rest of their time with? Thier peers and thier family. And unless the parents do a good job at training thier kids to make wise decisions, at the least who thier friends are, these kids will make many choices based on what thier friends do. The thing called peer pressure is more powerful than anything else a child will encounter outside their home. And pretty much the only way a child will be able to make the right decisions is by having parents that instruct them in that manner. I know there are exceptions on both sides (not having good parents and making good decisions, and having good parents and not making good decisions), but so often parents want thier kids' teachers or youth pastor to fix their kids, when it is their resposibility. The latter can help, but the parents have to be involved or a child will be in grave danger of going down the wrong path.

I completely agree with you, Fencer. People expect schools to solve all of the world’s problems. Many parents are pushing their responsibilities off on others. Education will never fix all the world’s problems neither will good parenting. The fact of the matter is that only God can fix all of the world’s problems. I’m not saying that we should stop trying to fix the world’s problems, but I do think we need to be reasonable about what we can accomplish. You are right about Christian schools too. They are by no means immune to drugs, language, sex, etc. They also have a problem with bullies. I think it would be better if the parents taught their children about right and wrong and the more sensitive issues. I think the idea behind it is parents aren’t doing it so the educational system has to. If I remember correctly, there really isn’t any hard evidence that shows that these anti-drug programs help significantly. In some case they might actually have the opposite effect.

Interesting education, PP! Let's see, I first had sex ed [of sorts] in 5th grade. But it was more detailed in 7th and 8th. Alcohol: middle school? high school? Drugs: 5th or 6th grade, I think. Why would anyone introduce a student to stuff like that that early?

I did have a very interesting education. … and I didn’t mention everything I could have. Did anyone else have to take self-esteem building classes? I got really tired of hearing about self-esteem. It was part of D.A.R.E. which I think I had in 6th and 8th grade and we had to take a class called “I can” in 7th grade. We also had something in high school to do with goals and other stuff that I can’t remember. Personally, I think too much emphasis is put on self-esteem.

220Christian, because the sad reality is that some children are doing drugs and having sex at those early ages.

On one hand I do feel that things are starting too young but then on the other hand Warrior has a point too. When I was in sixth grade (1996-97), a first grader claimed to have been raped by another first grader. I occasionally watch the old Adam-12 and Dragnet shows (I think they are from the 60’s and maybe the 70’s). The calls the officers go on are reenactments of real calls the police have gone on. I remember one where two children (younger than 9?) got into their mom’s illegal pills and another where a little boy had got into his older brothers drugs.

The idea of when kids should be exposed to certain things and how much they should be sheltered also can be apply to the Bible. I was subbing in a four year old preschool room and the children were learning about Moses. The teacher told them that the pharaoh didn’t like little boys and wished they would go away. Then she proceeded to show them the beginning of the Prince of Egypt. It is rated PG and rather violent at times. I sat there fuming because I felt it was inappropriate to show little kids. I know if I had watched it at that age I would have been scared and perhaps crying. On the other hand, I was also mad that she didn’t tell them that pharaoh killed little boys. I don’t believe in sugar coating the Bible either. On Sunday, we watched the Veggie Tales version of Moses at Sunday school (3yr olds – 2nd graders). While it was more appropriate for that age group, I had problems with it too. It soften the story by just having the babies float away on the river, not to mentioned set the story in the old west. Basically, I’m wondering what other people’s opinions are about teaching children stories from the Bible.

By the by...anyone have that mysterious formula for deciding which passages are poetic and which are literal?

I think it might be very similar to the formula which decides which passages can be kept as written in stone, whilst others, even the very next chapter, can be quietly ignored if it keeps stiff-necked and eminently unsuitable men in charge of things and even suitable women marginalised into 'their proper place'.

I was going to say something similar but less blunt (no offense meant to you wagga). If anyone here has the formula for deciding which passages are literal, poetical, culturally bound (i.e. they were meant literally for a specific place but have a deeper meaning we are supposed to follow (ex. Meat sacrificed to idols, women not braiding their hair)), etc. I would love to have it. My guess is that one doesn’t exist and that is why we are here debating how the world was created and exactly what women’s role in the church is. Not to mention why people have been debating theological points since the early church.

And what about selective preaching? When was the last time any of you ever heard a pastor preaching on the more ignored passages of Genesis? Such as what happened to Noah? Or Judah's treatment of Tamar, his daughter-in-law? Or Rachel's and Leah's rivalry in who was the apple of Jacob's eye? Or how he got his comeuppance for getting Esau's birthright on his first wedding night?

The church does seem to get stuck on certain parts of the Bible. At my church, the pastors occasionally preach on texts other than the gospel reading for the day, sometimes on the Old Testament and sometimes on one of the non-gospel books. I’m afraid that I don’t remember many examples. There was one on a prophet that God told to marry a prostitute. Unless the sermon is extremely good or extremely bad (i.e. ones that are not soundly based on the Bible) I forget them rather quickly.

I find it interesting (and a little funny) that people worry so much about exactly how the world was created. Most of us here are perfectly willing to take it on faith that Jesus was God and Man and died on the cross and was raised again. We aren’t trying to explain it by science. As interesting as this discussion is, we will never come up with a theory that all of us will agree on. I think most (dare I say all?) of us agree that God or some divine power had to have something to do with it. When I think about it, I can’t even understand why there should be matter at all. The only way I can fathom it is that God created it. (Of course that does open up the question as to how there came to be God. I just dismiss that with He’s God and he understands if we don’t). The most important point is that God created the world. Personally, I’d rather go with the Bible and the scientists that back it. All that can be done is to present the research and theories and let people decide for themselves what they believe. In the end only God knows exactly how it was done. When I think about all that God has done and is doing, I feel this sense of awe.

The truth of the matter is evolution and creation are completely incompatable. Theistic evolution is a desperate attempt to reconcile the two and it works even less than the theory of evolution itself.

Actually, it's possibly the only way that macroevolution could work.

Here's a question: Why would Humankind's fall from grace affect the rest of the Animal Kingdom? Why did some go from vegetarianism to predation?

In Christian theology, creation is affected by the fall just as much as man himself.

I'm tending toward a literary framework view of Genesis 1, given that there are some (to my mind) discrepancies with the chronology of Genesis 2. The point of the passage may not be to describe how God created but what God created. It's an argument for God's sovereignty, not a science textbook or historical account (indeed, it's just too poetic to be a historical account).

Anyway, just some thoughts.

TBG

Genesis 1 and 2 are the creation story, one just goes into more detail than the other.