Walter Hicks wrote:
> I have to say that when I went to school -- albeit in the dark ages -- I
> recall no reference to any of these things at that time either. By the
> same token, I became aware of them from numerous other sources. I also
> was not exposed to sexuality in the 5th grad either. That too came from
> other sources.
>
> Either way someone gets to be in control and pushes his/her agenda via
> the school system. Just because something is true does not mean that
> absolutely must be taught in the schools. especially if not everybody
> agrees on what is true and what is not.
>
> I'm sure that I'll get a lot of flack about this but I see flagrant
> atheism, liberalism $ humanism taught in many public schools in my
> state. Teachers have openly said to my daughter that if she doesn't like
> it then send her children to a private school. If people fight back by
> denying others the tools, I do not blame them.
The best way to "deny others the tools" is for churches to incorporate
evolution into thei theology, teaching, proclamation, & worship. By this of
course I do not mean that evolution should be the heart of the church's message,
that it should be considered an ultimate truth, or anything like that. But if
people heard evolution being discussed in positive ways in the church, and if the
doctrine of creation were presented with evolution in view, then children would
learn to see it as part of a Christian understanding of the world. Then when
they got to high school and some atheist biology teacher said (as was the
experience of one of my parishoners) "Forget what you've learned in Sunday School
- now we're going to learn how it really happened", their reaction would be,
"What are you talking about? Evolution is how we learned it in Sunday School."
In contrast, the way too many churches have dealt with this issue amounts
to painting a target on their chests and then handing atheists a gun.
Shalom,
George
George L. Murphy
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
"The Science-Theology Interface"
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