Re: [asa] RE: Conrad Hyers essay

Ted quotes Harry Emerson Fosdick from his letter "A Reply to Mr. Bryan in
the Name of Religion," published originally in the "New York Times" in 1922.
(We use to use it in our Religious and Historical Perspectives
interdisciplinary course at Berea College, along with a selection from the
Address Bryan was going to deliver at the conclusion of the Scopes Trial.)

    "Origins prove nothing in the realm of values."

I'd like to add further from Fosdick's letter:

    "The fundamental interest that leads Mr. Bryan and others of his school
to hate evolution is the fear that it will depreciate the dignity of man.
Just what do they mean? Even in the book of Genesis God made man out of the
dust of the earth, and that is low enough to start with, and evolution
starts no lower. As long as God is the creative power, what difference does
it make if out of dust by sudden fiat or out of dust by gradual process God
brought man into being. Here man is and what he is he is. Were it decided
that God had dropped him from the sky, he would still be the man he is. If
it is decided to God brought him up by slow gradations from lower forms of
life, he is still the man he is.

"The fact is that the process by which man came to be upon the planet is a
very important scientific problem, but it is not a crucially important
religious problem. Orgins prove nothing in the realm of values. To all folk
of spiritual insight, man by whatever process he first arrived, is the child
of God, made in His image, destined for His character."

Fosdick goes on to express great sympathy for the concerns that led Bryan
for his position, but challenges his attack on evolution. Perhaps I should
say, the evolution of man, since Bryan, if my memory is correct, was a
day-age proponent and prepared to accept evolution prior to humankind.

I would add, that if I should hear the statement that "I don't believe that
I am descended from slime" (a common objection), I would say, "What's wrong
with slime? God created it, too! Isn't everything God created good?" "Slime"
conjures up an "ugh!, sticky, messy, useless" sort of thing and is used to
characterize the behavior or character of certain persons; it's a rhetorical
device designed to appeal to negative emotions. Even the word sounds, well,
slimy. It ought to be challenged.

Bob Schneider

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Received on Wed Jan 31 13:31:16 2007