[asa] teaching about origins--possible workshop at annual meeting

Bernie, et al.

I am hoping to offer a half-day seminar on this very topic -- teaching
about origins for lay audiences (churches, undergraduate courses, Christian
schools, even adult learning in community settings) -- at next summer's
annual meeting of the ASA. The details aren't set yet, but if it works out
I will be providing a detailed look at how I do this, together with
materials for getting it done. I hope that some on this list will consider
coming, assuming that the arrangements fall into place.

Yet one more reason to attend the meeting!?

I don't use the DE category, but if I did I'd be tempted to put into that
category some ID advocates (ironically). I say this, b/c they just won't
talk about theology, let alone Christ, in their "official" stuff. The TEs
certainly will do that. Much that is ironic here--the TEs are often
criticized for being deists (and I understand why some of them might fit
that category), but many of the Christian TEs are far more willing to talk
about the Incarnation, the Resurrection, and the Bible than many of the IDs
are. When people focus on the science issues, leaving the theology out of
the picture, then the TEs might look more like deists, since they don't
emphasize miraculous acts in earth history--and some of the TEs (not those
whom I recommend) hold very liberal views of the Bible, such that they don't
believe in biblical miracles or the incarnation. At the same time, when IDs
leave the Bible out of the picture, they too can seem no different from
deists, since they seem uninterested in bringing the Triune God into the
mix; they want to leave things at a very generic theism. While I know that
most IDs are not deists, someone like Anthony Flew or Michael Denton or
David Berlinski seems to fit this pattern well. Are they whom you have in
mind as DEs?

I use the following overall categories in my discussion:

Scientific Creationism (YEC)
Concordism (OEC)
Framwork Hypothesis (can align with OEC, ID, or TE; in theory, can align
also with a recent creation, but the YECs detest the framework hypothesis
b/c it does not claim that the days must be chronological)
TE
ID

I don't get into scientific atheism in this unit, although I do in an even
broader unit that I offer in some courses. There's enough to do with this
part, which emphasizes issues of biblical interpretation and attitudes
toward modern science.

Ted

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Received on Mon Dec 17 15:56:26 2007