Re: [asa] Neo-Darwinism and God's action

"Part of what makes the creation so amazing is that God made something that is truly other than himself, something that is given the freedom to be itself. And no, I'm not being a Deist, because I believe strongly that God can and does interact in the causality/contigency stream of His creation to make his will known and to "woo" his bride."

Amen. The witness of nature through science is not only that the world sustains itself but that it even--once initiated--generated itself. The world gives every indication of being an independent entity. Its independent emergence illuminates the nature of the relationship: The fundamental relationship is a love relationship, a marriage. Everyone knows the bride emerges independently of the husband; otherwise it would not be a true marriage. Under this paradigm the need for mental contortions vanishes and everything simplifies.

See http://www.asa3.org/archive/ASA/200302/0090.html<http://www.asa3.org/archive/ASA/200302/0090.html> .

I still believe that God has tweaked and continues to tweak his world, not for philosophical reasons but because I have evidence in my personal history. That, of course, is a matter of faith, not objective fact.

 Don

  ----- Original Message -----
  From: Douglas Hayworth<mailto:haythere.doug@gmail.com>
  To: AmericanScientificAffiliation<mailto:asa@calvin.edu>
  Sent: Friday, February 15, 2008 3:01 PM
  Subject: Re: [asa] Neo-Darwinism and God's action

  On 2/15/08, D. F. Siemens, Jr. <dfsiemensjr@juno.com<mailto:dfsiemensjr@juno.com>> wrote:
    I think I see a problem, which may be more semantic than
    philosophical/theological. Is God competent to create a world with
    metaphysical contingency, or is it merely apparent contingency? Is there
    any level of human freedom, or is everything produced by divine
    providence or causality? Does God determine my actions rather than know
    what I will do?

  Doug responds:
  Okay, the discussion went down this direction anyway (see my earlier post in which I restrained myself from critiquing on the traditional Reformed concept). I used to be pretty solidly Reformed in my thinking, but now I am no longer comfortable with Creation in which there is only a mere appearance of contingency. Isn't God sovereign enough to create a world in which he does not have to determine all events? Behind the clever, nice-sounding language of the WCF statement, there is a bald contradiction: God can't determine all events at all levels without also being the author of sin. No matter how many fancy theological words you try to use, it just doesn't work. Part of what makes the creation so amazing is that God made something that is truly other than himself, something that is given the freedom to be itself. And no, I'm not being a Deist, because I believe strongly that God can and does interact in the causality/contigency stream of His creation to make his will known and to "woo" his bride. But I don't think that the he determines all events. He is sovereign over all events because he could determine any events he chooses. Several times recently I've heard preachers, etc. comment that the world and it's material structure would completely melt into nothingness if God stopped sustaining it by his thought. I am questioning that notion nowadays. What makes his creation a true creation is that it really does exist; it is not merely a dream in God's mind. Without God's sustaining input in our affairs, our universe would no doubt be a despairing place to be, but I do think we exist outside of God's mere thought.

  Actually, I'm not sure that I hold strongly to any of these ideas, but this is the only forum in which I think (hope) that it's safe to ask the hard questions. I look forward to reading responses and additional posts in this thread.

  Doug

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Received on Sat Feb 16 16:32:34 2008