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Evangelicalism and Evolution ARE in conflict (and that’s fine)

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There are two kinds of thinking that get in the way of the conversation evangelicals need to have over evolution.

One is a defensive, retreatist approach aimed at maintaining theological parameters deemed non-negotiable in mainstream evangelical thinking despite the evidence of science. The other is the claim that there is no real conflict between evolution and Christianity. The two can get along quite well, with perhaps a minor adjustment or two—nothing to lose sleep over.

Both of these views are unrealistic and in the end cause do more spiritual harm than good.

One advantage that the first group has over the second is the frank admission that evolution poses a serious challenge to how Christians have traditionally understood at least three central issues of the faith: the origin of humanity, of sin, and of death. That is true.

I argue in The Evolution of Adam that sin and death are undeniable universal realities, whether or not we are able to attribute them to a primordial man who ate from the wrong tree. The Christian tradition, however, has generally attributed the cause to sin and death to Adam as the first human. Evolution claims that the cause of sin and death, as Paul understood it, is not viable. That leaves open the questions of where sin and death come from.

More than that, the very nature of what sin is and why people die is turned on its head. Some behaviors Christians have thought of as sinful are understood in an evolutionary scheme as means of ensuring survival—for example, the aggression and dominance associated with “survival of the fittest” and sexual promiscuity to perpetuate one’s gene pool.

Likewise, in an evolutionary scheme death is not the enemy to be defeated. It may be feared, it may be ritualized, it may be addressed in epic myths and sagas; but death is not the unnatural state introduced by a disobedient couple in a primordial garden. Actually, it is the means that promotes the continued evolution of life on this planet and even ensures workable population numbers. Death may hurt, but it is evolution’s ally.

So, I repeat my point: evolution cannot simply be grafted onto evangelical Christian faith as an add-on, where we can congratulate ourselves on a job well done. This is going to take some work—and a willingness to take theological risk.

Evolution demands true intellectual synthesis: a willingness to rethink one’s own convictions in light of new data, and that is typically a very hard thing to do.

The cognitive dissonance created by evolution is considerable, and I understand why either avoidance or theological superficiality might be attractive. But in the long run, the price we pay for not doing the hard and necessary synthetic work is high indeed.

Evangelicals are sociologically a defensive lot, tending to focus on the need to be faithful to the past, to make sure that present belief matches that of previous generations. I get the point, but we must be just as burdened to be faithful to the future, to ensure that we are doing all we can to deliver a viable faith to future generations. That too is a high calling. Ignoring reality or playing theological games won’t do—no matter how unsettling, destabilizing, perhaps frightening such a calling may be.

Such a journey must be taken, for the alternatives are not pleasant. Christians can turn away, but the current scientific explanation of cosmic and biological origins is not going away, nor is our growing understanding of the nature of Israelite faith in its ancient Near Eastern context. I do not believe that God means for his children to live in a state of denial or hand wringing.

Likewise, abandoning all faith in view of our current state of knowledge is hardly an attractive—or compelling—option. Despite the New Atheist protestations of the bankruptcy of any faith in God in the face of science, most world citizens are not ready to toss away what has been the central element of the human drama since the beginning of recorded civilization.

Neither am I, not because I refuse to see the light, but because the light of science does not shine with equal brightness in every corner. There is mystery. There is transcendence. By faith I believe that the Christian story has deep access to a reality that materialism cannot provide and cannot be expected to know.

That is a confession of faith, I readily admit, but when it comes to accessing ultimate reality, we are all in the same boat, materialistic atheists included: at some point we must all say, “I can see no further than here, comprehend no more than this.”

As for evangelicals, perhaps evolution will eventually wind up being more of a help than a hindrance. Perhaps it will remind us that our theologies are provisional; when we forget that fact, we run the risk of equating what we think of God with God himself. That is a recurring danger, and the history of Christianity is replete with sad and horrific stories of how theology is used to manipulate and maintain power over others.

It may be that evolution, and the challenges it presents, will remind us that we are called to trust God, which means we may need to restructure and even abandon the “god” that we have created in our own image. Working through the implications of evolution may remind Christians that trusting God’s goodness is a daily decision, a spiritually fulfilling act of recommitment to surrender to God no matter what.

That’s not easy. But if we have learned anything from the saints of the past, it is that surrendering to God each day, whatever we are facing, is not meant to be easy. Taking up that same journey now will add our witness for the benefit of future generations.

The Next Frontier: Why Evangelical Seminaries Must Engage this Issue

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I approach this discussion as a seminary professor who teaches theology and Christian Thought courses, including a course devoted to “Theology and Science.” I have discovered that our seminary students have had very little exposure to complex discussions of the relation between science and theology. They often come into seminary (as I did) with minimal science background and often with only peripheral exposure to questions and issues around the intersection of science and religion. Some of them, having been raised in conservative Christian traditions, matriculate with perceptions about the fundamental incompatibility between scientific explanations about origins and orthodox Christian faith and theology. The evangelical seminary context calls for special attention to possibilities of constructive dialogue between the scientific consensus on origins and an evangelical, orthodox theology committed to the authority of Scripture.  

It is not exaggerating to say there is urgency about this issue. Most observers recognize that the institutional American church is in a state of decline (see, for example, David Olson’s The American Church in Crisis, Zondervan, 2008). Part of the reason for this decline is that church leaders are not equipping their congregants to intelligently engage challenging worldview issues (including, among others, theological, philosophical and ethical questions). A recent book by David Kinnamen, You Lost Me: Why Young Christians are Leaving Church…and Rethinking Faith (Baker, 2011), shows that close to 60% of churched teenagers drop out of church after high school, often rejecting their faith altogether. One of the reasons for this, as Kinnaman’s research shows, is a perceived “anti-science” attitude within the Church. Pastors, youth pastors, and other church leaders either ignore issues raised by science or they take an aggressive stance against it (reflecting the “conflict” model in Ian Barbour’s oft-cited typology). Recently, a group of Christian sociologists studied fifty “deconversion narratives” and published an analysis of those narratives. They discovered that a major reason for many of these deconversions was the lack of engagement within the church regarding complex intellectual issues like the relation between faith and science (a full 2/3 of the respondents spoke about intellectual issues). In the words of one former Baptist in the study: “Christianity is a disease; education is the cure.”

Traditionally, apologetics has been directed primarily to non-Christians (atheists, agnostics, or adherents of other major religions). But another apologetic need is arising today within the church itself. This apologetic argues that the perceived forced choice between science and faith is a false dichotomy. But it is one that is perpetuated by many pastors, youth pastors and other leaders in conservative streams of Christianity. Seminaries need to engage with science on issues like “origins” because they need to equip pastors with a sophisticated worldview and a capacity for nuanced discourse around the intersection of biblical hermeneutics, theological anthropology, and scientific explanations of cosmic, terrestrial and human origins. In short, pastors need to be able to help parishioners who are convinced by the scientific consensus on origins to realize that they can accept this consensus while simultaneously affirming the Bible’s unique, divine authority as the inspired word of God. They can acknowledge that while science helps us to explain things at an empirical, natural level, Scripture provides explanations and insight into theological, moral, and metaphysical realities. Alastair McGrath’s use of Roy Bhaskar’s stratification metaphor is helpful here: science and theology offer distinct but complementary (and even overlapping at times) layers of explanation. As Galileo, citing Cardinal Baronius, famously said: the Bible was written to tell us how to go to heaven; not how the heavens go.” People should not feel forced to choose between either science or faith; either science or theology; either science or Scripture.

When seminaries (and pastors) engage science integratively and hospitably, rather than with deep suspcion and hostilly, a number of complex issues emerge that demand sustained attention. How should Genesis 1 and 2-3 (two distinct but related creation accounts) be interpreted (i.e. what is meant by a “day” in Genesis 1 and should we understand Adam and Eve as historical persons or as theologically symbolic archetypes? What are the theological implications of accepting an evolutionary account of human origins on our understanding of the imago Dei? How should we understand the connection between sin and salvation (from what–or to what–are we saved by Christ)? Can or should a doctrine of “orignal,” or “inherited” sin be preserved in an evangelical theology which takes an evolutionary creationist account? Or is the noticeable reality that all people are in fact sinners (what theologians have pointed to as the most empirically verifiable doctrine of all) enough to secure for us that we need a Savior–irrespective of one’s view on a literal Adam/Eve and a historic Fall? Furthermore, there are a host of implications for our understanding of evil and suffering (theodicy): If death has been around for millions of years of evolutionary history, then death is not the consequence of human disobedience. Is God, then, somehow implicated in death’s sting–from the very beginning?

Many more questions could be listed. It would not surprise me if these questions surrounding the intersection of theology and science become the next frontier of popular, evangelical debate (we’re probably already there). A number of theologians, philosophers, and scientists who are self-identifying evangelical Christians are exploring these questions and others in the pursuit toward a more integrative Christian theology and a more cohesive Christian faith. Books and academic papers are being written, grant projects are under way (see for example the numerous, diverse BioLogos projects on “Evolution and Christian Faith“), and conferences and colloquia are taking place. Key to the sustainability of these academic projects, however, will be their translatability into the parlance of the everyday pastor and of the “Christian in the pew,” many of whom have been socialized within their evangelical faith to either avoid science or to combat it. It will be important to show that this integrative work is consonant with a high view of Scripture and the primacy of Christ for salvation. It will also be important to develop and articulate a fully-orbed, progressive, evangelical theology that connects the dots between creation, sin, salvation and the Eschaton–and which allows science to have a prominently descriptive role (one of the strata) in that theology. For that to happen, evangelical seminaries will need to be involved.