How do we feel about young earth creationism?

[Terabith]

Just to continue my stirring the pot and old times sake theme.  

I'm voting for utterly ridiculous hokum.  

Discuss.

[Moonhawk]

POPCORN, POPPPCORN, get your POPPCORNNNN here!!!  🍿🍿🍿

[theelfqueen]

I seriously looked at this and thought - what kind of sh!t are you trying to stir now??

[MercyA]

😂  LOL.  

I used to be a vehement young earther and literal 7-day creationist. I am now an old earth creationist, open to the possibility that God used evolution in His process of creation. It does not diminish my awe of or faith in Him in the slightest; if anything it has increased it! 

I believe young earth creationism to be damaging to the faith of our children in the long run. I truly do not understand the emphasis that has been misplaced upon it. I think like so many other things it has arisen in part from an "us vs. them" mentality. American Christianity seems to have embraced and aligned itself with so much that is, in my view, extra-Biblical and sometimes anti-Biblical.

Edited October 5, 2020 by MercyA

[Terabith]

24 minutes ago, theelfqueen said:

I seriously looked at this and thought - what kind of sh!t are you trying to stir now??

I'm nostalgic, and also I honestly don't remember how we would get from stuff like this to cupcakes and kilts.  

[Rosie_0801]

The only young earth Christians I know are very tolerant of me. 

[Ellie]

I kind of believe it, but I don't think it's the deciding factor as to whether someone is a true believer or not.

A number of years ago a number of Christian groups decided to make it into a Big Deal and added it to their Statements of Faith. First, I won't sign one of those even if I can, because I don't believe in making it a requirement for membership; second, I don't think this belongs on a statement of faith, anyway. A number of years ago, there was a convention in Colorado, I believe, where exhibitors were required to sign a SOF, and the Young Earth, Special Creation clause was added. Sonlight refused to sign it and so they didn't exhibit. Seems like there was a lot of fall-out from that. Stupid on the part of the organization.

[Pawz4me]

5 hours ago, MercyA said:

American Christianity seems to have embraced and aligned itself with so much that is, in my view, extra-Biblical and sometimes anti-Biblical.

Yep.

[Megs]

I am a young earth creationist. To me, it’s just taking every piece and part of the Bible at face value. If I start picking apart one section, what would stop me from picking apart other sections? It’s totally a faith thing for me. I know that’s not the popular belief, but I’ve never cared about being popular anyway. 😀

[Guest]

I was completely indoctrinated in YEC growing up. I remember, even as a child, wondering where dinosaurs fit into this story and thinking it puzzling that National Geographic always explained everything from an evolutionary framework. (And it typically seemed more logical to me, for ex., that a cave-dwelling salamander with sightless eyes evolved that way because sight was unnecessary vs. God created a blind animal and then...what? Transported them to the dark caves where they live?)

In my early hs years, I still believed in YEC, but I felt ill-equipped to teach my kids about numerous things because those things didn’t make sense to me. I will tell you I am fuzzy on large portions of astronomy, geology and paleontology because my parents ignored those things. So I spent several months reading a lot on Answers in Genesis.

I bought the book Unlocking the Mysteries of Creation. I started reading this, thinking, once I understand these details, then I will be prepared to teach my kids about origins. But that isn’t what happened. I remember a question about how we can see the light from stars that are billions of LYs away and the “answer” was that God simply created the light “in transit,” if you will, so supposedly, no discrepancy there!

There were many other “answers” like this. This was the beginning of my relinquishing the belief in YEC. At the time, I decided to teach my kids that there were two prevailing thoughts and so, they would find they had some friends who believed the earth was very young and was made by God in the same form it is now in, while others believed it was very old and everything evolved. For myself, I settled on a Theistic Evolution concept and that is (probably) what I think now. 

I agree with Mercy that YEC teachings have done more to harm people’s faith than to help it. I also believe it is one reason some Christians don’t care about climate change. 

[Guest]

20 minutes ago, Megs said:

I am a young earth creationist. To me, it’s just taking every piece and part of the Bible at face value. If I start picking apart one section, what would stop me from picking apart other sections? It’s totally a faith thing for me. I know that’s not the popular belief, but I’ve never cared about being popular anyway. 😀

Thank you for sharing your thoughts, Megs. I knew there had to be one and wondered if anyone would be willing to say so. I admire your courage.

 

[Guest]

5 hours ago, Terabith said:

I'm nostalgic, and also I honestly don't remember how we would get from stuff like this to cupcakes and kilts.  

Well, IIRC, cupcakes started out as it’s own thread. Remember? But itis kinda crazy how that devolved so far that “cupcakes” became a symbol for irreconcilable differences. 

[Hyacinth]

But do you put your shopping carts back or leave them in the parking lot?

[Wheres Toto]

It requires ignoring a lot of basic, foundational, well-established science and most of the sites claiming to dispute old earth are using arguments that science has moved past decades ago.  We have a lot more evidence from the past 10 years or so.  

I think it leads to a lot of kids questioning everything they've been taught when they get older and realize how much was misrepresented.   Although I do know some YEC who teach their kids YE at home but realize their kids are likely going to be exposed to OE in other places and are okay with it.  They just explain to them that they believe differently.  I don't know if that's going to go better for them or not.    I dislike YE who expect everyone else to change a class for them, or mark things out in library books.     

[alisoncooks]

I was raised YE and lean that way...but for me: in nonessentials, liberty.  My essential beliefs don't change if the earth is young or old or created with the image of age or whatever. 

[Guest]

13 minutes ago, Hyacinth said:

But do you put your shopping carts back or leave them in the parking lot?

Put them back!!! What sort of baboon doesn’t do this?! Lol

[alisoncooks]

1 hour ago, Hyacinth said:

But do you put your shopping carts back or leave them in the parking lot?

Yeah...I'm flexible re: the age of the earth but I draw the line at shopping cart abandonment. 

[QueenCat]

YE is not a scientifically sound theory. For me, that means there is no way that I can adhere to that thought. 

[Scarlett]

You guys are cracking me up.  
 

For the newbies....
 

YEC.....I was never taught that.  I was  also taught that science is wonderful but does change as it learns more and that it is ok to believe something contrary to current scientific thought.  It doesn’t make you an idiot.  
 

The Bible is often non literal and it really doesn’t say how long a creative day is.  And I don’t care.  It doesn’t shake my faith in the absolute Awesomeness of my God.  

[fairfarmhand]

8 hours ago, Ellie said:

I kind of believe it, but I don't think it's the deciding factor as to whether someone is a true believer or not.

A number of years ago a number of Christian groups decided to make it into a Big Deal and added it to their Statements of Faith. First, I won't sign one of those even if I can, because I don't believe in making it a requirement for membership; second, I don't think this belongs on a statement of faith, anyway. A number of years ago, there was a convention in Colorado, I believe, where exhibitors were required to sign a SOF, and the Young Earth, Special Creation clause was added. Sonlight refused to sign it and so they didn't exhibit. Seems like there was a lot of fall-out from that. Stupid on the part of the organization.

Yes! This. I lean toward ye, but I can’t get too bothered over it either way. It has nothing to do with salvation.

[Ottakee]

I do lean young Earth, but it is not a salvation issue.  Our pastor once said that there are key ingredients to salvation, just as in ice cream.  Then there are issues that give you the various flavors....but they are all ice cream 

[vmsurbat1]

1 hour ago, alisoncooks said:

I was raised YE and lean that way...but for me: in nonessentials, liberty.  My essential beliefs don't change if the earth is young or old or created with the image of age or whatever. 

This is exactly where I land, especially wrt "in nonessentials, liberty".

[Scarlett]

49 minutes ago, Ordinary Shoes said:

I wasn't raised YE. I was raised Catholic and YE and anti-evolutionism wasn't a thing in the Catholic Church when I was growing up. But I was raised in the Bible Belt which meant they skipped over evolution in school. I remember the high school biology text had an Evolution chapter but it was never assigned or discussed in class. 

Now I'm a little angry about that. How could they keep a scientific theory that it almost universally accepted from us because they were afraid of offending a few people? I don't object to holding YEC beliefs but public schools (and schools that use public funding) should teach evolution and old Earth because that is accepted science. 

 

 I was also raised up in the Bible Belt.  I have no memory of being taught evolution in school but mom says I was.  But I often do that....my mind just doesn’t retain things that don’t make sense to me.  Like the negative things in On Becoming Baby Wise. That book helped me a lot as a new mother but I have zero memory of the negative parts.  

Edited October 5, 2020 by Scarlett

[Guest]

2 hours ago, alisoncooks said:

I was raised YE and lean that way...but for me: in nonessentials, liberty.  My essential beliefs don't change if the earth is young or old or created with the image of age or whatever. 

 

24 minutes ago, fairfarmhand said:

Yes! This. I lean toward ye, but I can’t get too bothered over it either way. It has nothing to do with salvation.

 

10 minutes ago, Ottakee said:

I do lean young Earth, but it is not a salvation issue.  Our pastor once said that there are key ingredients to salvation, just as in ice cream.  Then there are issues that give you the various flavors....but they are all ice cream 

What does it mean to lean young earth? (Any or all of the quoted posters, or others following along are welcome to answer.) I don’t think I understand that phrasing. 

[Ottakee]

Just now, Quill said:

 

 

What does it mean to lean young earth? (Any or all of the quoted posters, or others following along are welcome to answer.) I don’t think I understand that phrasing. 

I tend to believe more of the young earth timeline but I also know that I don't know everything and it isn't a salvation issue so not an issue I spend a lot of time thinking about/debating, etc.

 

[maize]

There is so much that is beautiful and fascinating in science, and you have to severely limit access to real astronomy and geology and biology in order to teach a YEC point of view.

Why would God expect us to close our eyes and cover our ears to avoid learning through scientific processes?

So...you know where I stand 🙂

[Not_a_Number]

I'm obviously old Earth, lol. Also, I'm a secular atheist Jew, so... I don't fit a lot of the standard homeschooling demographics, lol. 

[Garga]

9 hours ago, MercyA said:

😂  LOL.  

I used to be a vehement young earther and literal 7-day creationist. I am now an old earth creationist, open to the possibility that God used evolution in His process of creation. It does not diminish my awe of or faith in Him in the slightest; if anything it has increased it! 

I believe young earth creationism to be damaging to the faith of our children in the long run. I truly do not understand the emphasis that has been misplaced upon it. I think like so many other things it has arisen in part from an "us vs. them" mentality. American Christianity seems to have embraced and aligned itself with so much that is, in my view, extra-Biblical and sometimes anti-Biblical.

 

3 hours ago, Quill said:

I was completely indoctrinated in YEC growing up. I remember, even as a child, wondering where dinosaurs fit into this story and thinking it puzzling that National Geographic always explained everything from an evolutionary framework. (And it typically seemed more logical to me, for ex., that a cave-dwelling salamander with sightless eyes evolved that way because sight was unnecessary vs. God created a blind animal and then...what? Transported them to the dark caves where they live?)

In my early hs years, I still believed in YEC, but I felt ill-equipped to teach my kids about numerous things because those things didn’t make sense to me. I will tell you I am fuzzy on large portions of astronomy, geology and paleontology because my parents ignored those things. So I spent several months reading a lot on Answers in Genesis.

I bought the book Unlocking the Mysteries of Creation. I started reading this, thinking, once I understand these details, then I will be prepared to teach my kids about origins. But that isn’t what happened. I remember a question about how we can see the light from stars that are billions of LYs away and the “answer” was that God simply created the light “in transit,” if you will, so supposedly, no discrepancy there!

There were many other “answers” like this. This was the beginning of my relinquishing the belief in YEC. At the time, I decided to teach my kids that there were two prevailing thoughts and so, they would find they had some friends who believed the earth was very young and was made by God in the same form it is now in, while others believed it was very old and everything evolved. For myself, I settled on a Theistic Evolution concept and that is (probably) what I think now. 

I agree with Mercy that YEC teachings have done more to harm people’s faith than to help it. I also believe it is one reason some Christians don’t care about climate change. 

Both of these! Exactly yes to both of these. I was taught young earth in church. If Adam and Eve were the first people, and if you could count down their generations, then we know that humans have been around for 7,000ish years. Full stop. Besides, evolution was just a theory and we all know that theories are just things people make up until they can prove them. (I don’t believe that last sentence, but that’s what I was told.)

I have no memory of learning about evolution in school (I graduated in 1990.)

I was in my 20s and read a fiction book by Jean Auel about prehistoric people.  On the inside cover of the book was a map that showed the places where various artifacts were found and the estimated dates of the artifacts.  I was completely floored that an artifact of a female figurine was dated 50,000 years ago.  I honestly believed that people hadn’t shown up on the earth until about 7 (maybe 9,000) years ago. But the map was clearly not a piece of fiction, it was a real map depicting real artifacts. I actually believed that everyone believed that humans were only about 7-9,000 years old and this was my first encounter with the idea that most people thought humans had been around much, much longer. 

Don’t ask me what I thought about dinosaurs. Evolution wasn’t a topic I thought of very often up until then, and I never tried to sort out in my mind how everything would have worked. I knew that people thought dinosaurs were a long time ago, but I thought we all knew that humans were recent.  

There was no internet back then and I was ashamed at my lack of knowledge, so I didn’t talk to anyone about it and just wondered about it for a long time and started piecing things together on my own. 

Four years ago when I finally sat down to teach my son a proper high school biology class, I lapped up the chapter on evolution. Finally! It all made sense!

I never taught my kids young earth.  I was just kinda quiet about it until that biology class and then taught evolution full hog without any hesitation or apologies.

Edited October 5, 2020 by Garga

[sassenach]

I once heard someone teach that when Jesus created the wine out of water, he didn’t create new wine, he created fine, aged wine. So therefore, the creation of the earth, even if young earth, does not eliminate the idea of creating an aged earth. That was a novel thought to me. 
 

Personally, I am utterly convinced that the earth and everyone and everything on it was created and designed. I believe Adam and Eve were real people, and the garden of Eden was a real place. I am unattached to a timeline as it translates into my perception of time. 

[Garga]

Also, as far as my faith...it actually is stronger to think that, per the scriptures, from the creation of the world, God had us in mind. That means he didn’t have us in mind for 9,000 years, but for billions.  For billions of years, God has thought of us and loved us even before we were here.  He had a plan for us billions of years ago. 

And he is big enough that he can wait that long for the plan to play out.  And he took that long to guide the world until we were here.

I think that Adam and Eve were possibly real people who lived 7000ish years ago and that’s when he decided it was time to start revealing his plan to us through them.  Up till then, he was still preparing. 

[sassenach]

These threads are cracking me up @Terabith

[Guest]

11 minutes ago, sassenach said:

I once heard someone teach that when Jesus created the wine out of water, he didn’t create new wine, he created fine, aged wine. So therefore, the creation of the earth, even if young earth, does not eliminate the idea of creating an aged earth. That was a novel thought to me. 
 

Personally, I am utterly convinced that the earth and everyone and everything on it was created and designed. I believe Adam and Eve were real people, and the garden of Eden was a real place. I am unattached to a timeline as it translates into my perception of time. 

Forgive my drilling down. I just want to understand this better...

When you observe geological features, what do you think about this? IOW, do you think a desert was created as a desert, a glacier was created pretty much the same place and characteristics it currently has, a canyon/gorge was created pretty much at the depth that it currently has, "balanced rocks" and "natural bridges" were created similarly to how they appear? You are unattached to a timeline, but does that mean you don't think these features were once something different and have been changed over time? Or do you think God made, say, a lake with the long-range plan that it would dry up and turn into a salt flat, for example? 

[kbutton]

2 hours ago, alisoncooks said:

I was raised YE and lean that way...but for me: in nonessentials, liberty.  My essential beliefs don't change if the earth is young or old or created with the image of age or whatever. 

I agree, though I think that a church shouldn't be sneaky about their origin of the world beliefs because I think that can lead to conflict ("What are they teaching my kids in Sunday School!?!" kinds of moments go both ways and should be avoided). I think everyone should know what their church believes, be prepared to allow others to hold varying secondary beliefs on the non-essentials, and anticipate how to respond if the non-essentials don't match up with their beliefs in those areas. We get too comfy thinking everyone agrees with us in church settings.

8 minutes ago, sassenach said:

Personally, I am utterly convinced that the earth and everyone and everything on it was created and designed. I believe Adam and Eve were real people, and the garden of Eden was a real place. I am unattached to a timeline as it translates into my perception of time. 

I am getting less attached to the timeline, but I think it's shorter than old earthers and probably longer than other YE people believe (tens of thousands of years is huge for YE people but laughable by evolutionary timelines). 🙂 

[sassenach]

13 minutes ago, Quill said:

Forgive my drilling down. I just want to understand this better...

When you observe geological features, what do you think about this? IOW, do you think a desert was created as a desert, a glacier was created pretty much the same place and characteristics it currently has, a canyon/gorge was created pretty much at the depth that it currently has, "balanced rocks" and "natural bridges" were created similarly to how they appear? You are unattached to a timeline, but does that mean you don't think these features were once something different and have been changed over time? Or do you think God made, say, a lake with the long-range plan that it would dry up and turn into a salt flat, for example? 

TBH, other than being intrigued by that teaching, I didn't give much thought to the mechanics of it all. 

If someone insisted that I choose an explanation, I would probably say that God works outside of time, so geological changes did happen over the course of long periods of time and how that played out vs how we explain it isn't of great consequence to me. I'm comfortable working in timelines of millions of years. What I absolutely do not believe is that life evolved randomly, without any influence of a creator. I've sat through many a secular biology class and I have yet to find a professor that doesn't use "created" at some point. Learning about irreducible complexity and fine-tuning went a long way to solidify my beliefs there (and no, I don't really want to debate that today but people can google it). 

Edited October 5, 2020 by sassenach

[J-rap]

To be honest, it never even occurred to me that people read every part of the Bible so literally until a boyfriend of mine in college told me he did (in the 80's).  Then I forgot about it until I started homeschooling.  😁   It seems like once you get caught up in taking everything literally, then you run into a lot of obstacles and tricks to get around them and you can lose site of the overall message of God's beautiful, enormous, non-judgmental love.   

I grew up in the Lutheran church and had friends from many different denominations, and I don't remember any of them believing in young earth creationism.  Did that become more of a thing later? 

 

 

 

[Spy Car]

10 hours ago, Rosie_0801 said:

The only young earth Christians I know are very tolerant of me. 

So you're saying that bad judgement extends to all areas? 

Bill

[Momto6inIN]

I am a YEC.I didn't read very many other responses.

I minored in anthropology and took several evolutionary theory courses, one of them a graduate level course, so I am somewhat more informed than your average Joe. I was not a born again Christian at the time and thought YEC was only for stupid uneducated people and said so publicly more than once. Even after I became a Christian I still cringed inwardly whenever people talked about it. How could they he so backward and uninformed?

But the more I read and the more I examined what I'd been taught in my college courses, the more questions I had about the accuracy of the science. I won't bore you with the details and I will not get into one of those "show me your sources" debates, because in my experience those never go well and they don't convince anyone. Suffice it to say that the conclusion I came to was that there are a lot of significant holes in evolutionary theory and for it to be accepted as fact is stretching the data.

In addition to the science, it also came down to a faith issue for me. I could not simultaneously believe in millions and millions of years of death before Adam and also believe that Jesus Christ brought me new life. The idea that Adam brought death and Jesus brought life in response are inextricably linked in Scripture. There was a significant amount of cognitive dissonance there that I couldn't handle.

I very much dislike Apologia's and AiG's stance that YEC is a salvation issue because I know I was saved even as a believer in evolution. But I equally dislike and resent the stance that I'm stupid and uninformed because I am now YEC.

[frogger]

I was taught YEC and go to a church where there is disagreement but we love each other and our love is being currently tested by masks. There will always be tests to love and peace though.

I'm sorry to give you a long explaination but I don't know that my beliefs have a name. If someone knows, please enlighten me.

 

Though I was raised YEC as an adult while reading Genesis 1 it dawned on me that this really wasn't what the main point was. God wasn't explaining science, he was declaring his authority to the Hebrew people. In the Egyptian culture and most other ancient cultures there are a plethora of gods. They have their own little domain be it ocean or sun or the underworld, etc. God very specifically stated that every domain was His. He created them, which is a sign of ownership. I think people across cultures typically agree if you made something it's yours. And He named everything, which is also a sign of authority. You can see he gave Adam authority over the animals in verse 28 and in chapter two you see he was told to name them. So naming shows ownership. God was declaring himself ruler over ALL and thus the Hebrews became monotheistic in a polytheistic world. I think he wanted to be very clear about it because if he just said he was God of the whole world they would start tacking on extras to specific domains.

I also believe it beautifully shows a desolate, formless, and void world that God spoke light and life into in a powerful way: abundant life of every kind, the oceans teemed with life and life that wasn't just life but that begat more life. I believe this is something that applies to people's lives now.

It also shows the power of his word to a people who depended on him but this is getting too long.

 

Anyway, I don't know what these beliefs are called because I just see them in Genesis itself. 

Edited October 5, 2020 by frogger

[Not_a_Number]

4 minutes ago, Momto6inIN said:

Suffice it to say that the conclusion I came to was that there are a lot of significant holes in evolutionary theory and for it to be accepted as fact is stretching the data.

I don’t think that most of the dating of fossils comes down to evolutionary theory. I actually think those are separate issues 🙂 . 

We totally don’t need to debate, just a note. 

[kbutton]

24 minutes ago, Quill said:

Forgive my drilling down. I just want to understand this better...

When you observe geological features, what do you think about this? IOW, do you think a desert was created as a desert, a glacier was created pretty much the same place and characteristics it currently has, a canyon/gorge was created pretty much at the depth that it currently has, "balanced rocks" and "natural bridges" were created similarly to how they appear? You are unattached to a timeline, but does that mean you don't think these features were once something different and have been changed over time? Or do you think God made, say, a lake with the long-range plan that it would dry up and turn into a salt flat, for example? 

I would say that most people in my circles (YE) would say that those things were the result of catastrophic events more often than not. The idea is that those events accelerate changes (Mt. St. Helen's and its aftermath is used as an example of catastrophic change). YE creationists that I know believe in ice ages and things like that. There are some that are conducting research to try to confirm or disprove some YE models, not just making up ideas. One area of research (not sure if it's current) focuses on coconino sandstone deposits, and there have been articles published in mainstream journals on the topic (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S003707381000165X). I do not keep up on this, so articles like this may have been superceded.

I would note though that there are scientists doing field and lab research with the hope of making defensible models; whether people consider those efforts misguided or not, is another story. 🙂 
 

[kbutton]

7 minutes ago, Momto6inIN said:

I am a YEC.I didn't read very many other responses.

I minored in anthropology and took several evolutionary theory courses, one of them a graduate level course, so I am somewhat more informed than your average Joe. I was not a born again Christian at the time and thought YEC was only for stupid uneducated people and said so publicly more than once. Even after I became a Christian I still cringed inwardly whenever people talked about it. How could they he so backward and uninformed?

But the more I read and the more I examined what I'd been taught in my college courses, the more questions I had about the accuracy of the science. I won't bore you with the details and I will not get into one of those "show me your sources" debates, because in my experience those never go well and they don't convince anyone. Suffice it to say that the conclusion I came to was that there are a lot of significant holes in evolutionary theory and for it to be accepted as fact is stretching the data.

In addition to the science, it also came down to a faith issue for me. I could not simultaneously believe in millions and millions of years of death before Adam and also believe that Jesus Christ brought me new life. The idea that Adam brought death and Jesus brought life in response are inextricably linked in Scripture. There was a significant amount of cognitive dissonance there that I couldn't handle.

I very much dislike Apologia's and AiG's stance that YEC is a salvation issue because I know I was saved even as a believer in evolution. But I equally dislike and resent the stance that I'm stupid and uninformed because I am now YEC.

I know someone else that has a similar background and story. 

I had college professors who had never been educated in a Christian setting themselves that believed in YEC, which was always interesting to me--they are a product of public schools and secular universities. 

It's a more diverse group than people expect.

[Not_a_Number]

1 minute ago, kbutton said:

I had college professors who had never been educated in a Christian setting themselves that believed in YEC, which was always interesting to me--they are a product of public schools and secular universities. 

Were they religious? 

[kbutton]

4 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

Were they religious? 

I think one was while he was being educated, but I don't know for sure. The part that stands out to me is one of them pointing out that it wasn't a lack of a secular education that made him a YEC, not whether he was religious while he received that education.

The college I attended was religious though most professors were educated in secular settings, particularly for their graduate degrees.

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, kbutton said:

I think one was while he was being educated, but I don't know for sure. The part that stands out to me is one of them pointing out that it wasn't a lack of a secular education that made him a YEC, not whether he was religious while he received that education.

The college I attended was religious though most professors were educated in secular settings, particularly for their graduate degrees.

Yeah, my dad became religious as an adult and has definitely flirted with questioning evolution. I don't know if he really doesn't believe it because I don't ask, lol -- I kind of don't want to know. 

[Guest]

18 minutes ago, Momto6inIN said:

I am a YEC.I didn't read very many other responses.

I minored in anthropology and took several evolutionary theory courses, one of them a graduate level course, so I am somewhat more informed than your average Joe. I was not a born again Christian at the time and thought YEC was only for stupid uneducated people and said so publicly more than once. Even after I became a Christian I still cringed inwardly whenever people talked about it. How could they he so backward and uninformed?

But the more I read and the more I examined what I'd been taught in my college courses, the more questions I had about the accuracy of the science. I won't bore you with the details and I will not get into one of those "show me your sources" debates, because in my experience those never go well and they don't convince anyone. Suffice it to say that the conclusion I came to was that there are a lot of significant holes in evolutionary theory and for it to be accepted as fact is stretching the data.

In addition to the science, it also came down to a faith issue for me. I could not simultaneously believe in millions and millions of years of death before Adam and also believe that Jesus Christ brought me new life. The idea that Adam brought death and Jesus brought life in response are inextricably linked in Scripture. There was a significant amount of cognitive dissonance there that I couldn't handle.

I very much dislike Apologia's and AiG's stance that YEC is a salvation issue because I know I was saved even as a believer in evolution. But I equally dislike and resent the stance that I'm stupid and uninformed because I am now YEC.

Thank you for sharing such an interesting background. Your second-to-last paragraph makes me wonder this: what are your thoughts on dinosaurs and prehistoric animals and plants? I was never able to understand how that could fit with a view of no death pre-Fall of Man and a young earth. 

[kbutton]

1 minute ago, Not_a_Number said:

Yeah, my dad became religious as an adult and has definitely flirted with questioning evolution. I don't know if he really doesn't believe it because I don't ask, lol -- I kind of don't want to know. 

Yeah, it might be best left unprobed! Lol! I don't mean to poke fun if it causes injury to your relationship, but I think there is always *something* parents and kids tend to not want to explore in regard to changing minds over time! I am chuckling at the universality of parent/child dynamics. 🙂 

[Reefgazer]

I have no problem with it as a personal belief system, but it isn't science, doesn't meet any of the definitions of science, and shouldn't be taught as science.

[Terabith]

To actually give a serious answer to my tongue in cheek topic... I grew up in public schools (in Tennessee) and was not taught evolution in school because my biology teacher was a YEC.  But while I obviously knew people who believed in young earth, I didn’t really know much about the details of what they believed until I went to a chapel in high school at the college I was taking a dual enrollment course and heard someone talking about how fossils were placed here to make us question our faith.  I also vaguely remember in third grade talking with a kid and saying, “But the Bible obviously has poetic language.  Why does seven days have to mean 24 hours when the sun didn’t even show up until day 2?”  I also remember talking about how amazing it was that the Bible, written so many thousands of years ago, got the order and details of Big Bang theory and evolution so close.  I mean, if you were an ancient Israelite and got a planetarium show on the Big Bang and evolution from God, how would you write it to make sense?

 I tend to believe that YEC damages many people’s faith, because they don’t know how to throw out the baby (YEC) without throwing out the bath water of their faith as well.  I definitely believe God created the world; I just believe He did it over a long period of time and largely utilizing natural processes.  I do think there’s a certain arrogance that I have seen among evolutionary biologists that I have known.  My husband did high performance scientific computing for a group of them, and they were constantly mocking his faith.  And we’re Episcopalians!  My husband says there’s a lot of hand waving that they do and that scientific culture has a huge element of faith; people just won’t acknowledge the assumptions that they make.  That’s a lot to say that I think there’s room for both.  I definitely taught my kids astronomy and paleontology and evolution, but I also wasn’t afraid of telling them (especially when they were very little) that some things are the way they are because God likes them that way.  
 

When my husband was getting his masters in astronomy, I had an interesting conversation with his advisor, who was incredibly entertained by the idea that I was getting my M.Div.  He was a very vocal atheist and a cool guy, but one day he told me, in a sort of musing way:  “You know, if there’s only one universe, I think you would almost have to believe in a God, because it’s so entirely crazy that all the conditions of the universe are so precisely tuned to make life possible.  It’s really only if there are an infinite number of universes and we happen to live in the one that makes life possible that the idea of no creator makes sense.  Obviously, I do believe in the multiverse, but the further I get in science, the harder it is for me to really make fun of theists.  If I am really honest.”   Clearly, his was a minority opinion, but it was interesting.  

[Momto6inIN]

1 hour ago, Quill said:

Thank you for sharing such an interesting background. Your second-to-last paragraph makes me wonder this: what are your thoughts on dinosaurs and prehistoric animals and plants? I was never able to understand how that could fit with a view of no death pre-Fall of Man and a young earth. 

I'll try to come back to this later. Right now I'm on my way to teach public speaking to six 4-8 year olds 😉

[Not_a_Number]

1 hour ago, kbutton said:

Yeah, it might be best left unprobed! Lol! I don't mean to poke fun if it causes injury to your relationship, but I think there is always *something* parents and kids tend to not want to explore in regard to changing minds over time! I am chuckling at the universality of parent/child dynamics. 🙂 

Honestly, our relationship is pretty nonstandard -- we haven't lived in the same country since I was 11, and my parents have been divorced since I was something like 5 or 6. So we aren't close, although I'm in some ways a lot like him. 

So it's possible this is something I'd know if I saw him more often 😉 .