Let’s offer a word of congratulation to PJ Media and its assistant editor Tyler O’Neil. His article up today is “4 Reasons Christians Can Believe in Evolution.” As a non-Christian who has surveyed a fair amount of Christian thinking about evolution, I worry when I see a headline like that. I would anticipate no less trouble from an article titled “4 Reasons Jews Can Believe in Evolution.”
What you expect is a very partial and superficial presentation of relevant science and theology, likely in the service of ill-concealed axe-grinding, with a dash of patronizing acknowledgements that the whole subject can be “threatening” to believers. But O’Neil surprised me. He solicited the views of theistic evolutionists (Kathryn Applegate and Jim Stump, editors of a new book from BioLogos, How I Changed My Mind About Evolution: Evangelicals Reflect on Faith and Science), intelligent design advocates (Stephen Meyer and Jay Richards), and a Young Earth Creationist pastor. I don’t know if theistic evolutionists and YEC folks would agree on this, but I discern no hint of axe-grinding. What a novel approach.
O’Neil understands the basic issues, scientific and theological, including that the word “evolution” is ambiguous, with at least three major separate meanings. He gives his four reasons, but is also aware of scientific problems with the evidence for Darwinan theory as an adequate explanation for biological complexity and diversity, so that “while Christians can believe in evolution, they may not want to.” That is, they should not feel compelled to do so just out of respect for science, since the science is ambiguous.
He’s even aware of the upcoming Royal Society meeting, “New Trends in Evolutionary Biology,” that promises a major debate on the condition of neo-Darwinism (and which, incidentally, has now released its intriguing schedule of speakers). He gives what seems an unbiased presentation of the several different takes on the matter available to Christians, and evidently wished to give a fair shake to all.
His main conclusion is in favor of mutual respect of others holding divergent opinions. That is quite rare, and refreshing. I repeat, it would be no less so in a Jewish context, or an entirely secular one. Nice going, Mr. O’Neil!
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