Why Having the Bible and Creationism in Schools Is a Bad Thing!

Kudos to @Cristina Chance for inspiring this post!

 I have good reason for my opposition to teaching the Bible in schools, despite being a Christ-follower. It's a great sentiment, but it's only going to still up trouble. It's better than banning atheism (which would only create more pro-atheism sentiment), but still, they have to consider the social ramifications of their actions. That, and to be honest, I'm not pro-Old Testament, there's a lot of racism, war-mongering, nationalism, and other hateful crap. I'm pro-New Testament, and particularly pro-Gospels, but even then I don't think it should be taught in schools. A lot of parents don't want their children to read the Bible, and I know a lot of friends who have Christian parents and hated the Bible being forced down their throats. The Bible may be a good thing, but it should be shared lovingly, not integrated into something as broad as the public school system, that's what private school is for.

"It's also an elective so it's not mandatory" Well that is a relief (this helps prevent anti-sentiment backlash!) but it still encourages an approach to the Bible that no one (to my knowledge) who wrote the Bible intended: as a source of knowledge. The Bible has some great knowledge and insights in it, and can be a great source of historical knowledge and commentary, but it was originally intended as a collection of letters, written to various people to help them with their various roles in God's plan for them /etc.. While such a function could be made possible in a public school course, It's more likely that especially in light of the inevitable clash between Creationists and Evolutionists, such an approach to the Bible will be lost in translation even if it is used to teach the Bible.

Creationists will claim that the creation story / various reference of the Bible prove that God created the world, and evolutionists will claim the Bible is outdated and fallacious and that the theory of Evolution isn't just a theory, that it's backed by a mountain of evidence and is a rigorous science. The Bible being taught in schools will almost certainly generate controversy, and has more often than not been misused as a propaganda machine for people (such as teachers) to insert their own bias, commentary, and interpretation of what the Bible means into their material. So even for Christians and Bible lovers, this is a lose-lose situation, because even if the Bible is taught in its proper context (letters written to men and women of God, etc.), there is still a very high potential for abuse and bad odds of the Bible not being abused. I think this is a case of people looking at the potential benefits of the Bible being taught in schools (more awareness of God and his love for us), without looking at the many drawbacks and consequences of such. Sure is sounds like a great idea, but like many other great ideas (like that wonderful revolutionary idea "Communism"), some things are only great theoretically.

I don't personally agree with the theory of evolution, with its "evolved by accident" and "survival of the fittest" egocentric paradigms, although I do believe in the world evolving in God's image from a pattern he set in place, in a chaos theory/fractal fashion. I also have good reason to believe that the creation story actually supports my evolutionary beliefs more than traditional creationism. 

But the problem with creationism being promoted by Christians as an alternative to evolution (or vice versa) is that they're not compatible: to begin with, the foundation is different- Creationism is based on Faith, while Evolution is based on fact. To quote Paul, "Faith is the essence of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." By contrast, all of natural science is based on empirical observation, which is based entirely and things that are seen. So really when people try to argue one over the other, they are completely missing the point. It's comparing apples and oranges. Evolution is supported by empirical evidence, and even if that evidence is only currently correlative when it comes to the evolution of man, it still is taken a lot more seriously by scientists than Creationism for obvious reasons: it's based on fact. Creationism is not, and so is naturally seen as nothing more than a stumbling block to reason, which most scientists view as faith's natural enemy (more accurately though, its faith's natural opposite and together these two forces promote Balance!

So the big problem with Creationists comparing their beliefs to evolution, is that you can't convincingly argue faith with facts- not only is this counterintuitive, but it makes Creationist arguments inherently fallacious and thus self-defeating. When Creationists try to present their arguments of biblical creation by using the Bible as a historical precedent and prophesy as proof of intelligent design, they more often than not alienate non-believers and make fools of themselves. Not only that, but they also prove that they themselves are completely missing the point, by presenting their faith in such a way that implies that it needs to be proved. If you have so great of faith, why do you have the need to justify your beliefs in the eyes of others. If there is no doubt in your mind, why should you have anything to prove? 

When Creationists defend their beliefs so desperately and using such un-faith like methods, I have to wonder if they themselves doubt their faith. Why else would they need to defend their beliefs with something so spiritually inferior and sophistic as facts? Shouldn't Faith-filled Christians be above that rubbish? I don't think there really is any valid reason for anyone who's beliefs are based faith to try to justify them with facts, and even if there was, faith and reason are so different in their nature that trying to justify one with the other is just asking for trouble!