This is the much-needed counterpoint to WildestBill’s thread in which he asks people if evolution turned them away from God. So:
Does the existence of “creation science” make you less likely to be a Christian? Did it turn you away from Christianity?
In my case it definitely did so, if only indirectly. A big part of the reason I left Christianity is because I got sick of all the lies and hypocrisy, and creationism is, of course, part and parcel of that.
-Ben
Creationism wasn’t my biggest problem with Creationism. The moral problems with most forms Christianity are enough to turn me off before the scientific problems.
That second Creationism should be Christianity. I’m just a damned tool.
Hypocrisy. That was it. Creationism had nothing to do with it, since at the time I made the decision, I’d never actually met anyone other than Jehovah’s Witnesses who believed in the Genesis story.
The SDMB and the constant battling over Creationism here has come as a bit of a shock.
Back when I considered myself a Christian I always believed that God created the earth and he created whatever forces were needed to start evolution. I never believed that the story of Adam and Eve was anything other than fiction. A story created to help people in a less scientific time understand sin? where people came from? how cruel God is?
that snakes can talk? Who knows, I can rarely tell what the hell point anyone’s trying to get across in these Bible stories.
Questions about when or how humans arrived on Earth did not affect my faith in any way. If I had ever belonged to a religion that really insisted that everyone believe in Creationism it could have been more of a deciding factor for me.
Nothing turned me away from Christianity. I am simply unable to accept on faith even the most basic tenants of that religion.
Never have I thought of Creationists as representative of Christians or Christianity. This is because of my constant exposure to remarkable people who happen to be admirably sensible Christians.
The Tim: Your mistake gave me a good excuse for a chuckle.
Creationism doesn’t put me off Creationism – it’s the bloody Creationists!
heeheeheehee!!
[sub]I’m far too easily amused.[/sub]
Creationism had (and has) nothing to do with my decision to leave Christianity. Most Christian Creationists, OTOH… :rolleyes:
No Christians I grew up with believed Creationism, so that certainly had little effect on my beliefs.
It was just the whole package that was hard to swallow. Way too arbitrary. If Jesus was God, what exactly was he killing himself for again? And what kind of supreme being gives a crap about things like gay sex, eating beef but not pork, sacrificing animals, etc. If that’s all for real, then it’s time to start searching for God’s God and establishing a court of appeals.
Speaking as a game designer, I’m always struggling to get my AI-driven NPCs to have personalities of their OWN, not to just blindly follow my rules. I think it’s awesome when they innovate and totally surprise me, and I’ve got to hope that if there’s really a God out there, he feels the same way, preferring his creations to think for themselves and amuse him with the novelty!
If I really believed that Creationism was synonymous with Christianity- and there seem to be plenty of Christians who insist that it is- then yes it would turn me off.
Fundamentalists detract from Christianity, IMHO.
Dunderheaded views such as blind belief in Genesis certainly put me off evangelical Christianity, as that seems to be the branch upon which most Biblical literalists reside.
For the rest, within Christianity can be found some reasonable moral guidelines, but I happily reserve my free will to accept or reject those aspects that come across as pointless, silly or just plain wrong.
When I quit religion when I was 12, it was purely cause of how stupid I felt it was. (note, that’s just a personal opinion I had when I was 12, it’s not an attack on anyone’s beliefs)
Since then, anytime I’ve become involved in any sort of discussion on christianity the person always seems to have a creationist viewpoint. I don’t know if that’s because I’m surrounded by creationists or because creationists are the sort to start such conversations (I suspect the latter - proper christians are more of the live-and-let-live variety, pretty much by definition).
The attempt to present the Bible as literally and historically accurate and as the divine Word of God is part of fundamentalist Christianity. It is not the only way people can draw understanding and benefit from the scriptures and it is not a central idea within all denominations.
I grew up in a Pentecostal Church of God congregation. That is very evangelical, fundamentalist sect. Creationism as part of the fundamentalist view in totality did lead me to reject Christianity for many years.
However, age and deeper understanding (at least I hope I’ve gained some wisdom over time) have led me to realize that are spiritual nuggets within the Bible. It just takes a little mining to get to them sometimes. However, the Bible is not the exclusive source of spiritual wisdom.
Although I attend a Christian church, I don’t self-identify myself as Christian. I think that is partly because I don’t want to use a term for myself that the FCs of the world use for themselves. I am afraid the word “Christian” has become so tainted by the fundamentalists that someone will associate me with them by the use of the label.
For me, the entire debate has been interesting to follow as a course in science methodology, not much else.
S. Norman
Strangely enough, Creationism, or Creationists either, have not turned me off to Christianity. (This is news? :rolleyes: )
On the other hand, the insistence that “this is a mandatory piece of the pie, to be believed despite evidence pointing to the contrary” is the hallmark of people with self-imposed blinders – and a demand that one not use the brain one has devoted to God’s service. Ergo, I get very frustrated with that POV. As evidenced by my recent “Wild Bill hiccup” over in the Pit. 
To be frank, I am a Creationist in the dictionary use of the term (y’listenin’, Gaspode?). I believe in the existence of a God Who created everything.
However, I’m firmly convinced that the Universe He created gives firm evidence of the techniques He used in doing that Creation, e.g., the Big Bang, inflationary early-cosmology, phylogenetic evolution, etc.
For the record, which I’m beginning to sound like a broken one of on this topic, Genesis 1 is a myth. A reading of Joseph Campbell or any of Freyr’s posts or my own on the topic would make it clear we’re not speaking of truth value but literary genre. It’s a simplistic account of God’s work useful for drumming home the essential facts the author of that chapter felt to be important: God created. By His Word. In sequence. And called it good. The whole thing is wrapped in a repetitive stylistic device reminiscent of the Three Bears – just as you know that whatever Goldilocks finds is gonna come in threes, with the parent bears’ possessions too much one way or the other, but the baby bear’s thing being just right – and if you’ve ever read that to a preschooler, you know how much fun they have reciting that bit along with you – so you know that when the author gets to the Tyrannosaurus, he’s gonna say, “And on the Nth day, God said, ‘Let there be tyrannosaurs,’ And there were tyrannosaurs. And God saw the tyrannosaurs, that they were good, and the evening and the morning were the Nth day.” The six-days bit was an attempt by the (Jewish) author to stress the importance of the Sabbath, by making it an essential element of Creation. If Chaim or Zev or Izzy wanders in, they can speak to that issue, because it’s of vital importance to Judaism then and now. The point to having the story take six days was not to describe how long God took in doing creation – He could have wrapped the whole thing up in a nanosecond if He chose – but to make clear that the Sabbath was an integral part of what He created.
Sidebar for a joke:
“You know, God didn’t create the world in six days.”
“No? What did He do, then?”
“Well, he goofed off for five and a half, and then pulled an all-nighter.”
And, JFTR, most major denominations of Christianity do not expect adherence to the six-day literalist interpretation – even the SBC and Assemblies of God don’t require it, although many of their leaders believe it, and the Episcopalians, Methodists, Lutherans, and a number of others find the advocacy of the theory by outspoken conservative Christians to be an embarrassment to their attempt to focus on commitment to God as known through Jesus, and fulfillment of His expectations to the creation He entrusted us with and to one’s fellow man. And that, IMHO, is the point to be stressed by anyone who calls himself or herself Christian, not an attempt to sell some particular interpretation of a Bible passage.
I was reading my son abook the other night.
The story was about a grasshopper who was taking a walk.
He came upon some beetles who were holding up signs saying Morning Rules! We Love Morning!
Grasshopper said he loved morning too, so they made hima member of their club.
Then, however, he mentioned he also liked afternoon and evening.
The beetles fell silent, and became angry; how dare he! then threw him out of their club casue he ddin’t beleive exactly like they did.
I realized this was a good analogy of christianity.
This is true. It seems that people at the top of the power structures of Christianity have twisted those guidelines to their own purposes at different times during history, The Spanish Inquisition being just one example.
Creationism doesn’t turn me off to Christianity. I find the abuse of power within its ranks, and of most other organized religions, to be a big turn-off. And I can’t, in all honesty, say that I can believe in an unseen deity even if there were no such abuses.
A belief in Creationism has nothing to do with religion. It has to do with fear. It’s all about not liking the idea that the universe is too big and complex to directly comprehend. So instead you package it up in a little box called Genesis, or whatever creation myth works for you, and call it reality.
It’s not about Christianity, Islam, Judaism, or any other religion specifically. It’s about being scared of the dark.
There are fundementalists of all stripes, sadly. Within, and without Christianity. Ya might even find some naturalist fundementalists…
So in reading this thread, and Wild Bill’s thread with the contra POV. CvE debates do little to hinder or gather Christians.
Fascinating…
**
Of course there are. But the question of the moment is what turns people off from Christianity. Anyway, it’s not like the President is a Wiccan fundamentalist ranting about how Christianity isn’t a real religion…
On the contrary, it appears to me that many of the replies run like this:
Creationism wasn’t an issue because I hadn’t heard of it while I was a Christian. (Clearly this doesn’t mean that CvE “does little to hinder or gather,” since creationism wasn’t present to play a role.)
Creationism per se doesn’t turn me away, but fundamentalist stupidity and hypocrisy does. (Since creationism is one arena where fundamentalists act like stupid hypocrites, clearly it plays a role.)
Creationism doesn’t bother me, but creationists do. (I think that the interpretation of this one is rather obvious, and it conflicts with your conclusion.)
One might well ask, “Would you be more likely to be a Christian if there were no Evidence that Demands a Verdict, no Satanic conspiracy theories, and no creationism? Would you be more likely to be a Christian if fundies didn’t claim that atheists have no morals and that existentialism means ‘you only live once, so party hard’? Would you be more likely to be a Christian if fundamentalists generally valued freedom of speech and religion, and were intelligent enough to understand SOCAS?”
-Ben