General Chat

Hi Mandy, I agree with so much of what you say – particularly the being tolerant and accepting of others and their beliefs. However, that does not mean that I can agree with their beliefs. More than that, I believe that the Bible is the Word of God and the only way by which we can know Jesus Christ and receive salvation from the judgment we deserve for our sins. Can I therefore, choose not to talk about this most important part of life? Taking Muslims as an example – I respect their right to worship Allah as they see fit. I respect their right to dress as they think is appropriate. But I do not believe that they are right in worshipping Allah. He is a false god. Some will say that I myself am an extremist – but consider… If a friend of mine has a terrible disease but does not know it – and I know of the disease AND of a cure….how will they view me if I allow them to keep suffering under it. If I am ‘tolerant’ then I will allow them to go on with the disease, not knowing that it is slowly killing them. Or I could cause them great distress and possible offense by telling them that they have the disease but that there is a marvelous cure. What must I do in that situation? Society today would tell me to keep quiet. Society is going mad. Kind regards, William

Hi Julie, as far as I'm aware, ID is not taught as fact. Evolution is. That's the problem. William

I have never been taught evolution as fact, and my children have not either. It has been presented as a theory as far as I know, and that is at an ordinary state school. They have also been taught about all the major world religions, which I think is quite correct. Liz

Evolution makes sense,Adam and eve does not!! I do believe in God I also think you can believe in God and evolution!!

Evolution was not taught as fact to me at school (and I'm 21). Classes were free to argue for intelligent design/alien prison colony as long as they could get a decent argument in an essay. Evolution is a perfectly valid theory and is probably in the right area, although it needs further investigation. However, there's not essentially a conflict between it and ID; couldn't the Designer create the Universe and then let it evolve, rather than stagnate? The effects of evolution take many generations to become apparent, but if you happen to study fruit flies or bacteria, they're more obvious. All species appear suited to their environment, because those which fit best do better than those which just muddle along. Do you know why so many TB bacteria are resistant to antibiotics? It's because even 50 years ago, penicillin etc only killed 99% of the germs That 1% were naturally unaffected and continued to reprooduce every 20 minutes. After an hour, one bacterium has become 8 and they are all unaffected by the antibiotic. Nowadays, it's hard to find a TB bacterium that is killed by the antibiotic, because they're all descended from those tough little blighters of 50 years ago! They might look like they're perfectly suited to live in a penicilin-rich environment, but they were once the freaks - the fittest who survived. It proves that forms of life do change quite drastically, they do mutate and they do evolve different characteristics over time.

Back to Charles Darwin for a moment - given the society he lived in and the pressure that there would have been on him to 'conform' it's not outside the bounds of possiblity that even if he did renounce his theories on his death bed - disputed but possible - that he did so out of fear, and was simply 'hedging his bets'. The pressure to 'make his peace with God' so that he stood a chance of going to heaven must have been enormous.

Just as the opponents of Galileo found it hard to believe the earth wasn't the centre of the universe, so mankind finds it hard to believe that people aren't the centre of the universe so they tend to believe either man is the centre of the universe and was created by God or some other supreme Being or man is the result of evolution which was planned but its like history. History isn't how things are meant to be, its how they are. William the Conqueror could have been defeated at the Battle of Hastings. Conversely, Adolf Hitler could have invaded Britain. We just assume that what happened was destined. But as far as I can tell from Bill Bryson's 'A Short History of Almost Everything' the universe seems to exist to allow bacteria to go forth and multiply and humans are just one of many hosts to these amazing life forms. nell

Intelligent Design makes a lot of sense ....... to the unintelligent. len

The US government is spending millions of dollars searching space for non random radio signals from space, as they believe that if they are non random, it denotes intelligence. Why then, when they look at nature and see amazing design in EVERYTHING, do they say it is random? Some years ago an evolutionist said on Radio 4 science programme that Evolution was impossible, but he had to believe it , because there was no alternative. So we see that evolution is a belief. About the same time another evolutionist said 'If evolution was true it would break every known law.' No-one has seen evolution at work. No-one has seen any of the processes that form rocks, gullies, canyons etc. Not until about 30 years ago, when Mount St Helens in Washington state erupted. Canyons formed in days. Rocks were formed that had an apparent age of up to 2 million years, sunken forests were formed and buried and many other examples of instant ageing. If anyone is interested you may read about it in the following web pages (remove brackets). http://www.evangelical-times(.)org/articles/may05/may05a08.htm http://www.evangelical-times(.)org/articles/may05/may05a07.htm http://www.evangelical-times(.)org/articles/may05/may05a09.htm http://www.evangelical-times(.)org/articles/may05/may05a10.htm Incidentally, some one mentioned George Bush as a Christian extremist. George Bush has announced that the US would aid the rebuilding of the bombed mosque. He has done no such thing with some Churches that were bombed recently in Alabama. David

An extract 'The May 1980 eruption of Mt St Helens may not have been the most destructive in recorded history, but it has left an unsurpassed legacy that challenges some firmly-held geological dogmas. 'Processes that were thought to require thousands of years — deposition of strata, erosion of landscapes, burial and fossilisation of upright trees, and the production of peat layers — were found to have occurred catastrophically in days and weeks. 'If this happened on the relatively small scale of Mt St Helens, it is easy to imagine what would have happened during the global catastrophe of the Genesis Flood. 'Clearly, the millions of years usually assigned to the formation of geological strata are highly questionable. The Bible’s description of a young creation and a recent global Flood can thus be totally trusted.' Andrew Snelling BSc (Hons), PhD (Geology)

The earth is flat. The sun and stars revolve round the earth. The earth is 6.400 years old. Man was created in God's image. And the rib that God had taken from man was made woman. And woman took the fruit of the tree that was in the garden (well she would, wouldn't she) and they bit into it. Moses was 120 years old when he died(checked with Ancestry. com) But Enos lived 905 years. Methuselah made 969 years, mostly begatting, then he died And God looked upon the earth and behold, it was corrupt. So he flooded it. Intelligent design

But if there was a flood that covered even the highest peaks, where did all the water go? Even if every single glacier melted, there wouldn't be enough to cover everything. Was it freshwater or saltwater, and how did fish used to one survive in the other? And where did it all go to after? It couldn't have re-frozen into ice-caps within such a short time-frame, and if it had all evapourated the humidity must have been permanently through the roof and the clouds blacker than night.

Darwin's theory is sometimes misunderstood to mean that Life is continually trying to improve itself. Actually it neans that some mutations are better adapted to survive in the prevailing conditions. It has been discovered that many factors during a woman's pregnancy can have an effect on the genetic structure of the child, including what she eats. It does seem strange to me, as someone has previously stated, that there are not more living links with our predecessors as we would expect the mutations to still be continuous. Or perhaps something happened in Africa some hundreds of thousands of years ago which affected the children of a particular tribe of primates and bingo Homo Erectus! And since then that particular series of effects has never recurred. As to God, I keep an open mind, always remembering the old discussion between a Protheist and an Atheist which ended with the Protheist saying 'I have lived a pretty good life and done harm to nobody. I have enjoyed myself and when I die, if there is nothing (as you believe) what have I lost? If, on the other hand, you, who have lived an equally enjoyable but Godless life, are wrong. What have you lost?' On the other hand, are our Geneticists and Roboticists not trying to recreate intelligent life? Maybe God was a Bio-Geneto-Scientist a million years ago on this planet, and he designed us because he knew that his race's life forms were not going to survive the forthcoming climatic and geological changes. Maybe our legacy to the world which we may yet destroy would be a new strain of bacteria with our genepool curled up inside it.

Some people seem to misunderstand who God is. The following is God speaking through the prophet Isaiah, where he says exactly who He is: Isaiah chapter 44 24 Thus saith the LORD, thy redeemer, and he that formed thee from the womb, I am the LORD that maketh all things; that stretcheth forth the heavens alone; that spreadeth abroad the earth by myself; Isaiah chapter 45. 5 ¶ I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me: I girded thee, though thou hast not known me: 6 That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the LORD, and there is none else. 7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things. 8 Drop down, ye heavens, from above, and let the skies pour down righteousness: let the earth open, and let them bring forth salvation, and let righteousness spring up together; I the LORD have created it. 12 I have made the earth, and created man upon it: I, even my hands, have stretched out the heavens, and all their host have I commanded. 18 For thus saith the LORD that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it; he hath established it, he created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited: I am the LORD; and there is none else. 19 I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth: I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain: I the LORD speak righteousness, I declare things that are right. 21 Tell ye, and bring them near; yea, let them take counsel together: who hath declared this from ancient time? who hath told it from that time? have not I the LORD? and there is no God else beside me; a just God and a Saviour; there is none beside me. 22 Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else. God is speaking most of this to the Persian king, Cyrus. The Amazing thing is that Cyrus was named in these chapters about 150 years before he was born. Oh, and who is included in the “ends of the earth”, but us. David

I think it's quite possible to believe in both God and evolution, although not neccessarily the standard theories for both. I believe that the world was probably created by God and that we, like everything else, have evolved. I think it's quite blinkered to deny that evolution has occurred at all because we know that we are not the same as we were 1000s of years ago. My belief in God is different from some of the beliefs that have been posted here. My faith rarely wavers but I don't believe that the Bible is the word of God. It was written by many different people with their own beliefs which reflected the time in which they lived - hence the amount of contradiction from book to book (and sometimes even within the same books) and from the Old Testament to the New Testament. I also don't believe that the God of the Bible is the only god. I respect others' religions and see them as different interpretations of a higher being. Although I'm C of E, I certainly don't think that my religion is the only way to heaven. If it was it would be rather empty given that my religion is less than 600 years old. The saints (being Catholic) and the Apostles (being Jews) presumably wouldn't be there if the road to Heaven was only through the Church of England. I think it's very arrogant to assume that we know God better than anyone else. Anyone who believes in any higher being has their own relationship with that higher being and who is anyone to say that their belief is above someone else's? Personally, I'm very contented with what I believe and don't feel the need to argue it or to use quotations from anyone or anything to defend what I think - apologies if this offends anyone who has done that. But I'm happy to state my case. I don't see why anyone has to believe in their God OR an evolution when it seems clear to me that both are likely:)

David,I agree with you 100%:-))

One question. If the world was created in 6 days, how much of that time was spent meticulously creating layers in the earths crust that APPEAR to be billions of years old, rather than a few thousand as the bible implies ? Oh and planting those dinosaur bones/neanderthal man, just to confuse us.

Paul,What an excellent question!!:-))

Hi Paul. I asked some creationist friends that very question and they told me the devil planted fossils to fool gullible man. There's no answer to that really. Gwynne

Gwynne, no there isn't is there, I'm sure someone will find one in the bible though. I have read the bible, when I was younger. There's some good stuff in there, I can see its appeal - I especially liked the bit where someone got turned into a pilar of salt.