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December 10 - December 16, 2023
In the heyday of the scientific method, evangelicals spurned science, chose emotion over reason, and set the movement on a path of anti-intellectualism.
An education in isolation provides no opportunity for scholarship in science to inform theology. It is no surprise, then, that evolution denial and a young earth are the norm in evangelical Bible colleges, preaching schools, and seminaries. The price we pay is perpetuating anti-intellectual, antiscience mindsets in our leaders, teachers, pastors, and preachers.
When evangelicals declared war on evolution, they set a course for science denial in the modern age.
If Genesis is read as a literal scientific and historical account of beginnings, we immediately have a problem with modern genetics, biology, chemistry, physics, and geology.
And in the twenty-first century, when faced with discerning other elements of the natural world like climate and disease, evangelicals are suspicious of the evidence and suspicious of the experts. We’ve been conditioned: when in doubt or when something challenges long-held beliefs, the true Christian rejects the intellect and elevates faith.
It is no secret that self-identified conservatives, Republicans, and supporters of President Trump disproportionately resisted COVID restrictions. It is also no secret that evangelicals are disproportionately conservatives, Republicans, and supporters of President Trump.
In the first century, they knew we were Christians by our love. In the twenty-first century, they’ll know we are Christians by our fight for rights.
And what do you get when you mix religion with politics? You get politics.
If someone objects to the science of climate change, it is likely for a reason that is not a scientific reason.
For many evangelicals, human-caused climate warming is not only hooey; it’s downright unbiblical.
Just as an ancient earth is essential in explaining evolution, an ancient earth is essential in explaining climate change. If your theology demands a literal reading of the first eleven chapters of Genesis, you might have a problem with both areas of science.
Evangelicals have been told that secular scientists’ interpretations of climate data cannot be trusted because they are made with the assumption of a billions-of-years-old earth. If the earth is only six-to-ten thousand years old, how can scientists possibly know what the climate was like fifty thousand years ago?
Like the evangelicals who resisted COVID vaccines, masking, and gathering precautions, climate science deniers refuse to be “controlled” by fear. God is sovereign, so we throw caution to the wind. Faith over fear in a time of pandemic, faith over fear as the planet heats up.
For some evangelicals, addressing global warming is as futile as mopping the deck of the Titanic. We’ve all read the end of the book. We know what happens. It’s all gonna burn.
For many evangelicals, the future of the planet is irrelevant. End-times theology sets our sights on the next world, not the present. We simply pass through this life and let the chips fall where they may. Just ask John MacArthur: “God intended us to use this planet to fill this planet for the benefit of man. Never was intended to be a permanent planet. It is a disposable planet. Christians ought to know that.”
The late John Walvoord, a renowned dispensationalist at the seminary, approached climate science denial from a different angle: God wants us to have all those fossil fuels. In fact, God wants us to burn them.21 According to Walvoord, it’s all in preparation for the end-times. God divinely created massive oil fields in the Middle East, just where they need to be for the coming battles of Armageddon.
It used to be, says Douglas, that conservatives were in favor of conserving. Apparently, conserving-conservatism doesn’t apply to the planet.
The fact is, says Hayhoe, we fear the solutions more than we fear the impact of global warming. We fear solutions will limit our personal freedoms or lower the quality of our lives. We fear more government regulation. Impacts of global warming, on the other hand, are either far away in the future or far away in another country. My truck is in my driveway, right now.
Solution aversion makes it easier to dismiss or deny scientific evidence. If we deny the science, we don’t feel like a bad person for failing to act. If we accept the science, we feel obligated to do something about it.
When climate change entered our evangelical consciousness, who were the messengers? It was the same pointy-headed scientists who have been on the other side of the fence regarding evolution, the age of the earth, and a global flood. And when COVID entered the picture, infectious disease scientists were standing right there with them. We know what scientists do. Scientists hide evidence. Scientists massage the data. Skeptics are silenced. Culture war, fear, rights, freedoms—we’ve been through it all before. In climate science denial, we sing the third verse of a familiar song. The climate
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We can choose to look away, but the earth is not flat, the climate is warming, evolution is real, and the scientific method works.
The culture warriors tell us that evolution is causing atheism. Quite the opposite—the denial of evolution and other aspects of science is shipwrecking faith.
White evangelicals are the least likely of all religious demographic groups to be vaccinated for COVID. Drilling down into the rationale behind vaccine refusal reveals a troubling trend. White evangelicals are also the religious demographic least likely to consider the health of their community in making a vaccination decision.
Fighting evolution perverted our approach to science. We are conditioned to distrust the experts. We are comfortable having our own facts and standing against the consensus. We listen to comforting, familiar voices, so we don’t worry about it. God’s in control. Faith over fear. Our culture wars are killing people and wrecking faith.
In an evangelical culture where politics and faith converge and flow together, acceptance of science comes with a cost. Economic costs, curtailed freedoms, the disapproval of those in your church—all are possible.
In the case of evolution, there is a cognitive price to pay. Accepting the evidence for evolution means releasing long-held beliefs about biblical inerrancy.
It means accepting that parts of the Bible can be truth without being literally, historicall...
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As Christians, we are called to truth. Speaking it. Defending it. Living it. Why be afraid of science? If God is truth, all truth is God’s truth, including scientific truth.
