Sim-O

Heresy Corner:

Creationism doesn’t come on its own. In that respect at least Michael Reiss was right: it’s part of an entire world view. It is merely one part of a much larger structure of fundamentalist belief. Belief in the literal truth of the Bible underpins it, of course: but so, too, does the whole scheme of salvation. Jesus died for the sins of mankind, goes the theory. This belief entails others: for example, that mankind is in a state of sin. Sin exists because of the Fall: Adam and Eve sinned, and that Original Sin has been transmitted to all succeeding generations. No Adam and Eve, no Garden of Eden, no Original Sin: no need for Jesus. Similarly with the “young earth”. Given that the creation, fall and redemption of man is (according to traditional doctrine) the whole point of the universe, then the idea that it is around 15 billion years old, whereas modern human beings have been around for about one hundred and fifty thousandth of that time, leads to problems of scale. Of course God, who can do all things, could have spent those billions of years twiddling his divine thumbs waiting for man to arrive; but contemplating the immensities of time and space tends to make the traditional religious narrative seem rather parochial.