ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, January 9, 1997 TAG: 9701100002
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-9 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: TOM TAYLOR
ACCORDING to a recent statement by Pope John Paul II, he now believes Darwin's theory of evolution is scientifically sound as long as the creation process is attributed to God. For one who has long admired the pope for his courageous stands for the truth, it was upsetting, indeed, to see him endorse evolution, which I believe to be the ultimate lie.
But then I began to wonder, what if he - and many other Christians - are right? What if God did use evolution to create the species? What difference would it make anyway?
The scene was in heaven. After millions upon millions of years and countless trips to the divine drawing board, the Lord at last succeeded in simultaneously evolving male and female homo sapiens from a population of exceptional apes. So elated that he virtually danced about the heavenly throne, he pointed them out to Gabriel.
"Look down there in Eden," he said. "See how they walk upright so easily! They don't scratch under their arms, and thank goodness that cranial ridge is finally gone! Yes, the mutations worked out perfectly this time. I was beginning to think we would never do it."
"So was I," murmured Gabriel under his breath.
"Now I will give them an immortal spirit and soul. I will call them mankind."
"Yes," said Gabriel. "And we must tell them who they are and where they came from!"
At this the Lord paused and his countenance fell. "Oh no," he said. "We can't tell them that! All those eons of evolution with the trial-and-error and those dead-end mutations all that cruel pain and death! When I think of what happened to those poor Neanderthals... "
He lowered his face into his hands. "I'm so ashamed of all that! No, we mustn't tell mankind of it. How would they ever believe I'm an all-powerful, all-loving, holy God?"
"That's a tough one all right," said Gabriel. Then the angel brightened. "Say, why don't you just tell them you did it all in six days! They'll really think you're omnipotent! And then," Gabriel went on, waxing truly creative, "when they fall into sin, tell them that the result and penalty for sin is death. They will think they are the ones who brought pain and death into the world instead of you."
"Hmmm, yes, I like that," said the Lord. "Six days! And blame the existence of suffering and death on sin! I suppose a little white lie after all these other mistakes wouldn't really matter... "
So that is what they did. And so, throughout history, those cultures that have had God's revealed word have believed he created the Earth in six days; and pain and death entered a perfect world only after man sinned.
Moses continued the deception when he recorded the Ten Commandments. "In six days the Lord created the heavens and earth," he wrote, "and the seventh day he rested." All mankind even adopted a seven-day week patterned after the Lord's creation week.
As for the existence of death in the world, the apostle Paul wrote in the book of Romans: "For by one man sin entered the world, and death by sin. And so death passed to all men, because all sinned." Boy, was he ever fooled.
Even Jesus believed it; and, thinking that death was the penalty for sin, he offered his own sinless life on a cross to pay that penalty for all mankind.
But then along came Darwin to rescue us from our ignorance. Oh sure, the idea of long ages of death and renewal had been floating around the human race for thousands of years, and formed the basis for many pagan religions. But Darwin used a bit of scientific observation before vaulting on to his hypothesis so, instead of a pagan religion, evolution became science. Then when no less an authority than the pope said it was true, well the game was up for the Lord.
Were men dismayed over the idea that God is cruel and inept; and they themselves were only descendants of worms, fish and apes? Not at all. In fact they welcomed the chance to take God down a peg or two. They decreed that evolution must be taught in schools throughout the land; and teaching children the evidence for a recent creation and flood was forbidden by law.
No, mankind was not at all dismayed. After all, he had always wanted to be his own god.
The reverie ended at this point, and a very depressing point it is until we remember that Jesus, the noble Son of God who gave his life, also did what no man has done before or since. He burst out of his grave, the conqueror of sin and death. In so doing he proved forever who is telling the truth about it all; and it isn't Darwin.
Tom Taylor of Roanoke is a bookkeeper for Norfolk Southern Corp.
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