Does evolution conflict with christianity?

Question

I got into a bit of an argument with a friend. He's a creationists and I'm a Christian that believes in evolution.

He doesn't really think I'm a Christian because I believe in it. Is it scripturally accurate to say people who believe in evolution can't be Christian?

Answer 1

I'm a christian too, and I believe evolution is true, but it doesn't matter to me anyway. God made everyone and everything, and how he did it just doesn't matter to me. He's the creator - I'm just the creation. I lean not on my own understand, but acknowledge God in all things. Proverbs 3: 5-6

Answer 2

I think the one thing that alot of you are missing is that God did NOT write The Bible, man did. Genesis is not a biogrpahical depiction of how God actually made the universe and everything in it. From what I've read, most scholars and theologians worth anything will say one of two things about the Old Testament; It is either A.) Man trying to understand and explain things that in the time it was written were unexplainable by reason or logic alone, or that B.) The Old Testament is just a guide. It's a collection of folk tales, setting examples of how one should lead their life.

To believe literally what is written in the OT is actually kind of foolish. For example, if the entire human race was born of just two people, the world would be awash in genetically abnormal humans due to inbreeding, and the species as a whole would have died out years and years ago, the same with all the animals that were supposedly on Noah's Ark.

So, is it possible that God used evolution to spark humanity? Definately. Is it the only answer? Of course not.

Lastly, I'd just like to put in my own opinion, and it's this; for anyone to argue that their own ideas about God are the ONLY answers is just plain ridiculous. No one can know with 100% certainty what God has planned. So to tell someone they are wrong for their beliefs, or persecute them for their ideas, is foolish and ignorant.

Answer 3

If you are a Christian who believes in evolution, do you think the Genesis account is a lie? Why would God not have told us the truth?

Evolution's only function is to provide a scenario for life on earth without God. There is no evidence for evolution. If creation by God were an established fact, would anyone still cling to the idea that God was lying to us? I don't think so.

Evolution is at the core of Marxism and Naziism. The Communists teach class struggle and the Nazis promote racial superiority. It is really an evil belief, aside from being unscientific.

Answer 4

Depends. Normally I'd say no problem, but in another question today someone brought up a good point: If there was no Adam and Eve and no fall, what is the point of salvation?

Granted, I'm not a Christian, and the original sin doctrine has dodgy origins at best, but I thought that was a rather interesting angle to consider.

Though, then again: People who live in third world countries and are brought Christianity by missionaries aren't necessarily going to be able to read the whole Bible, say if literacy is low in the area and so on. If they miss a doctrine, or find it and don't believe in it in the "accepted" way, are they not saved?

Answer 5

I am not very religious, but I had a priest explain your question to me once and it made sense... the Judo-Christian God created the world in 7 days, right? (I know, 6 days plus one resting, really) but why would we think God defines a day as 24 hours? That's our arbitrary creation. For God, a "day" might be 24 million years. You can do a lot of evolving in 24 million years, times 6 "days." Also, the whole people used to be monkeys is erroneous. We have common ancestors but we did not evolve from primates. Check out this link. If it doesn't work, search for "timeline of evolution." It is really interesting.

I understand Christianity to be those people who believe in God and Jesus. I didn't know there was a caveat for evolution. I think your friend is taking a narrow and slightly pompous view of Christianity.

I've found that creationists and many (not all, but many) deeply Christian people are not open to scientific notions of humanity.

Answer 6

It depends on which Christians you ask. Francis Collins, head of the human genome project and a Christian, believes in evolution.
Evolution seems like an odd way for God to bring about life, and of course, it is in conflict with the Genesis account of how God brought life into being. If evolution is true, why doesn't God say so in the Bible? If evolution is true, why do we have the story of a man and a woman in a garden?

Answer 7

Evolution and Creationism/theism (that includes Christianity) are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

Now... Intelligent Design and Evolution are another story.

I'm pretty sure though, that believing in Jesus means you cannot believe in Evolution. This is because Jesus is linked to Adam and Eve who are said to be the first humans in the world and ate from the tree of knowledge and whose story does not fit with Evolution.

Answer 8

As long as you aren't a literalist, evolution meshes nicely with Christianity.

Very few serious people exist who still believe that God literally created the world in 7 exact days, some 4,000 years ago. Most Christian scientists believe that the Genesis tale is a metaphor - can you imagine trying to explain evolution to the Hebrews 3,000 years ago? What a headache! Most Americans still don't get it, and we're got microwave ovens! ;)

Answer 9

No, there is no conflict for the educated Christian. The trouble is that most have never been exposed to seminary level studies of the Bible and have been taught by well-meaning pastors and Sunday school teachers you've never been fully taught the history of our Bible. Everyone seems to want to filter ancient biblical texts through present-day culture, which is not proper Bible study techniques. As a minister who has been taught to study in-depth the historical context of the Genesis creation story, I understand that its writing was not a literal explanation of God's creation. It was more about contrasting the multiple pagan gods of Babylon against the Hebrew belief in the one God of Israel, Yahweh. Near-Eastern culture taught metophorically because it was primarily an illiterate society. Genesis was a story that offered the Jews hope of deliverance from Babylonian slavery and oppression. To align Genesis with the literal order of creation and apply a specific science methodology from it is to entirely miss the point of Genesis.

Answer 10

Not in the least.
There are many Christians who seem to feel that God has covered every detail in inspiring the Torah and the New Testament to be written and translated, but I feel that to be a little purposefully foolish. There are details that are unimportant to the message, so for me, the bible is a book written by men covering the vast general things that encapsulate the message. The details of the message are far more important than all the little details of existence, and if you look at the sequence in Genesis, it agrees with the evolutionary sequence from lack of life to man.