How do you keep your religious beliefs intact while trying to accept biological facts like 'evolution'?

Question

What ways of thinking do you implement to achieve it?

Sorry, I shouldn't have used the word 'fact'... I meant 'concept'.

WHOA! Some people are a bit harsh. Okay, I was wrong to use the word 'FACT.' It doesn't have to be smacked into my face.

I meant 'CONCEPT.' :-)

To the others, thanks for giving time to answer my question! Keep 'em coming. :-)

Answer 1

Understand that everything need not be black or white. If the theory of evolution makes sense to you, then why not just believe that evolution is how God IS creating? You shouldn't be forced into this position where you are not allowed to question anything at all, or adapt the way you believe as facts become available. Remember, at one point people were jailed for thinking that the earth rotated around the sun, because they believed that it was blasphemy. (They insisted that everything revolved around the earth, because earth was where God chose to make life, and where His son lived. It was essentially the same type of argument, different day.) We now know for a fact that it isn't true, and Christianity has conceded it, and doesn't question it anymore. If people carry on unable to adapt, then Christianity will shatter when silly stubborn beliefs (that shouldn't really make a difference in whether or not you believe in God or Jesus) are proven wrong. If you believe in God, and you believe that Jesus is your savior, then what difference should it make whether or not humans came about through evolution or through "creationism"? Your faith should not be shaken by either result. Getting so bent out of shape at the idea of evolution vs Adam & Eve tells me that the person must have very shaky faith, that can crumble far too easily if little insignificant (in the grand scheme of things) stories that they grew up believing are proven wrong.

Answer 2

Evolution is the gathering of concepts and ideas in an attempt to "prove" God does not exist. How could He if you can prove His story of the earths beginning was false.

However, being a very analytically minded believer and follower of Jesus Christ, I take the statements made by people like "Centurion" to the extreme conclusion. If a day in creation was anything longer than what it actually states in the Bible for each day, "an evening and a morning were the ______ day", life could not have progressed. If there was a million years of separation between the flora (plants, trees, etc.) and fauna (animals, insects, etc.) all the plants would have died without seed germination. Evolutionists forget facts like that all the time, because "Pure Science" PROVES the theory of evolution to be false.

Answer 3

You should be proud of yourself for not opting to simply deny scientific facts, as so many others choose to. I'm not sure what to tell you. Personally, I don't have any religious beliefs. I'm a Maverick Knight (no, I'm not insane, it's a good, solid belief system), I acknowledge all possibilities. As possibilities, and nothing more. Keeping my certainty at a realistic level. But there very well could be a God. He's basically an interchangeable element. Logically and considering all available information, everything works just as well with or without God's existence. Who's to say that God didn't create us by setting the course of evolution? It's possible. And it's a possibility many favor, as a way of reconciling faith and facts.

Answer 4

If I can ignore all those laws in Leviticus about eating lobster, breeding hybrid corn, wearing a shirt woven of two kinds of thread (50% cotton, 50% polyester) and having two kinds of grass in my "pasture" (the one out front that I mow every Saturday), I can take the story of Genesis with a grain of salt.

The Lord may have created the universe by creating a set of laws and letting it unfold like a flower, or He may have built it piece by piece. Does it matter? Someone or other said the most important thing was to love thy neighbor as thyself. If you are doing that - being honest and loving, working for a better world - then the question of evolution fades.

As an example of a ridiculous question, who cares what color socks Jesus wore? Here is another r.q. - we're here. Unless you are a biologist, does it matter how we got here? Let the biologists argue. Every hour and every dollar you spend fighting or supporting evolution is a dollar and an hour you don't spend making the world a better place.

Those dollars and hours wouldn't matter if no child went to bed cold or hungry, if everyone had a home and if everyone had a decent-paying job and if everyone had all the education he/she wanted. Feed the hungry, teach the illiterate, shelter the homeless, comfort the hurt.

Answer 5

Evolution -- the theory -- is finite man's attempt to explain the infinite in terms that are familiar to him. Evolution - the religion, which neither accepts or allows for any deviation from its dogmas -- is just another absolute unquestioning belief that threatens excommunication/shunning to those who dare question its tenets -- kinda like baptists, or JW's, or other cults that try to control one's thoughts.

The first is understandable and should not be a threat to anyone's religious beliefs, The second is the same type of dangerous thinking that led to Copernicus being threatened with prison -- or the TV weather channel trying to define the limits of scientific study.

Answer 6

I have the same problem. What I have come to believe is that they are both connected. Just because there is evolution doesn't mean it wasn't God who created the world with evolution. Of course some parts I cannot accept : like the world begining from a bacteria? What is that? Beside that I don't see why God couldn't have created the world in a way of evolution.

Answer 7

Firstly, let me say that evolution is NOT a biological FACT,
it is instead a Scientific ASSUMPTION.

I keep my spiritual beliefs intact, because I do not agree with evolution for the mere FACT that it has never been proved to be a FACT my dear.

One cannot prove the fact of something which is an idea/assumption, evolution is one such idea. One would have to be able to have lived through myriads of lifetimes to in FACT know if evolution exists. This is because there are only records of ideas about the subject, and even though some adhere to those records of ideas ... they can only prove that it is a FACT that they were written. They can prove for a FACT that the person who wrote them or believed in evolution lived and had ideas about it. HOWEVER there is no proof for it, thus it can be labeled a fact BUT cannot be proven to be one. Even scientists will tell you that it is NOT a fact, but an educated GUESS.

AND ... Biology is the true knowledge of something, not an assumption. It is not something made up in someone's ideas, instead it is based on factual evidence provided. [There is NO factual evidence for evolution.]
Main Entry: bi·ol·o·gy
Pronunciation: bI-'ä-l&-jE
Function: noun
Etymology: German Biologie, from bi- + -logie -logy
1 : a branch of knowledge that deals with living organisms and vital processes
2 a : the plant and animal life of a region or environment b : the life processes especially of an organism or group; broadly : ECOLOGY
- bi·ol·o·gist /-jist/ noun

Blessings, Love & Wisdom,
Jewel

Answer 8

When evaluating any data from science whether tried and true or new and confusing, I ALWAYS start from the point of what God has said and revealed in His Word FIRST. For instance: God showed us in Genesis that He created each species in its order and then man. Now evolution teaches that change occurs between species (one species evolves into another species). But that is NOT what God said. So science in this case has misunderstood, misinterpreted or something. But it is wrong in this instance. So then I begin looking for understanding based on the fact that God is ALWAYS right. There could be evidence for "evolutionary" changes within species but they don't cross over. "Monkeys" don't evolve into Man. God first, science second. NO PROBLEM!

Answer 9

First off, despite all the hype, evolution is not a fact, it is not even science. in order to be science,it has to be observable,which evolution is not. lizards cannot turn into birds, and dogs cannot have kittens.There is an agenda to phase out God, which they refuse to believe in because if there is a God, then maybe they are accountable to Him, and this is unthinkable to them.They would rather believe in an OBVIOUS lie, than to face the truth.They love their sin,and will not give it up.Please stay focused on what you know is truth.Who do you trust,God or man?

Answer 10

What need is there to change anything at all?
Even a literal reading of Scripture does not invalidate the theory of evolution in the least. Does Genesis specifically deny natural selection? Does it claim that Adam was the first humanoid? Does it specifically state that the 'days' of creation are not epochs? Does it go out of its way to tell us not to read it just like every other ancient genealogy?