Bible Question: I am in an English 101 class and for our final grade we are doing a research paper in a group of 5 women. THe topic that was actually chosen by one of our group members is "creating a perfect race". The paper so far seem to be centered around natural selection, Darwinism, cloning, and gene alteration to make "perfect people". I do not agree with most of the things we are writing about, but I am trying to remember this is just learning, knowing doesn't mean you have to believe. Today we were discussing what we need to research and I brought up the topic of looking for areas where natural selection might be in the Bible so we can look at it from a religious point of view as well. Another girl in my group is not religious and told me that there is no natural selection in religion. she says the religious believe God does everything and He keeps what He wants and doesn't want. This is true, but has He also put in animals the desire to leave behind their weak and their sick? Most of them do. Another arguement is that humans are the only species that nurse their weak instead of letting them die. I do not believe this to be true either and I told her and she says okay- it is your job to find proof that there are humans that do not nurse their weak and which animals do not leave their weak behind. I don't want my research to be about proving her wrong, but I do want to know these things for the paper. I know this explanation is LONG, I apologize, but any opinions of suggestions on anything I a have mentioned of any place to look up things would be GREAT!! I am having a hard time standing firm in what I believe and working with another person who is firm in their non-belief. Thank You. |
Bible Answer: Hello, Kristi. So this is what English 101 has come to? It's been a long time since I was in English 101 (and loved it so much that I decided to major in English Lit). But it seems to me the topic is more appropriate to biology, anthropology or philosophy than English 101, but that parcel of homespun sagacity doesn't address your question. If it were I, I as a Christian would work as hard as I possibly could to research and write a paper designed expressly to debunk at its very core the idea of man's "creating a perfect race". In the first place, man never has "created" any race. God alone creates in the primal sense of creation. I would not hesitate to take the biblical view of creation and there is more purely scientific "proof" of creationism than evolution -- and the reason I put proof in quotes is that there is no absolute proof of creationism or evolution, although the scales of scientific thought are tilting more and more in favor of creationism. So that's what I'd do -- I'd work extra hard and write the best paper I could as a Chrisitan apologist for what the Bible teaches about men and sin, and propose that the only way to be free from the human condition of sin is not through genetics but through Christ. If your paper is a well-researched and well-written one, you should make a high mark, unless your professor happens to be a full-blown evolutionist crackpot who punishes with low marks students who oppose his views. I trust this is not the case with your professor, and extend best wishes for your success with your enterprise. By the way, icr.org might prove helpful to you as a research tool. --Hank |