Engaging Science in the Life of Your Congregation
With so many issues to discuss, Christians can easily get the feeling that science is always attacking the faith. It is essential to balance such conversations with positive responses to God’s creation. After all, the primary response to the natural world in the Bible is to praise the God who made it.
Why Do More Homeschoolers Want Evolution in Their Textbooks?
"Many homeschool parents contact me or show up at my office and quietly say, 'Is there anything besides Young Earth Creationists?'"
Series: Understanding Randomness
In this series, Kathryn Applegate addresses the concern that randomness implies the absence of God's activity and involvement in the natural world. She begins by clearing up some common misconceptions about the concept of "randomness", and later focuses on the mechanisms of the immune system to demonstrate that God works through random processes to preserve life. Far from being an indication of a "godless" universe, one might conclude that randomness is one of God’s favorite mechanisms for creating and sustaining life!
Evangelical Homeschoolers Ask for Accurate Science
… whatever their reason for homeschooling, evangelical families who embrace modern science are becoming more vocal about it—and are facing the inevitable criticism that comes with that choice.
Searching for Motivated Belief: Understanding John Polkinghorne, Part 2
To understand more clearly where Polkinghorne lies on the larger landscape of science and religion, let’s consider his approach to the Resurrection. Many contemporary thinkers, including some theologians and clergy, believe that “science” has somehow made it impossible to believe in the Resurrection, the deity of Jesus, and even belief in the transcendent God of the Bible.
The Lesson of Grace in Teaching
I want to talk about my biggest life lesson, that is deep and profound, and continually reshapes the way I approach my students: Your accomplishments are not what make you a worthy human being. And you learn this when someone shows you grace, good things you didn't earn or deserve but you're getting them anyway. Because grace gives people dignity they don't have to earn.
Series: God and Creation
In this four part series, David Opderbeck explores the interesting relationship between God and his creation. He first looks at his transcendence over the material world. In one respect, God is completely distinct from all creation, yet he is also immanent, or present within all creation. Another aspect of God reflected in creation is his Triune nature. Just as love, fellowship, and delight exist within the Trinity, so these characteristics are present in the world, and experienced by humans. He completes his thoughts with a discussion about God’s interaction with humans.
Evolution and Christian Faith Grantees Announced
Congratulations to the 37 winners of the Evolution & Christian Faith (ECF) grants competition! ECF is a new BioLogos program designed to support projects and network-building among scholars, church leaders, and parachurch organizations.
A Tale of Two Worldviews: Being a Biology Teacher in a Christian School
The first challenge for me at the beginning of each school year is to clarify the students’ understanding of evolution as it has been taught in their Bible and pre-requisite science courses. Invariably, they come back with the same answer: “Evolution is a lie,” to which I respond with, “Which aspects of evolution are you talking about?”
Raising Children to Pursue Truth
In this video Conversation, Joel Hunter articulates the importance of raising a child that can garner knowledge from a variety of sources and to be able to study science with integrity—that is, to be able to pursue the truth to where it leads.
Worshiping, Growing, and Learning
Yesterday, biology professors Randy Moore and Sehoya Cotner raised the concern that workshops focused on evolution-related training do not reach not reach creationism-based biology teachers. Today, we'd like to focus on BioLogos' efforts to address that divide through our Biology by the Sea workshops.
Evolution and Creationism in America’s Biology Classrooms
High school biology courses have a strong and lingering impact on students’ views of evolution and creationism.
Science, Christianity, and Homeschooling
Resilient learners and a robust faith can handle challenges. But the faith of the students my professor described was different— strong, but brittle; it did not have the resilience that comes through testing.
Using Film to Catalyze Conversations on Faith and Science
What are the best ways to spark productive conversations about science and faith? Certainly there are books, articles, blogs (like this one), and podcasts. But there are particular advantages to using film.
Science and Faith on a Secular Campus
While many Christian colleges actively seek to help their students engage issues of faith and science constructively, few secular colleges are active in promoting the conversation. As a professor at a secular school, how can I encourage my students to authentic engagement and dialogue on science and faith issues?
Mending the Disconnect
How can it be that two things we love and treasure—two things that are absolutely central to ourselves and the lives we’ve built—seem so often to be at odds with each other?
Did David Hume "Banish" Miracles?
“I flatter myself,” Hume triumphantly proclaimed, “that I have discovered an argument . . . which, if just, will, with the wise and learned, be an everlasting check to all kinds of superstitious delusion, and consequently, will be useful as long as the world endures.”
Series: Divine Action in the World
In this talk, Professor Plantinga addresses the fact that many contemporary thinkers—including many theologians—believe that God cannot perform miracles, providentially guide history, or interact in the lives of people, as these activities would be contrary to science. Plantinga, on the other hand, makes the case that this popular view is mistaken; excluding divine action in the world is not a central feature of natural science itself, but a philosophical or theological preference that has been added on to science (and can just as readily be removed). Plantinga concludes that it is completely logical to accept the miracles of the Bible and support contemporary science.
The Randomness Project
It is not uncommon to hear voices proclaiming that biology and physics have shown us that—at fundamental levels—nature is random, hence meaningless, purposeless, and without a creator. But how might God work providentially through indeterminate processes? The John Templeton Foundation has provided a generous grant of $1.69 million to support a new research initiative on the theme of Randomness and Divine providence.
Series: Evolution and Personal Faith: How Christian University Students Resolve the Conflict
As students across the country begin their academic year, nearly all of them will receive some kind of science education, and many will experience tension between what they have been taught about God's creation in church or at home, and what they are likely to find in science textbooks and hear from their instructors. How should that tension be addressed? How might it be resolved? What resources does the Church have (and still need) to equip our young people to honor the truth God has revealed in both his Word and his world, and to share in the work of his Kingdom? This series from Mark Winslow, Dean of the College of Natural, Social, and Health Sciences at Southern Nazarene University (SNU) in Bethany, OK, focuses on how Christian biology-related majors at a mid-Western Christian liberal arts university reconciled evolution and their personal religious beliefs.
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