Ah, Pity da Fool

I believe that I may have finally listened to my last "Morning Edition from NPR." I surely don't agree with some of my right-wing friends that all NPR's programming is slanted left. And I don't agree with all my liberal friends that NPR and MSNBC are the only "fair and balanced" news programs out there. Yet here comes this bit of "news" - truly an opinion piece - this morning.

http://www.npr.org/2011/08/09/138957812/evangelicals-question-the-existence-of-adam-and-eve#commentBlock

I do chuckle at re-reading the text and the commentary following it. You have the defenders of a "literal interpretation" versus the intelligentsia who seem to shake their heads at the duped, simpletons who simply refuse to accept the theories that have been advanced concerning human evolution. The faith that so many put in the scientific theories is a religion in and of itself, it seems.

I myself don't have a problem with evolution vs creationism. I'm comfortable in my belief that God created man and woman. I'm good with that. And I see the point that science puts forth - that we have evolved over eons from primates to modern homo sapiens.

It's like when I tell my daughter, Elaina, that she is the most beautiful girl in the whole world. Then I tell another daughter, Isabella, that she is the most beautiful girl in the whole world. For me, both statements are absolute. They are true. They are law. And they are not contradictory.

My real problem with the story as written is the two camps involved. Barbara Bradley Hagerty states that according to a Pew research poll, 4 in 10 Americans believe that God created humankind. She states that this is a central tenet of much of conservative Christianity. But from that point forth, the pro-creationism camp are "evangelicals" (at one point a Baptist is consulted - not sure if they qualify). Come to that, I'm not sure if I qualify either.

I was raised in the Episcopal Church and many of the folks I knew believed that God created Adam and Eve. I went to Catholic school for four years. There I was taught that God created Adam and Eve. I attended a Methodist college. There I was taught that God created Adam and Eve. I had a Jewish roommate. He believed that God created Adam and Eve.

I have researched that Judaism accepts the Genesis story of creation with as much "literal" vs poetic interpretation as do Christians. Genesis was written by a Jew. Why are Jews not even mentioned in the article? I have researched that Islam accepts the Genesis story of creation with as much "literal" vs poetic interpretation as do Christians. The Qur'an seems to give some leeway and many Muslims accept evolutionary theory. But I'm curious to know, how many out of 10 Christians, Jews, and Muslims accept that God made humankind. Remember, the quote from the poll is Americans, not Christians.


So yet again, the mainstream media looks to make me, an educated person of sound mind and body (mostly), lose "intellectual currency and respectability" for believing a theory that to me, has even more grounding, than the theory of evolution. Evangelicals are the defendants in a new Scopes trial, in which the verdict has been pronounced before the opening arguments have begun.

Map all the genomes you want; for me "there are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

So I shook my head, changed the channel, and put on some worship music.