A post, by a scientist who is also home schools his children, touches on a very important issue, namely teaching science in home schools in Christian homes. As the author points out, all too often, such instruction presents young-earth creationism as if it is the only Christian alternative, and as if it has no serious weaknesses as a view of origins, when neither of these is true. (See here for my chart, indicating that all views of origins have some serious weaknesses.)
If home-schooled Christian children are not given a broader view, and a fairer one, of origins, these kids will probably become the majority of the conservative Christian leaders of the next generation. That will almost guarantee that most of their followers will be unable to present reasonable answers on origins to honest, seeking, unbelievers, and many of these unbelievers will remain in that state, because well-meaning Christians have nothing better to present on origins but gibberish. (See this post for St. Augustine's view of this sort of thing.)
The author, Douglas Hayworth, gives advice on selection of textbooks, and on other practical and important matters.
Thanks for reading.
Musings on science, the Bible, and fantastic literature (and sometimes basketball and other stuff).
God speaks to us through the Bible and the findings of science, and we should listen to both types of revelation.
The title is from Psalm 84:11.
The Wikipedia is usually a pretty good reference. I mostly use the World English Bible (WEB), because it is public domain. I am grateful.
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The posts in this blog are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. You can copy and use this material, as long as you aren't making money from it. If you give me credit, thanks. If not, OK.
2 comments:
I don't make a big deal out of the controversy; my kids know about it generally. When we read either secular old-earth or Christian young-earth materials, I tell them parts I personally am skeptical about but also use such occasions as opportunity to teach about truth-finding and determining authority in terms of knowing what is true. Part of both the scientific process and the Christian life, no?
Thanks, Bonnie. That sounds like a good approach.
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