I'm kind of weird when it comes to religion. I'm actually a fairly devout Christian. When I say fairly devout, I don't mean anything near saintly. You'll notice I didn't use the term "good Christian" because I'm not, but I do try to live my life the way I think God wants me to (excepting a few sins that I can't seem to make myself refrain from indulging in) and I pray fairly regularly (although the frequency of my prayers is one of my faults, I think.) The thing that makes me weird is that I hate going to church. This has nothing to do with the boredom, pushiness or most of the other things many disillusioned Christians complain of. The denomination I come from (Primitive Baptist) is very non-evangelical almost to the point of being anti-evangelical. (If you're wondering what that means, evangelical is a descriptor meaning they're trying to convert members or save people. Part of the reason we're not evangelical is because we don't believe it's an choice for you make, whether or not you "get" saved. We believe it's a decision God made before the creation of the world. It's actually a bit more complex than that, but that's not the point of this post so I'll leave it alone. Because we're not evangelical, we're not pushy. The boredom usually doesn't bother me, but then again I actually like thinking about that kind of stuff. What does bother me is the silly, non-important stuff preachers can get worked up over and start preaching from the pulpit.

One of these issues is evolution. I can tell you right now that as soon a preacher brings up the matter in a sermon, he's lost me. And it's not like I'm a fanatical supporter of the sciences believing that scientists can do no wrong. I actually take the scientific findings skeptically until I see the proof that convinces me they were correct. The problem is I've never heard an intelligent argument from a preacher on why the concept of evolution is so horrible that it needs to be condemned from the pulpit. And it's not like these guys have ever even studied the thing they're condemning because I don't know how many times I've heard Darwin's name brought up with the guy had nothing to to with the theory of evolution. His idea was natural selection (a foundation for evolution, but not evolution). Considering the fact that natural selection only says that there is genetic diversity in species and that members of the species with the traits best suited to survival in their environment will be more likely to live and pass on their genes to subsequent generations, this really isn't all that hard of a concept to swallow. It also goes nowhere near contradicting anything in the Bible.

Evolution, I can see, does have some points that may prevent it from being placed into a biblical viewpoint, but only if you're unwilling to admit that the bible may always not be a literal history book. For example, Primitive Baptists don't take the book of Revelations as a literal prophecy of what will happen at the end of the world. We don't believe in a literal 1000 year reign of Jesus on earth and we don't believe there will be an actual battle. Since we believe the last book of the bible, which tells of a future far beyond our imagination, why can't we believe the first book of the bible, which tells of a past far beyond our imagination, is just a metaphorical. In fact, if you'll look, the actual order of events of the creation of the universe through man appearance on earth fit the description in the bible. Only the exact times and methods don't match. Well the time difference is easy to explain. Other places in the bible say that (I'm greatly paraphrasing since I'm not actually looking in the bible to find the actual verse) a day in heaven is like a 1000 years. Of course that would only give the 5 days before the creation of man 5,000 years which still doesn't jive with science. But if you'll remember the bible also says that heaven is never ending, enduring infinitely so the day-1000 years thing is really nothing more than something to help people struggling with the concept of infinity get a better grasp on it. In fact, I think the entire story of the creation in the bible is precisely that. God understood that many people, especially primitive people with little scientific background, would have no chance of understanding the real way the earth was created or be able to grasp the amount of time it took to make it. Instead it was simplified down to the simplest true form (because he said so) and used a metaphorical time frame that was easy to understand.

So why does it make me mad to go to church? Mainly because ignorant men go up and spout ignorant ideas under the disguise of it being the word of god. In my opinion, such nit-picky details as whether or not Jesus' fables actually happened of if he created the stories to fit the message, or the actual way the earth was created are not important to the faith. There's no problem in discussing them, but they should be saved for the dinner table after church and not discussed from the pulpit. It takes away from time you could be spending helping me understand the bible and teaching me the way I should live my life.

I actually have some major issues with Christianity as a whole and more specifically Christian fundamentalism. If you read my posts again, you'll probably hear some rants about those as well.

Jacob