Creationism in Schools?

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” This passage from Genesis is the cornerstone for a whole following of believers convinced there can be no other alternative for the creation of the universe. To creationists, the writings in Genesis are a literal interpretation of how the universe was created. So does this mean the Bible is a scientific textbook meant to be read word for word? Should the teachings of creation be taught side by side with evolution , a heavily researched and supported science? The answer is no. Creationism is a pseudo science and an offense to the separation of church and state that should not be allowed in the public school system.


First we must look at the text that gives creationists their theory. If we are to view the Old Testament as a textbook filled with facts that guide their theory, we must take the book literally. Let’s look at what Moses, the author of Genesis, tells us in Numbers 31:15, “Now kill all the boys and kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.” Moses talks often of rape, murder, abuse, and even incest. Remember the story of Lot’s daughters who get their father drunk so they can have his children? According to Deuteronomy 22:28-29, God says himself a woman should marry the man that rapes her. “If a man is caught in the act of raping a young woman who is not engaged, he must pay fifty pieces of silver to her father. Then he must marry the young woman because he violated her, and he will never be allowed to divorce her.” These stories are too numerous to list them all. If the story of Creation is to be taken as a literal interpretation of God’s word, then so should the Old Testament in its entirety. Man cannot accept one part and deny the other. If the story of creation is literal then we are to take literal the stories of rape, slavery, incest, murder, and abuse that was approved and even ordered by God, as well.

Creationists believe there are several inconsistencies in the theory of evolution. One argument is that carbon dating has been shown to be inaccurate and that evolutionist’s dating of the Earth is wrong. This is partially true. Although it is still often useful, organic materials are often contaminated and determining ages can sometimes be difficult. Carbon has a half life of 5730 years and can only calculate dates of organic, carbon based materials up to 60,000 years. There is one problem. Carbon dating isn’t used to date the Earth. Rocks cannot be carbon dated and the Earth is far older than 60,000 years. Radioactive decay is used for dating the earth as well as dating samples throughout the Universe. The half lifeof the radioactive elements are in the millions. The accuracy of radioactive decay is a proven science and dating is within a few percent margin of error. Arguments like these on various anti-evolution websites border on ridiculous, and several pieces of scientific data were either misinterpreted or lied about altogether.

Creationists will tell you that they have numerous scientists that back up their theories. The backbone of the scientific research for creation is done by the Discovery Institute’s Division of Biology. This includes, according to them, “at least three researchers.” Out of the estimated 1,108,100 biological and geological scientists only 600 reject the theory of evolution. This means only 0.054% of scientists. The list of groups that support Evolution are numerous and credible. The American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Association of University Professors, American Astronomical Society, American Chemical Society….I have only begun with letter A, but I think you get the idea. What about religious groups? Most churches have actually accepted evolution as a valid theory. These churches include the United Methodist Church, National Baptist Convention, USA, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, Presbyterian Church (USA), National Baptist Convention of America, African Methodist Episcopal Church, the Roman Catholic Church, the Episcopal Church, and others. There are also been over ten court decisions that have upheld evolution.

Lately the theory of Intelligent Design has been thrown around a lot. Proponents of Intelligent Design vehemently deny they are connected with creation and that they are scientists independent of religion. This is a proven lie. In 1986 a draft of a book called Biology and Creation was written to teach a creationist alternative to evolution. It was widely rejected by teachers for its religious leanings. In the 1987 court case, Edwards v. Aguillard, it was ruled that teaching creationism in public schools violated the Establishment Clause of the United States constitution, but that alternative scientific theories could be taught. Creationists realized if they were to get their theory out they would need to use some clever changes of speech. The book stayed almost the same but they changed the title to Of Pandas and People and the uses of the root word "creation", including "creationism" and "creationist" were replaced with words like “intelligent design”, “intelligent creator” and “intelligent agency”. They thought they could pass this new scientific theory as a true scientific alternative to evolution and quickly separated any connection to creationists. They made one mistake. In a draft of the book, when trying to delete “creationists” and replace it with “design proponents”, they did not delete the word entirely. This left the misprint "cdesign proponentsists". With the help of this evidence, teaching of intelligent design was also struck down and found unconstitutional.

There was a day in which scientists and philosophers were excommunicated, tortured, and even killed for trying to bring forth theories other than what we read in the bible. Galileo was asked by the church to publicly deny his finding that the sun was the center of the solar system and sentenced to house arrest. There is nothing wrong with opening our children’s eyes to various possibilities, but teaching them half-truths is an injustice. Whether you call it creation or intelligent design, teaching it in public school is not only unconstitutional it is an affront to reason and science.