Interesting Creationism Resources on YouTube

[Canuckster1127]

Many people are more visually and auditorilly oriented than they are oriented to reading words on the written page. I tend to be more of a written word person.

I spent a little time looking through YouTube and ran across some materials that I thought might be of interest. I doubt all of them will be of interest to everyone but I thought I'd link to some of them here along with a few comments. I'm not endorsing all of them necessarily in whole or in part. Some here may have strong reactions for or against the material. That's fine. If any of them seems worthwhile to discuss feel free to do so on this thread or start a new one as you see fit.

http://bit.ly/GEp6ds
A 10 minute lecture to students by Dr. Denis Alexander, Director of the Faraday Institute for Science and Religion, St. Edmunds College, Cambridge. He speaks of the importance of the Church's handling of Evolution (Darwinism especially) to be sure that when it's discussed that the "church" (Anglican in this instance) get the science right so as not to look foolish before others. He also speaks of the importance when scientists speak of the reception of Darwinism to get the history and the theology right. The premise here is that often both sides in the debate speak from untenable positions rooted in getting these elements wrong.

(to be continued)

[Canuckster1127]

http://bit.ly/GEKZve

Dr. Denis Alexander again, in a short 4 minute video speaking about the fall of man and noting the significance of the use of the word "yom" noting its proximity to the creation narrative and clearly if the death spoken of was to be on the "day they ate of the fruit" (yom used here) then either the death spoken of is not physical by spiritual because obviously that 24 hour day they didn't physically die. Or you have to accept too, that yom is used in the 2rd chapter where the warning is given is a period of time outside of 24 hours. Both situations are difficulties to answer and to maintain consistent hermeneutics for many typical YEC positions.

Note too that this video is put out by BioLogos. BioLogos is tied with Francis Collins, a theistic evolutionist and they provide home school materials as well. Another representative of BioLogos is Peter Enns. Peter Enns is the person who participated in Homeschooling conferences whom Ken Ham began to renounce and denounce during his presentations times while he shared the platfrom with Peter Enns. The Homeschooling conferences leadership, although they are unanimously YEC "disinvited" Ken Ham from future events.

This is the letter that was sent to AIG by Great Homeschools Conventions delivering the message and the rationale.

After much prayer and deliberation over the weekend, Great Homeschool Convention’s Advisory Board has unanimously decided to disinvite Ken and AIG from all future conventions, including the Cincinnati convention next week. The Board believes this to be the Lord’s will for our convention and searched the Scriptures for the mind of the Lord and the leadership of the Holy Spirit before arriving at this decision. The Board believes that Ken’s public criticism of the convention itself and other speakers at our convention require him to surrender the spiritual privilege of addressing our homeschool audience. Please know that our Board is 100% young earth and we largely share AIG’s perspective from a scientific standpoint. That is why Ken was originally invited and treated so graciously and extremely generously in Memphis and Greenville (far beyond what we do for other speakers or their ministries). Our expression of sacrifice and extraordinary kindness towards Ken and AIG has been returned to us and our attendees with Ken publicly attacking our conventions and other speakers. Our Board believes Ken’s comments to be unnecessary, ungodly, and mean-spirited statements that are divisive at best and defamatory at worst.

One of the core values of our convention is that we believe that good people can disagree and still be good people. We believe that Christians do not need to personally question the integrity, the intelligence, or the salvation of other Christians when debating Biblical issues. Ken has obviously felt led to publicly attack our conventions and a number of our speakers. We believe that what Ken has said and done is un-Christian and sinful. A number of attendees are demanding explanations from our board and we must respond to them.

We believe that Dr. Ham is very intelligent and deliberate and that he decided that publicly slandering our conventions and defaming a number of our speakers is what he wanted to do. Whereas Ken chooses to conduct himself in a way that we believe to be unscriptural, we cannot countenance that spirit as we believe it would not honor the Savior whom we serve.

A public statement will be prepared for distribution at the convention explaining our Board’s decision. Anyone who inquires regarding Dr. Ham or AIG will be referred to that statement. We have no intention to defame or publicly slander Dr. Ham, the Creation Museum, or the work of AIG. Our Board would respectfully request that Dr. Ham and AIG prayerfully consider doing the same. Our Board takes seriously the admonition of Jesus in John 13:35, “By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye have love one to another.”

Sincerely,
Brennan Dean
Great Homeschool Conventions, Inc

BioLogos has a lot of short vignette videos out giving snapshots of Christian Leaders who are Old Earth Creationists, or Theistic Evolutionists (Theistic Evolution is in a broad sense under the large umbrella of OEC in several regards, but obviously a smaller subset overall.)

Peter Enns will be in some of the vids following.

[Canuckster1127]

http://bit.ly/GDsV6L

Another BioLogos quicky of under 2 minutes. This is Os Guiness speaking about the relationship of Christianity to modern Science and how the disconnect typically evidenced by YEC creationists (in the US) are out of the flow and something of an anomoly from the 19th and 20th century. It's time to move on and return to the Christiain tradition from which Science and Reason developed as compatible cousins.

[Canuckster1127]

http://bit.ly/GCEmJH

Another BioLogos snapshot of 3 and 1/2 minutes. Peter Enns (the object of Ken Ham's attacks at the Homeschooling conferences that subsequently disassociated with Ken Ham) interviews Rev. Dr. N.T. "Tom" Wright about Paul's Perspective of Adam and focuses on Romans in particular.

[Canuckster1127]

http://bit.ly/GEH0tT

OK. A long one here. 2 hours.

This is Ken Miller. Ken is a leading Theistic Evolutionist from Brown University where he is a leading Cell Biologist who works a lot with the electron microscope.

Ken is mainstream evolution and harshly critical of much of creationism, (YEC and to some degree some forms of OEC as well) and in this video of him speaking at Case Western he attacks Intelligent Design, especially as it relates to the political movement that identifies under that term. You'll get some history of the ID movement and it's political actions through the mid 2000s.

Ken Miller in terms of his science is a full evolutionists. Many here (me too on issues) will disagree with him. He's a primary voice in the area however and a professing Christian. Being familiar with the broad subject should include knowledge of who Ken Miller is and his positions.

[RickD]

Please know that our Board is 100% young earth and we largely share AIG’s perspective from a scientific standpoint. That is why Ken was originally invited and treated so graciously and extremely generously in Memphis and Greenville (far beyond what we do for other speakers or their ministries). Our expression of sacrifice and extraordinary kindness towards Ken and AIG has been returned to us and our attendees with Ken publicly attacking our conventions and other speakers. Our Board believes Ken’s comments to be unnecessary, ungodly, and mean-spirited statements that are divisive at best and defamatory at worst.

That's a very telling quote.

[Canuckster1127]

http://bit.ly/GGRAlS

10 minute video of Young Earth Creationist Dr. Al Mohler, the head of Southern Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY.

Dr. Mohler led a change at STS that removed 97% of the professors for a variety of reasons including whether they held a YEC position. This has spread and been a significant issue in the Southern Baptist Denomination in recent years.

Presented in the interest of including the YEC position as well.

[Canuckster1127]

http://bit.ly/GCLAcZ

10 min interaction on an MSNBC segment with Eugenia Scott (one of the most vocal critics of Intelligent Design and a prominent Evolutionist) and Stephen Meyer an Intelligent Design supporter and promoter. Not much information here as the host is very biased and the discussion is handled very unprofessionally with a lot of bias against the ID position.

Example of how the discussion breaks down in public forums.

[Canuckster1127]

http://bit.ly/GCPqGG

2 minute definition of Intelligent Design by Stephen Meyer sponsored by Chuck Colson's organization.

[Canuckster1127]

http://bit.ly/GBUF6f

7 1/2 minute clip of Antony Flew explaining with an interviewer why he moved from being an atheist (one of the most vocal and celebrated of the 20th century) to accepting the existance of God. What he ended up accepting is not Christianity but rather a philosophic form of deism. Key to his being convinced to moving in this direction was Intelligent Design's arguments.

[RickD]

http://bit.ly/GGRAlS

10 minute video of Young Earth Creationist Dr. Al Mohler, the head of Southern Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY.

Dr. Mohler led a change at STS that removed 97% of the professors for a variety of reasons including whether they held a YEC position. This has spread and been a significant issue in the Southern Baptist Denomination in recent years.

Presented in the interest of including the YEC position as well.

This guy's answer was horrible. I can even picture Jason Lisle giving a "double face palm" while watching this. If I were YEC, I wouldn't want thus guy representing my beliefs. He's so ignorant of the issue, that he would have been better off not answering at all.

[Canuckster1127]

This guy's answer was horrible. I can even picture Jason Lisle giving a "double face palm" while watching this. If I were YEC, I wouldn't want thus guy representing my beliefs. He's so ignorant of the issue, that he would have been better off not answering at all.

I feel that way and maybe there are better YEC representatives. Any reading this who want to link to a better one are welcome to do so.

[Canuckster1127]

http://bit.ly/GFcIgB

5 minute clip giving a short documentary approach to Antony Flew's conversion to a form of Theism. Expands on Intelligent Design elements and particularly DNA to RNA translation.

[RickD]

Bart, I can't help but ask, are all these videos leading up to something?

[Canuckster1127]

http://bit.ly/GBEo5K

An interview of the Bishop of Oxford by Richard Dawkins (yes .... creationism's and christianity's arch-nemesis).

This is the first of 4 videos is 10 minutes long. You can connect to the other 3 on youtube.

This is a fairly friendly interview. Clearly, this Anglican Bishop rejects a literal hermeneutic of Scripture and that explains too why he and Dawkins can speak with relative cordiality. They go on to discuss issues of morality and ethics related to suicide and euthanasia.

Obviously not an endorsement from me, but worth looking at if you want to see some discussion on some of the issues involving Dawkins that aren't caught up in the hype and emotions of the issues that often follows him (and which he seems to glory in creating at times.)