How can you accept evolution and still have a spiritual reality, and/or a God faith

[metis]

However, if the World decides to tell me that Deism can mean an involved God then I'm just going to have to produce a new title for 'God who cares no more about humans than wood boring weevils,, and such'.....

Read my "Faith Statement" at the bottom of my post to get my drift.

 

[i_feel_free]

Does evolution totally remove God, and spirit from reality.

If yes, how so?

If no, how so?

Spiritual awakening is the fulfillment of evolution. Once the soul reaches the human stage of evolution, one has the capacity to consciously participate in the process of evolution. True spirituality involves actual physical changes to the brain/nervous system and chemistry of the body. Thus, studies on long-term meditation practitioners reveal changes in brain waves, psychological functioning, blood chemistry, etc. These changes occur slowly, over time, as a result of sustained spiritual practice. This has nothing to do with conventional God ideas of popular religion. God is a metaphor for Spirit or pure consciousness, which is your essential identity.

 

[oldbadger]

The U.S. is not the world.

........ and it sure ain't mine.

And even in the U.S. there are quite a few Christians that accept evolution, they are just not the majority.

There are many many hundreds of Christian Creeds in the World
and a whole lot of those Christians accept evolution, and regard early Genesis as metaphorical.

Take it or leave it.

 

[oldbadger]

Sounds as if you have a similar worldview to Einstein, then.

Ah yes..........Einstein and me........ soul mates, yer see.....
I didn't know that, but I could understand how a physicist, mathematician or astronomer would see a Deity in all.........

 

[oldbadger]

Read my "Faith Statement" at the bottom of my post to get my drift.

I like that............ your Faith Statement.

It does leave 'leeway' for either a disinterested or involved God, so can see how it could lead to either Deism or Theism, but 'yes', I like it, because that's how I see it.

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

The question is: "How can you accept evolution and still have a spiritual reality, and/or a God faith?"

Frankly, I think it might be interesting to ask the inverse of that question: "How can you have a spiritual reality, and/or a God Faith, if it requires you to reject what is actually known and provable by science or any other area of human knowledge?"

For me, trying to hold on to even the most cherished belief in the face of clear evidence that my belief was false was quite enough for me to allow me to abandon it.

 

[Audie]

The question is: "How can you accept evolution and still have a spiritual reality, and/or a God faith?"

Frankly, I think it might be interesting to ask the inverse of that question: "How can you have a spiritual reality, and/or a God Faith, if it requires you to reject what is actually known and provable by science or any other area of human knowledge?"

For me, trying to hold on to even the most cherished belief in the face of clear evidence that my belief was false was quite enough for me to allow me to abandon it.

Group psychology makes possible belief despite any facts.

Madness in individuals is rare, in groups it is the norm.

You were lucky to escape. Some, like the scientologists
or JW make it very difficult. Some cults will kill you for
trying to leave.

 

[Hockeycowboy]

How unfortunate for you: so near yet so far. No ringing bell, no cigar.

I guess I'm not as easily misled as most. I look at the whole forest, not just particular trees.

 

[Hockeycowboy]

.....reject what is actually known and provable by science.

What is actually known and can be proven?

 

[Hockeycowboy]

Go back and read Genesis 1:3 (Let there be light) again, and this time note carefully that it does NOT say that this was to make a division between night and day.

How about reading that paragraph, with vss. 4&5? You'll see @Deeje is correct in context.

 

[blü 2]

How about reading that paragraph, with vss. 4&5? You'll see @Deeje is correct in context.

I've read it carefully many times and I've explained my reading carefully to Deeje (who in effect agrees with me, in that she associates the lights to separate day and night with the sun (and moon) ─ but these unambiguously are made on Day 4.

And as you know, Genesis 1:16 says, 'And God made the two great lights, the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night'. That was on Day 4. What do you say the 'greater light to rule the day' is, since you say it wasn't the sun. And what was the lesser light?

 

[Subduction Zone]

What is actually known and can be proven?

As much as anything can be proven by science the theory of evolution has been. I have a thread on how science is done, it is there so that the basics of science can be discussed so that creationists can begin to understand any science, not just the theory of evolution.

 

[Hockeycowboy]

What do you say the 'greater light to rule the day' is, since you say it wasn't the sun

No, we haven't said that. Light was observed on the second Day; it's source (the Sun) was not seen. The Sun itself (and the moon) was not observed until the fourth Day, when the atmosphere began clearing.

And what was the lesser light?

The moon, of course.

It just takes meditation on the context, and some critical thinking. As Isaac Newton did.

 

[Subduction Zone]

No, we haven't said that. Light was observed on the second Day; it's source (the Sun) was not seen. The Sun itself (and the moon) was not observed until the fourth Day, when the atmosphere began clearing.


The moon, of course.

It just takes meditation on the context, and some critical thinking. As Isaac Newton did.

Actually that is a special pleading fallacy. It is a logic error.

 

[Deeje]

Go back and read Genesis 1:3 (Let there be light) again, and this time note carefully that it does NOT say that this was to make a division between night and day.

Genesis 1:3-5....
"And God said: “Let there be light.” Then there was light. 4 After that God saw that the light was good, and God began to divide the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light Day, but the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, a first day."

Hellooooo.....God said "let there be light" NOT "I am going to create light". Light was already there on the first day....the same light that creates day and night even now.

And then read Genesis 1:14 again and note that here at last are the words "Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to separate the day from the night", and Genesis 1:16 where God accordingly makes "the two great lights, the greater light to rule the day".

Then you'll see that God made the sun on day 4, the day after [he] made the plants.

Genesis 1:14-18....
"Then God said: “Let there be luminaries in the expanse of the heavens to make a division between the day and the night, and they will serve as signs for seasons and for days and years. 15 They will serve as luminaries in the expanse of the heavens to shine upon the earth.” And it was so. 16 And God went on to make the two great luminaries, the greater luminary for dominating the day and the lesser luminary for dominating the night, and also the stars. 17 Thus God put them in the expanse of the heavens to shine upon the earth 18 and to dominate by day and by night and to make a division between the light and the darkness. Then God saw that it was good."

The word is "make" (asah) not "create" (bara) The two luminaries that dominated the day and night were the very same luminaries that had been there from the beginning. Because of the cloud layers, the earth at first was covered in darkness. The first thing God did was to illuminate his workplace. Since plants came first, there was enough light for photosynthesis to take place, but it was obviously not the time to clear away the cloud layers altogether. That came a little later on the 4th day when, from an earthly standpoint, it appeared as though God had just put them there. But in reality, they had always been there. Genesis is not a science textbook, it was written for people who at that time, had very little knowledge of science. It was sufficient to get the idea across.

Of course you can disagree, but please don't run away with the idea that your interpretation of scripture is accurate when we have shown you that it isn't. Job confirmed the swaddling layers of cloud that you just ignored.

 

[blü 2]

No, we haven't said that. Light was observed on the second Day; it's source (the Sun) was not seen.

The text says nothing of the kind. Genesis 1:16 on the contrary says God 'made' ['asah] the two great lights on Day 4.

And please quote me the part about the atmosphere clearing. It's not in my text.

It just takes meditation on the context, and some critical thinking.

The context to meditate on is the written page. You can background it with an understanding of Bronze Age cosmology if you like, in which (as in the bible) the earth is flat, and is the fixed and immovable center of the universe around which everything else moves, and the firmament (sky) is solid, and the stars are attached to it, and if they become detached they'll fall to earth.

But that won't alter the clear statement in Genesis that God made the plants on Day 3 and the sun on Day 4.

 

[blü 2]

Genesis 1:3-5....
"And God said: “Let there be light.” Then there was light. 4 After that God saw that the light was good, and God began to divide the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light Day, but the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, a first day."

So tell me, what was the 'greater light to rule the day' that God made on Day 4? At the same time as [he] made lesser light to rule the night?

 

[Deeje]

So tell me, what was the 'greater light to rule the day' that God made on Day 4? At the same time as [he] made lesser light to rule the night?

 

[blü 2]

Exactly.

On Day 4 (1:14) God said. "Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to separate the day from the night" ... And God made the two great lights, the greater light to rule the day ..."

And that was the sun, of course.

If you disagree, state specifically what it was instead.

 

[exchemist]

Ah yes..........Einstein and me........ soul mates, yer see.....
I didn't know that, but I could understand how a physicist, mathematician or astronomer would see a Deity in all.........

Einstein seems to have taken a similar position to Spinoza - another Jew, as it happens, though I don't know if there is significance in that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_and_philosophical_views_of_Albert_Einstein