"We've been attacked by the intelligent, educated segment of the culture" By MrMikey in MrMikey's Diary Tue Mar 29, 2005 at 10:17:23 AM EST Tags: User Diary (all tags)
	This story has been making the rounds the last day or so... DOVER, United States (AFP) - The pastoral fields and white frame houses appear at peace, but this Pennsylvania farm town is deeply at war over teaching Darwin or Christian creationism in its schools. Since last year the school board voted to have high school biology teachers raise doubts about Darwin's 145-year-old theory and suggest an alternative Christian explanation for life. The city has since been deeply riven over the issue of separation of church and state.

This pastor had some... interesting things to say: But pastor and parent Ray Mummert, 54, explained their point. "If we continue to indoctrinate our young people with non-religious principles, we're headed for an internal destruction of this society," he said. "Evolution is just a theory and there are other theories," Mummert explained, smiling through his beard. "There is such a complexity in life, and science wants to hang its hat on a belief that life somehow started -- they say there is no creator, no order ... I believe there is a creator," he said. "Christians are a lot more bold under Bush's leadership, he speaks what a lot of us believe," said Mummert. "We've been attacked by the intelligent, educated segment of the culture," he said, adding that the school board's declaration is just a first step. That's the saddest, scariest line of all... "We've been attacked by the intelligent, educated segment of the culture." What does that say about his opinion of himself, his community, intelligence, and education? As someone on the 'net quipped, "That's so unfair - they are obviously unarmed." I think they were more right than they knew: many people are ill-equipped, either intellectually or emotionally, to understand and accept some of what humans have learned about how the world works. It scares them... they find that the things they thought were certain, fixed, and simple are really illusory, and that the real world is neither certain, nor fixed, nor simple. This scares them, and that fear motivates them to reject or even seek to destroy the information they find disturbing, and even the messengers of that information. It is, in the end, a destructive impulse. The Earth will continue to turn regardless of what we believe, but we will face the consequences of actions motivated by fear or ignorance, wilful or otherwise.

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