[RO/EN] Veniti! - este motto-ul evangheliei / Come and Welcome

[RO] Din prima clipa a vieții spirituale până ce ajungi în glorie, chemarea lui Hristos este: „Veniți, veniți la Mine!”. 

El va merge întotdeauna înaintea ta, rugându-te să-L urmezi așa cum soldatul își urmează conducătorul. El va merge întotdeauna înaintea ta pentru a-ți pava drumul și a-ți pregăti calea și te va ruga să-L urmezi pe tot parcursul vieții tale. Şi în clipa solemna a morții, când vei zăcea în pat în dureri, cuvântul Lui dulce cu care te va introduce în lumea cerească va fi același: „Vino, vino la Mine! Întinde-ți aripile și zboară spre această lume de bucurii unde locuiesc Eu. Vino pentru a fi cu Mine, unde sunt Eu.”

Dar aceasta nu este numai chemarea pe care Hristos ți-o adresează ție, ci, dacă ești credincios, este și chemarea pe care tu I-o adresezi lui Hristos: „Vino, vino!” Vei aștepta cu dor cea de-a doua venire a Lui și vei spune: „Vino repede, da, vino, Doamne Isuse!”

Şi întotdeauna vei dori o comuniune cât mai apropiată cu El. După cum El te cheamă, „Vino,” tot așa va fi și rugăciunea ta către El: „Vino, Doamne, și locuiește în casa mea! Vino și consacrează-mă mai deplin în slujba Ta; vino și ocupă numai Tu singur tronul inimii mele.”

[EN]  "Come," then, is the very motto-word of the gospel.

From the first moment of your spiritual life until you are ushered into glory, the cry of Christ to you will be, "Come, come unto me." 

He will always be ahead of you, bidding you follow him as the soldier follows his leader. He will always go before you to pave your way, and to prepare your path, and he will bid you come after him all through life, and in the solemn hour of death, when you shall lie panting upon your bed, his sweet word with which he shall usher you into the heavenly world shall be-"Come, come unto me. Stretch thy wings and fly straight to this world of joy where I am dwelling. Come and be with me where I am."

Nay, further than this, this is not only Christ's cry to you; but if you be a believer, this is your cry to Christ-"Come! come!" You will be longing for his second advent; you will be saying, "Come quickly, even so come Lord Jesus." 

And you will be always panting for nearer and closer communion with him. As his voice to you is "Come," even so will be your prayer to him, "Come, Lord, and abide in my house. Come, and consecrate me more fully to thy service; come, and without a rival reign; come, occupy alone the throne of my heart."

"Come," then, is the very motto-word of the gospel

C.H. Spurgeon

Un blog creştin

Why Christians Shouldn't Celebrate Christmas?

The Hidden Enemy

If you're asking yourself, as I did, what aggressive scularism and radical Islam have in common, then you need to read The Hidden Enemy. 

Our Civilization is under assault from without- and from within.
We face an external threat from radical, political Islam. The enemy without wants to sweep away Western civilization and impose a global caliphate.
We face an internal threat form a coalition of secular humanists, atheists and leftists. The enemy within wants to erase the Judeo-Christian values our Western culture was founded on, replacing them with false dogmas and secularism, sexual liberation, hedonism, and moral relativitism.

The enemy without and the enemy within have almost nothing in common. Radical, political Islam seeks to impose a theocracy that, according to strict Islamic law, calls for the oppression of women and the execution of homosexuals. The secular left is fanatical about church-state separation, feminism and gay and transgender rights.

The enemy without and the enemy within could not be more opposed to each other. You'd think they'd constantly be at each other's throats. Yet the secular left defends and supports Islamism and the two groups join forces to attack our Christian faith, Judeo-Christian values, Western culture and the nation of Israel.

Often, the alliance between these groups goes largely unnoticed. Not long ago, however, representatives from the two groups publicly marched in solidarity. Like many leftist protest events, the Women's March on January 21, 2017, demanded reproductive rights (unrestricted abortions), LGBTQ rughts and wide-open borders- the usual progressive agenda. The march featured the standard collection of leftist sponsors: Planned Parenthood, the AFL-CIO, the National Center for Lesbian Rights, MoveOn.org and more.

Oddly, however, the march organizers chose as co-chair an Islamist, Linda Sarsour, whom the New York Times dubbed the "Brooklyn homegirl in a hijab" in a flattering 2015 profile. She's a darling of the left, whom President Obama honored as a "champion of change"- yet she advocates Sharia law in America. Her sale pitch: "You'll know when you're living under Sharia law if suddently all your loans and credit cards become interest-free. Sounds nice, doesn't it?
Sarsour neglects to mention that Sharia is incompatible with democracy, human rights, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, equality for women, LGBTQ rights and other causes liberals claim to support.
The progressive left's fawning adoration of Ms, Sarsour is a vivid demonstration of the strange alliance between these two ideologically opposed groups. But this is far from an isolated pheonomenon. The secular left and fanatical Islam have made a devil's bargain. Their mutual goal: the overthrow of Western culture and Judeo-Christian values.

How do we confront these enemies- the enemy within and the enemy without? Should we form a political action committee; hire a lobbying firm in Washington, DC; hold a protest march and flex our political muscles? Should we try to beat the Islamists and the secular left at their own game?
No. As God's Word tells us, there is only one way to win: We must "be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power" (Ephesians 6:10). 

We must never forget that Jesus taught us to love our adversaries, pray for them and do good to them (Luke 6:27-28). The battle against Islamic and secular extremism is not one we can win with weapons of hate. The battle for truth can be won by the power of Christlike love. Without His love, we're just clanging gongs and cymbals- making a lot of noise while accomplishing nothing (1 Corinthians 13:1)

 >>>Read the full book<<<

Paradoxuri

Paradoxuri Credinciosul vede lucruri care nu se văd deloc Și câștigă-ntotdeauna când renunță la: ”Eu pot!” Stăpânește multe lucruri, bogății imense are, Neavând nimic aici, prețios sau de valoare. Înălțat creștinul este doar atunci când e smerit, Iar odihnă el primește doar sub jug divin primit. Liber este când e rob Legii Duhului de viață, Și trăiește când e mort, iar din rău mereu învață. El domnește când slujește și ajunge înțelept, Când nebun e pentru lume și-are raiu-n al lui piept. Viața el de și-o urăște, o câștigă pentru cer, Biruiește-atunci când pierde din ego-ul său de fier. Cinstea lui este rușinea, când mereu batjocorit; O comoară își adună în tărâmul mult dorit. Nu se laudă, având putere, ci cu multe slăbiciuni Și devine tot mai tare când e slab – e pus pe culmi. Strălucește când renunță la lumină – faima lui, Și când pofta și dorința credincios le pune-n cui. Repede, frumos el crește și e tot mai credincios, Când domol cu Domnul merge sau pe bancă de stau jos. Minunată este viața de creștin și bucuros; Credinciosul înțelege planul sfânt și glorios! Tot ce pare că-i ciudat, imposibil sau pe dos Este logic și posibil doar când ești al lui Cristos! Autor: Oana Vidican

I am a Christian

Colorado Megachurch Using Armed Guards

A Colorado megachurch pastor says his church has an elaborate system of surveillance cameras, patrols and even armed guards. Rev. E. Christopher Hill, pastor of The Potter’s House in Denver, said the security measures are in place to protect the church’s 7,000 parishioners.

“There’s no way to look beyond the fact that Colorado has been specifically visited with great tragedy,” Hill said, making reference to the Columbine High School shooting in 1999, the Youth With A Mission and New Life Church shootings in 2007 and the Aurora theater shooting in 2012. The New York Times reports the Aurora theater shooting occurred less than five miles from The Potter’s House.

”We now live in an America where you must be vigilant,” Hill continued.

The megapastor said that security personnel do their best to avoid interfering with the worship experience. Each Sunday, 25 volunteer security members with military or law enforcement backgrounds meet for prayer, then patrol the church. About 15 percent of the team carry guns. 

Hill said, “You are not safe on a plane. You are not safe in an elementary school. You are not safe in a high school. You are not safe in a movie theater. Guess what? You are not safe in a church.” (christianheadlines.com)

So What Are You Doing for God? Cat de mult faci pentru Domnul ?

It's easy for christians to get caught up in thinking that they are doing enough for God..that The Lord doesn't want us to do more...that we can live happily in our confort zone and still be true servants of God.

But God sometimes asks for more:  Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your bed and walk.” - John 5:8

The apostle Paul said in Philippians 4:13 :"I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me."

So we should aspire to constantly be doing more and more for God, if indeed we are true Christians. 

Am auzit de multe ori creștini, care dorind să fie foarte spirituali, spun: ”nici Dumnezeu nu-ți cere să faci ce nu poți”. Oare, așa să fie? Mă tem că acești creștini se înșeală amarnic, crezând că viața de credință este o viață de confort personal și se autojustifică în fața prea-puținului pe care-l fac pentru Domnul.

Dumnezeu ne cere să facem totul pentru El. Da, chiar și ceea ce trece peste puterile noastre. „Scoală-te”, i-a zis Isus, „ridică-ţi patul şi umblă.” (Ioan 5:8) Aceste cuvinte le-a spus Domnul unui paralizat, care era în imposibilitate de a face lucrurile cerute de El, și totuși, Mântuitorul    îi cere să facă imposibilul. Și l-a făcut.

Dacă viața de credință se măsoară doar prin ceea ce pot eu să fac, ea rămâne o religie searbădă, care nu ajută la nimic, dar viața de credință este mult mai mult decât atât. Este viața care se bizuiește pe un Dumnezeu Atotputernic, un Dumnezeu care ne cheamă să îndrăznim imposibilul în Numele Lui.

Un creștinism trăit doar pe baza abilităților personale este doar o religie, din care poți liniștit să-l scoți afară pe Cristos, și nu îi vei simți lipsa. Creștinismul biblic este legat în mod organic de Cristos și această legătură cu El, face din cei ce se numesc creștini, oameni care trăiesc zilnic la granița dintre natural și supranatural. Ei ”pot totul în Cristos, care-I întărește.”(Filipeni4:13)>>(parerile.blogspot.ro)

Ierusalim,o poarta catre istorie si credinta(Documentar)

Faith leaders on Jesus meaning

Christians in the Middle East [ external source ]

Of the eight million people or so living in Israel, around 20% are Arabs—of whom about 7% are Christian. Israel's Arab Christians, in other words, number only about 110,000 people, living mostly in tight communities in Jerusalem and the Galilee.

For all the solicitous attention paid to them by such international Christian organizations as the World Council of Churches, you would think they were a larger and more important group. Much of the Vatican's diplomacy—its occasionally adversarial relations with Israel, its Palestinian favoritism, its reluctance to condemn the Islamic dictatorships—derives from its belief that the ancient Christian communities of the Middle East are at risk, and that the best way to defend them is to be seen to side with Arabs against their perceived enemies.

Hard to say the Vatican is wrong about the first part. At the beginning of the twentieth century, large numbers of Christians still lived in their traditional Orthodox and Catholic communities, from the Holy Mountain of Mount Athos all the way around the Mediterranean—through Asia Minor, down the Levant, and across North Africa to Morocco. In 1914, they made up 25% of Ottoman Empire.

The next year the Turks began the systematic part of their slaughter of the Armenians, and the churches of the Middle East have been in catastrophic decline ever since. By 2001, Christians were down to less than 1% of the Turkish population. The recent news out of Egypt—thousands of Coptic Christians fleeing the country since March, with 28 killed and hundreds wounded in Cairo on October 9—is only the latest installment in the ongoing story of the dying of ancient Christianity in the Middle East. The single most dangerous thing in the world to be, right now, is a member of a Christian community in a Muslim country.

The second part of the Vatican's view of the Middle East, however—the idea that what is left of the Christians can be defended by trying to forge relations with Muslim extremists—has proved dangerously wrong, both as an understanding of the Christians' situation and as a strategy for helping them.

Pope Benedict XVI has spoken often and clearly about Islamists, linking their energetic primitivism to the postmodern ennui of European elites. The Vatican's international-affairs officers, however, have been slow to grasp the pope's message, and on they seem to tread on the tired, old paths, seeking in the dark woods of Muslim politics some way to preserve the last remnants of the world as it was.

Christians in Europe and America need to recognize that, of all the Middle Eastern countries, the one that has managed best at keeping its Christians is Israel. The nation's Arab Christian community is small, but for decades it has remained stable. Meanwhile, the birth this year of the Republic of South Sudan has the potential to alter some of the diplomatic landscape. Although the nation is more African than Arab, its emergence as an ethnically Christian nation—the first in the area since France tried to protect the Maronite Christians with the creation of Lebanon in the 1940s—may offer a refuge for threatened Christians throughout the Middle East.

The most interesting and least understood change in the region, however, is the growth over the last decade of an entirely new Christian population. At least 200,000—and possibly as many as half a million—non-Arab Christians now live in Israel. Some are asylum-seekers from Sudan and Eritrea. Others are illegal immigrants who have slipped in from Egypt and guest workers from Goa, South America, and the Philippines. Add in the Jewish converts and the immigrants from Russia, and their numbers start to look significant.

A first-rate piece of reporting by the Associated Press this week describes the emergence of these people as an identifiable group in Israel. They work in normal Israeli jobs, their children speak Hebrew, and they think of themselves as fully Israeli—in marked contrast to the local Arab Christians who feel a cultural tie to Palestinian Muslims and remain generally antagonistic to the State of Israel.

Israel is not alone. In the Italian publication Chiesa, Sandro Magister notes that, throughout the Gulf, the population of immigrant workers is expanding. Kuwait alone has 350,000 Catholics among its guest workers, mostly from the Philippines and India, and they have begun to create their own culture within the Islamic state.

Pressure from local priests is at least causing the Vatican to move, however slowly, toward rearranging local vicariates to match the reality of the new distribution of the Christian population. Many of the old churches of the Middle East belonged to the Eastern Orthodox forms of Christianity, and few of the new Christians are Orthodox—which leaves the Orthodox denominations of Europe and America unwilling to act. The World Council of Churches, too, dominated by the fading Mainline Protestant churches, still blunders along in its old tracks, refusing to see the changed world of Christianity across the region.

Nothing in the Middle East ever seems to work out quite the way one hopes. But surely there is something worth noting in the re-emergence of even a tiny Christian population in the region that is unmoved by the Arab hatred of Israel, the ancient tribal divisions, and the envenomed rhetoric that dominates the political scene.

Joseph Bottum is a contributing editor to the Weekly Standard and the author of The Second Spring: Words into Music, Music into Words.

Why Does the Crucifix "Provoke" Muslims? [external source ]

The same "provocation," a crucifix, that prompted Muslim students in the United States to complain about "human rights" abuses at a private Catholic university, prompted Muslims in Egypt to murder a man.

First, the American incident. According to Fox News:

The Washington, D.C. Office of Human Rights confirmed that it is investigating allegations that Catholic University violated the human rights of Muslim students by not allowing them to form a Muslim student group and by not providing them rooms without Christian symbols for their daily prayers. The investigation alleges that Muslim students "must perform their prayers surrounded by symbols of Catholicism – such as a wooden crucifix, paintings of Jesus, pictures of priests and theologians which many Muslim students find inappropriate."

Representing the lawsuit is John F. Banzhaf III, a George Washington University professor, whose websiteboasts that his "enemies" call him a "Legal-Terrorist" and "the Osama bin Laden of Torts." He asserts that Muslim students are "particularly offended" because they have to "meditate" at the school's chapels and cathedral, where they pray while "having to stare up and be looked down upon by a cross of Jesus."

Of course, as a private Christian institution, even Banzhaf admits "that it is technically not illegal for Catholic University to refuse to provide rooms devoid of religious icons." Still, according to this so-called "Legal-Terrorist," that CUA is not submitting to Muslim demands "suggests they are acting improperly and probably with malice."

The reader is left to decide who really is acting "with malice": a private institution operating under private—in this case, Christian—principles, or Muslims,, who are free to attend non-Christian institutions, "offended" by Christian symbols?

Banzhaf further tried to denigrate CUA by boasting of how neighboring Georgetown University, a nominally "Christian" university, "provides its Muslim students with a separate prayer room and even a Muslim chaplain"—as if it is not well known that Georgetown's Arab and Islam departments receive much largesse by way of donations from the radical Wahhabis of Saudi Arabia --who, incidentally, refuse to permit churches, or even a Bible; or, in Mecca and Medina, even people -- whom they call-"Infidels" -- just because they are not Muslim. If that is not apartheid, what is?

Notable, too, is why Muslim students are seeking to create Islamic havens (or enclaves): As one of them put it, "Arab [code for "Muslim"] and American students have a difficult time befriending each other because people naturally gravitate towards others with similar backgrounds and interests." This is, rather, a product of Islam's own doctrine of wala' wa bara', which commands Muslims to be loyal to each other, but to completely disassociate themselves from "infidels."

Conversely, consider Muslim behavior toward Christian symbols, specifically the crucifix, where Muslims are the majority and thus in charge.

It was just revealed that a Christian student in Egypt who refused to obey his Muslim teacher's orders to cover up his cross was strangled and beaten to death by the teacher and fellow students. When the headmaster was informed of the attack, he ignored it and "continued to sip his tea." As usual, Egyptian media, insisting the conflict was "non-sectarian," covered it up.

In the words of the prominent Egyptian columnist Farida El-Shobashy, writing in the independent newspaperMasry Youm: "I was shaken to the bones when I read the news that a teacher forced a student to take off the crucifix he wore, and when the Christian student stood firm for his rights, the teacher quarreled with him, joined by some of the students; he was beastly assaulted until his last breath left him."

Further, the Maspero massacre, in which the Egyptian military killed dozens of demonstrating Christians—including running live Christians over with armored-vehicles—was a product of anti-Christian sentiment: Muslims insisted that a Coptic church be stripped of its dome and cross, so it would not resemble a church; as a Muslim elder put it, "the Cross provokes us and our children." When Christians refused to budge, Muslims destroyed the church. This is what Christians were protesting when the Egyptian military mowed them down to cries of "Allahu Akbar" ["Allah is Greater"].

Where Islam is weak, Muslims, spearheaded by Islamist organizations like Council on American Islamic Relations [CAIR], employ stealth, "terrorist-lawyers," and calls for "human rights"to demand respect for their "human rights;" where Islam is strong or dominant, Muslims simply take action into their own hands to violate the human rights of others. In both cases, the motivation is the same: to suppress all things "infidel" until, in the words of the Quran (2:193), "idolatry is no more and Allah's religion reigns supreme."

Raymond Ibrahim, an Islam and Middle East specialist, is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and an Associate Fellow at the Middle East Forum.

hudson-ny.org

Don't Be Ashamed [ devotion ]

Read Psalm 25:1-7 

Have you ever been so ashamed that you wanted to go somewhere and hide forever? Did you want to dig a hole, crawl into it and then pull the hole in after you? Read verses 1-3: "To You, O Lord, I lift up my soul. O my God, I trust in You; let me not be ashamed; let not my enemies triumph over me. Indeed, let no one who waits on You be ashamed; let those be ashamed who deal treacherously without cause." David was concerned that he would bring disgrace upon the name of the Lord.

When we are anxious not to be ashamed, we want to live a life that is true to the Lord. We don't want anyone to use us as an excuse for sin or to single us out as "one of those Christians." So one of our first considerations must be the glory of God. This is what David talks about in verses 1-3. He is saying, "God, I don't want anybody to do anything that will rob You of glory." Why don't we do certain things? Because God won't be glorified. Some things might not hurt us, and some places might not defile us, but they might hurt the glory of God. They might harm an immature believer. When my wife and I started to have a family, we discovered we couldn't leave certain things on the table. When she and I were the only ones in the apartment, I could leave a knife on the table or a pair a scissors on the floor--but not when the children came along.

Our second consideration must be the will of God. "Show me Your ways, O Lord; teach me Your paths. Lead me in Your truth and teach me" (vv. 4,5). To bring glory to God and obey His will, we must depend on the grace of God. "Remember, O Lord, Your tender mercies and Your lovingkindnesses" (v. 6). When these three elements are in your life, you will never be ashamed or bring disgrace to the name of the Lord. Instead, you will live a life that pleases Him.

Being true to the Lord involves consideration of His glory, will and grace. Do your actions and words bring glory to God? Are you living in His will? Are you depending on His grace? Take care to honor God with your life.

Dr. Warren Wiersbe

! UK Anglicans Move Closer to Allowing Women Bishops

LONDON – The Church of England came a step closer to opening the door to women bishops on Monday after legislation cleared the revision stage.

The draft measure on women bishops was approved after a lengthy and at times impassioned debate stretching over several days in York. A last minute attempt by one traditionalist to have the draft Measure sent back to the Revision Committee for further consideration was rejected by Synod as supporters made it clear they were anxious for the legislation to move to the next stage.

The legislation will now pass to diocesan synods for consideration. If it is approved by the majority of dioceses, it will be brought back before General Synod in 18 months for the final drafting stage.

The outcome of the debate is a victory for supporters of women bishops, who have long campaigned for them since the Church of England first started ordaining priests in 1994.

Christina Rees, Synod member and prominent women bishops campaigner, said the outcome of today's debate was a "wonderful result".

"There is a wonderful sense of being in a place where the church has finally taken the decision to go to the next stage of the process," she said.

"People out in the dioceses are ready and willing to have women bishops and they are wondering why it has taken so long."

While some traditionalists said they doubted the legislation would pass at final approval stage following the defeat of the Archbishops' amendment on Saturday, Rees said she did not share their "doom and gloom."

"This is the last meeting of the current term of Synod before elections take place and there will be around a 30 percent change in membership. Who's to say Synod won't be more representative of the church by the time the measure comes back for debate?" she said.

"The current Synod is less in favor of women bishops than the church overall and it may be that the next Synod is a more representative body."

Influential evangelical theologian Elaine Storkey said the Church had come to the place where “we just have to move on.”

“We have to disagree in grace and I think we are nearly there,” she said.

The debate has upset traditionalists who say their voices went unheard as Synod voted down several amendments providing for parishes that could not in conscience accept the leadership of a woman bishop.

They included the amendment put forward by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York that would have allowed for “co-ordinate jurisdiction” by a female diocesan bishop and a male nominated bishop, as well as amendments proposing the transfer of jurisdiction and the creation of separate dioceses for opponents.

Some members of Synod have already declared their intentions to leave the Church of England as they are unhappy with existing provisions contained within the draft measure. The provisions require that a female diocesan bishop make a scheme containing arrangements for the exercise of certain episcopal duties by a male bishop where this has been requested by a traditionalist parish.

It is believed that some Anglo-Catholics will make the move to the Roman Catholic Church, after the Pope invited them to join the Catholic fold earlier this year. Traditionalist evangelical parishes may seek the oversight of a sympathetic bishop.

The Rev. Preb David Houlding, Synod member and Master of the Society of the Holy Cross, said there was “despair” among the Anglo-Catholic society’s English members.

He said: “What we have before us in this measure does not in any way provide for people like myself. It’s not just a case of not meeting the mark, it simply doesn’t understand the theological position we hold and this, therefore, is for me and so many friends a moment of real crisis. There is real hardship right now in what is going on ... I don’t have a lot of hope for the future for the moment.”

In a surprise move, Synod voted to reject a proposal to form a hardship fund for clergy who decide to leave the Church of England following the weekend’s debate. The Revision Committee, which drafted the legislation, said there was no legal obligation for the church to provide financial support and admitted that it also did not have sufficient funds.

Summing up at the end of the debate, the Archbishop of Canterbury Dr. Rowan Williams acknowledged that many traditionalists were feeling “bruised and excluded” and that the last few days of debate had been marked by “stress and difficulty.”

He agreed, however, that it was time for the draft legislation to be sent out to dioceses for consideration and that Anglicans on both side of the divide would have to “find ways of serving one another through this no matter how challenging that may seem.” He said he hoped dioceses would regard the process of reflecting on the legislation as “more than a mechanical task.”

The final legislation must be approved by a two-thirds majority in each of the houses of Synod – laity, clergy and bishops – before it can come into law. The first consecration of a woman bishop is not expected to take place before 2014.

christianpost.com 

FLASHBACK 2.0.0.9 [part. 2 ]

Da-mi doar libertatea!

Nu numai sa vorbesc...

Immortality [ Man's will vs God's will ]

Religion - An Introduction

Christianity [Britannica Student Article]

Religions of the world : Christianity - The world's largest religion [A brief introduction to Christianity]

Religions of the world : Christianity - The world's largest religion [ Who is a christian ? ]

Religions of the world : Christianity - The world's largest religion [Crestinismul primar si epocile urmatoare]

Religions of the world : Christianity - The world's largest religion [ Original christianity and the following epochs ]

Religions of the world : Christianity - The world's largest religion [ Fragmentation of the primitive Christian movement ]

Religions of the world : Christianity - The world's largest religion [ Current status. Diversity of beliefs ]

Christianity Beliefs: Creationism and intelligent design

Drumul înspre Dumnezeu

DESTEAPTA-TE CRESTINE

Does God exist ? / Exista Dumnezeu ?

Puterea lui Dumnezeu / God's power

©Wild-Voice 2009-20010

Cautam o biserica ?

„Ce căutăm, ce dorim noi în acest sens?
Să facem o cernere a lucrurilor esențiale dintre cele generale.
Căutăm o biserică națională, romană, anglicană, grecească, olandeză (reformată), etc? Căutăm o biserică denominațională, metodistă, baptistă, episcopală, luterană, presbiteriană, independentă, etc? Căutăm o biserică ”liberă” sau ”de stat”, nedenominațională, interdenominațională? Căutăm o biserică ”deschisă” sau ”exclusivistă”? Căutăm o biserică cu anumite caracteristici particulare, moduri de practică, formă și comportament? Căutăm ”o biserică nou-testamentală” sau biserici cu anumite lucruri luate din Noul Testament care o constituie? Căutăm o catedrală sau o clădire simplă, mare sau mică? Are biserica căutată de noi un interior anume: fie el simplu, modest sau împodobit? Își îndreaptă Dumnezeu privirea din ”Locașul Ceresc” spre astfel de lucruri, le caută El? Dorește El așa ceva? Îl interesează aceste lucruri câtuși de puțin? Este El impresionat de podoabe și ornamente; de pompa și procesiunea desfășurării? Îl impresionează pe Atotputernicul îmbrăcămintea și veșmintele noastre preoțești și sacerdotale, robele, vestaliile, sutanele și turbanele? Privește El la toate acestea cu admirație și uimire? Le acordă atenție sau pur și simplu le ignoră? Și dacă totuși privește la ele nu o face oare plin de compătimire, poate chiar distrându-Se de ce vede? Bietele ființe omenești care se joacă de-a biserica și de-a serviciile religioase asemenea copiilor din vremea lui Isus care jucau în piețe pentru nunți și înmormîntări! Este vreun lucru din toate acestea sau toate laolaltă care să atragă privirea ”Celui care șade în cer”? (Psalm 2:4).”
„ Dumnezeu și Cerul nu sunt interesați de acel lucru care poartă numele de Biserică și nici bisericile locale ca atare. Dumnezeu și Cerul sunt interesați de Cristos, de natura Sa, natură cerească: în Duh și-n adevăr, în viață veșnică, în purtare și comportament ; în valori și caracter, în autoritate și luptă; în biruință asupra păcatului, asupra lui Satan și asupra lumii. Fără-ndoială, nu este vorba de o așezare în termeni geografici, ci ”oriunde doi sau trei sunt adunați laolaltă în Numele Meu, acolo sunt și Eu.” Asta se poate întâmpla pe vapor sau în avion și nici una, nici cealaltă nu sunt așezări fixe. Cristos poate să fie în Efes sau Laodicea sau în orice alt loc, dar Cel care definește Biserica este Cristos, nu locul! Cristos poate să Se afle într-o adunare, într-un clădire, într-o denominațiune cu toate astea cei de-acolo, luați ca întreg, să nu se afle în Cristos. Noi pe El Îl căutăm. Când ne strângem, la El ne strângem. EL este Terenul; ne adunăm pe El.Față de o bună parte din ”creștinism” și din”creștinătate” trebuie să ne-nchidem ochii deliberat, să ”nu le cunoaștem potrivit cărnii”, preocuparea noastră fiind Cristosul din oameni. ”Părtășia noastră este cu Tatăl și cu Fiul Său”. Dacă nu-L putem găsi în oameni, atunci acolo nu există părtășie cerească.”
„”Temelia Bisericii” trebuie să fie Cristos, doar Cristos; El trebuie să hotărască toate lucrurile și să fie răspunsul tuturor problemelor ”bisericii” noastre. Să ne grăbim să adăugăm că această scrisoare ne arată cât de valoroasă este exprimarea corporativă a lui Cristos oriunde ar fi ea. Aceste valori (strângerile laolaltă) sunt pentru credincios și lumea din jurul său. Asemenea strângeri sunt legate de prezența lui Cristos ca Trup, ca protecție și acoperire, ca zidire și maturitate; ca înrădăcinare și temeinicie; ca putere spirituală și ascendență; ca funcționare reciprocă și slujire; ca mărturie și impact asupra teritoriilor satanice și modului de gândire al îngerilor. În această scrisoare, toate astea se raportează la o adevărată expresie a lui Cristos. Dacă întrebăm: ”Poate să existe o asemenea expresie?” răspunsul nostru este: ”Da, chiar dacă nu este perfectă și desăvârșită, poate să existe într-o măsură vitală”.



Sursa: T.Austin Sparks, Misiunea, scopul şi mesajul lui Cristos în scrisoarea către Efeseni.

[ News] Vatican cardinal blames Christians over 'Islamisation' of Europe

Christians have become too selfish and pagan to defend spiritual heritage of the continent, says Miloslav Vlk

Muslims are conquering Europe because Christians have become too selfish and pagan to defend the spiritual heritage of the continent, a Vatican cardinal said this week.

Miloslav Vlk, who has served as archbishop of Prague since 1991 and was considered as a successor to John Paul II, launched an outspoken attack on Christians living in Europe and accused them of allowing Muslims to "Islamise" the continent.

He warned that Europe would "fall" to Islam if people continued to deny their Christian roots.

In an interview published on his website, Vlk blamed immigration and high birth rates among Muslims for filling "the vacant space created as Europeans systematically empty the Christian content of their lives".

The 77-year-old said: "Europe has denied its Christian roots from which it has risen and which could give it the strength to fend off the danger that it will be conquered by Muslims – which is actually happening gradually. If Europe doesn't change its relation to its own roots, it will be Islamised.

"At the end of the Middle Ages and in the early modern age, Islam failed to conquer Europe with arms. The Christians beat them then. Today, when the fighting is done with spiritual weapons which Europe lacks while Muslims are perfectly armed, the fall of Europe is looming."

It was Muslims and not Christians, said Vlk, who were shaping the spiritual outlook of Europe. "The Muslims definitely have many reasons to be heading here. They also have a religious one – to bring the spiritual values of faith in God to the pagan environment of Europe, to its atheistic style of life."

In a separate interview, a second cardinal criticised Islam for repressing religious freedom.

Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, who served as the Vatican's foreign minister from 1990 to 2003 and was appointed president of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue in 2007, urged countries to protect the right of religious freedom in their laws.

He told the Italian newspaper L'Osservatore Romano that such protection was assured in various Muslim countries with the exception of Saudi Arabia, where nearly 2 million Christians were deprived of public prayer gatherings. "They feel tolerated rather than a partner in public dialogue. And this does not do anyone any good."

He also commented on the Swiss referendum to ban the construction of new minarets, and seemed to approve of the outcome. "Naturally it is necessary to harmonize construction with the atmosphere in which it comes to be a part, with the city landscape, the cultural context, and the complex of the laws and norms that regulate the life of the society."

guardian.co.uk

Christianity [Britannica Student Article]

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Introduction

On a late afternoon, in about the year AD 30, two men were walking from Jerusalem to the nearby village of Emmaus. Their conversation centered on notable events that had occurred the previous week. As they journeyed, they were joined by a stranger who seemed ignorant of these events. Surprised, they asked him: “Are you the only person staying in Jerusalem not to know what has happened there in the last few days?” So they explained to him about a certain Jesus of Nazareth, “a prophet powerful in speech and action before God and the whole people. Our chief priests and rulers handed him over [to the Roman authorities] to be sentenced to death, and [they] crucified him. But we were hoping that he was the man to liberate Israel.” Even more amazing, they went on to say, were reports from some women who visited his tomb that he was alive again, raised from the dead.

Suddenly the stranger spoke: “How dull-witted you two are! And how slow to believe all that the prophets said. Was not the messiah bound to suffer thus before entering upon his glory?” Then he went on to clarify from the Hebrew scriptures all the passages that referred to himself. For the stranger was Jesus of Nazareth, of whom the two had been speaking.

Based on the life, death, and coming to life again of this man Jesus—also called the Christ—there has developed the world's largest religion, Christianity. It claims more than one billion members in all parts of the world. In the late 20th century, it is divided into hundreds of groups, or denominations, the largest of which are the Roman Catholic church, the Eastern Orthodox churches, and innumerable Protestant churches.

Expectation and Reality

The two men on the road to Emmaus were not disinterested bystanders. They were followers (called disciples, or learners) of Jesus who had known him for at least three years. During this period they had listened to all he said and had witnessed his amazing actions, such as healing the sick, giving sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf, and even bringing individuals back to life. They had become convinced that he was “the one who was to redeem Israel.”

Israel wanted and expected redemption. This small Jewish nation, located in the eastern part of the Roman Empire, had for centuries looked forward to a time when their God would, through some decisive action, free it from outside domination and establish it as the preeminent nation in the world. One way he might do this was by sending a messiah (Christos in Greek) who would deliver them from their enemies and become their king. The word messiah means “the lord's anointed,” someone God has set aside for a specific task.

Christians believe that Jesus, from the small town of Nazareth in Galilee, was that messiah. They also believe that what he accomplished far exceeded the expectations of Israel. The Jews looked for a messiah exclusively for themselves, though his power would be such as to draw other nations to a belief in their God. Christians believe that Jesus, as God's agent, accomplished something that was intended to benefit the whole world directly without being tied to the fate of any single nation. His work is to be considered inclusive of everyone in all times and places.

The Man and the Message

With all the differences in beliefs in the many denominations of Christianity, it is impossible to set out one list of teachings that apply to all Christians everywhere. The reason for this is fairly simple. Jesus, along with his life and work, are for Christians objects of faith; and the objects of faith are thought of by different people in different ways and differently in various periods of history. No one has ever succeeded in distilling an “essence of Christianity.” But the early followers of Jesus came the closest in their assertion that “Jesus is lord.” By this they seemed to mean that he was more than a man. He was also, in some incomprehensible way, God. And by his ministry, death, and resurrection he had accomplished a universal salvation available to all who believe in him.

What Jesus said and did can be gleaned from the first four books of the Bible's New Testament . These books—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—are not biographies; they are called Gospels, a word that means “good news,” because they are his followers' written testimonies of what his life was all about.

The Gospels depict a man who was thoroughly imbued with the whole tradition of Israel's religion from the time of Abraham onward.

From what Jesus said and did, his followers came to believe that God was perhaps acting through him in a very special way. Very possibly he was the one long awaited who would inaugurate God's kingdom on Earth. It was reasonable that they should think this, for they too were Israelites; and they saw in his words and deeds what portended to be the dawning of a new age. What dashed their hopes was his ignoble death, for crucifixion was a punishment reserved for criminals. Then came the great surprise: He was raised from the dead and appeared to them again over a period of 40 days. This stunning event required a complete reassessment of what Jesus was all about.

It is this reassessment that forms the basis for the writings of the New Testament. The Gospels themselves are part of it, but it is more strikingly conveyed by the other 23 books, all written by his followers over the subsequent decades after he had left them.

For he had left them. How and where to could only be explained as his returning to the God who had sent him. But he did not leave them forever: He promised that he would one day return, and he gave them a mission to perform—to carry the message about his life and work to the whole world.

The Assembly of Believers: the Church

First, a word about terminology. The small group of Jesus' followers that gathered in Jerusalem after his departure did not call themselves anything. The word Christian came into use years later and was at first a derogatory term applied by outsiders. When the books of the New Testament were written, the word used to name the believers was simply assembly. The Greek word is ecclesia and denotes any assembly of people, though it often had political connotations. Much later, probably in the 3rd or 4th century, the word church came into use to denote the specific kind of assembly that the believers composed. The term church is also of Greek origin, from the word kuriakon, meaning “belonging to the lord.” It is now the most common term applied to groups of Christians as well as to the totality of the world's Christian membership. The word is also frequently applied to denominations, a usage now so common as to be unavoidable. Denominations are, however, institutional arrangements based on specific viewpoints and traditional practices. They exist as a result of long historical development, doctrinal diversity, and geographical separation.

During the first decades of the church's existence, there were four significant accomplishments: The assembly of believers separated themselves from the religion of Israel; they formulated an extensive assessment of what the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus meant; new congregations of believers were founded in all parts of the Roman Empire; and the believers improvised organizational arrangements and forms of worship that were to remain influential.

Separation from Israel.

The early Christians were all Jews. They remained in Jerusalem and partook of the religious observances in the Temple. They differed from their fellow Jews only in that they believed that the Messiah had come. Had they remained quiet about their conviction, they might well have remained a sect within Judaism. However, they insisted on preaching to all who would listen that the Jesus whom the Jewish authorities had persecuted was the one Israel had long awaited. This preaching aroused great hostility on the part of religious leaders, and the early Christians were persecuted.

Yet these Christians had no thought of venturing beyond the confines of Israel with their message. It was only with the appearance of a man named Saul of Tarsus that the assembly of believers enlarged its horizons to include the whole known world. Saul, a strict Jew, was a persecutor of the church. He was nevertheless converted, and, after changing his name to Paul, began what is called the mission to the gentiles. (The word gentile is simply a cover-all term for all non-Jewish peoples.) It was this man who, more than any other, pulled the church out from temple and synagogue and set it apart as a separate institution.

But the separation was, for Paul, more than a physical one. It was also doctrinal. Christians, he asserted, did not have to become Jews. They were not subject to all the rites, rituals, and laws of Israel's religion. This, perhaps more than any other factor, aroused the intense hostility of the Jews and led to a definitive separation of the two camps.

Assessment.

The books of the New Testament, particularly the writings of Paul, contain the early church's testimonies about who Jesus was and what his life meant. The first issue that had to be settled was whether Jesus was for Israel only. The answer, already noted, was no. That he was for Israel in some sense was undoubtedly true, because he is presented as the one who had fulfilled every prophecy and promise in Israel's scriptures (called by Christians the Old Testament). The first verse of the Book of Hebrews states: “When in former times God spoke to our forefathers, he spoke in fragmentary and varied fashion through the prophets. But in this, the final age, he has spoken to us in the Son whom he has made heir to the whole universe, and through whom he created all orders of existence.” In this verse, and in many other places, the New Testament makes clear that Jesus was the full and final revelation from God for all people.

This represented a whole new way of thinking about God. Somehow this Jesus was one with the creator. This notion is abhorrent to both Judaism and Islam, which are strictly monotheistic religions for whom God is one and cannot be divided. But the Christians had to deal with this problem, and from what they believed about Jesus they could come to no other conclusion. They claimed it to be true, even though they could not understand or explain it. They simply believed it and stated it in their early confession: Jesus is lord.

How could this man have achieved such status? The writers of the New Testament answer: by his death and resurrection. But how could these events, occurring as they did in a remote part of the Roman Empire, have a universal significance? Paul himself admitted that the notion was scandalous; it was offensive to Israel because the Jews could never conceive of their messiah being put to death; and it was likely to appear as plain nonsense to gentiles who had no knowledge of Israel's beliefs. Yet it was stated as true by all early Christians. They believed that Jesus, by his death, had paid a universal penalty for all human unbelief and disobedience toward God. They further asserted that the resurrection was the first act by which God was restoring the whole creation. Creation was, in the words of some modern Christians, being “born again,” being reconstituted and remade after God's original intention. This was the message the earliest Christians took, first to Israel, then to the rest of the world.

Mission to the gentiles.

Paul and his associates took this message to most of the urban centers of the Mediterranean world. By the end of the 1st century there were strong congregations in Alexandria, Ephesus, Antioch, Corinth, Thessalonica, and even at Rome, the capital of the empire. Jerusalem, the mother church, was dispersed when the Roman legions destroyed the city in AD 70 during a Jewish uprising.

Organization and worship.

It is unlikely that the early Christians intended to devise structures that would endure for centuries. But any institution, to operate successfully, must organize itself. Of first importance in the church were the apostles, those who had been with Jesus during his lifetime. To their number Paul was later added. They were the living and authoritative voices that could be appealed to on all questions of belief . To assist them, deacons, or attendants, were appointed to help in preaching and in the everyday operation of the congregations. Later, there developed other leaders called elders (in Greek, presbyteroi, from which the modern Presbyterian denomination gets its name) and leaders called episkopoi (literally meaning “overseers”—the word episcopal is derived from it—normally translated as bishops).

The early church had no clergy; it had people who performed specific functions—leading worship, preaching, collecting offerings, and feeding and clothing the poor among them. But as centuries passed, the three functions of bishop, elder (priest), and deacon became arranged in a hierarchy. The bishop became the overseer for a city or region. He was, as well, the authoritative person in matters of doctrine. In time these functionaries came to be set apart from the rest of the membership by a process called ordination—suggesting that they were a special order within the church. One of the problems that troubles modern denominations is the relation between these ordained offices and the regular members of the denomination, called the laity. Some denominations have attempted to erase the distinction, while others have held rather rigidly to the traditional forms.

In its worship life, Christianity borrowed greatly from Jewish forms. Christians used prayers, sang psalms, read from the scriptures (the Old Testament) and from some of Paul's letters, and listened to someone expound the scripture passages for the day. The day was Sunday, to commemorate the resurrection, which had taken place on the first day of the week.

In addition, Christians used two rites that had been commanded of them by Jesus himself. These rites, often called sacraments, or holy acts, were baptism and the Lord's Supper (or Eucharist, meaning “thanksgiving”). Baptism, an immersion in water to represent the washing away of sin, was the initiating rite by which one became a member of the church. The Lord's Supper was originally a community meal, followed by the receiving of bread and wine. This meal was a remembrance of Jesus' last meal with his disciples before he died. Today these rites are so variously defined by the many denominations that no single interpretation of them is possible.

God's Presence in the Church

Before Jesus left his disciples, he promised them that they would not be alone and helpless in the world. He said that after he was gone he would send them a helper, a teacher, a comforter to sustain them and aid in carrying out the church's mission. He called this helper the Holy Spirit. It would be the Holy Spirit's purpose to “guide them into all truth” and to bring to remembrance all that Jesus had said and done. The books of the New Testament are vivid in their conviction that this spirit was indeed living and working through the first Christians. They were spared neither pain, persecution, nor death; but they were convinced that God's spirit was sustaining them in all their endeavors.

The faith that the Holy Spirit was working among them again forced the early Christians to broaden their understanding of God. They concluded that he had revealed himself as the creator of all things, as Jesus the redeemer, and lastly as the spirit that sustained and preserved the church. To explain this impenetrable mystery, early Christian thinkers devised the doctrine of the Trinity. This doctrine was never an explanation of God. All it could do was set forth the firm belief that, for Christians, God was somehow at the same time one and three.

Life of Discipleship

Essentially Jesus commended to his followers the same type of life he led: selfless obedience to the will of God. He called himself a servant and said that they were to be servants as well. They were to fear nothing, not even death. He summed up what their basic attitude was to be by saying, “You shall love the Lord your God above all things and your neighbor as yourself.” They were to do good to all people and to carry the message concerning him everywhere. Above all, they were not to be just people who believed certain doctrines. Their obedience was to be an active participation in the life of the world.

Paul summed up the characteristics of the individual Christian by saying: “Put on the garments that suit God's chosen people . . . compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience. Be forbearing with one another, and forgiving. The nature of the individual Christian's obedience and quality of life was generally left to private judgment within these parameters. Christians over the centuries have found a great variety of ways to express their individual faithfulness.

A Short History

The history of Christianity is filled with conflict, controversy, and division. It also has countless instances of brilliant creativity in worship, architecture, painting, sculpture, music, and literature. And in all ages churches have sought to carry out the mission entrusted to them by Jesus. Within this article only a very brief summary of the history can be given.

Early period to AD 380.

Christianity became established in nearly all parts of the Roman Empire and in the Middle East during the first two centuries. As it continued to grow and expand, it became the object of persecution by the Roman authorities. The severest persecutions came during the reigns of the emperors Domitian (AD 96), Marcus Aurelius (161–180), Decius (249–251), and Valerian (253–260). Worst of all was the attempt by the Emperor Diocletian (284–305) to extinguish Christianity altogether. But in 313 Constantine the Great issued an edict of toleration for all religions. In 380, Theodosius I made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire.

Middle Ages.

Although the church was empire-wide, two cities came to be more influential than others in guiding its affairs: Rome and Constantinople (now Istanbul). Many theological disputes arose in the centuries after Constantine, and these were usually settled by councils . The Roman church, headed by its bishop, the pope, gradually diverged in both belief and practice from the church at Constantinople, headed by its patriarch. The Roman church became dominant in Western Europe, while the church at Constantinople dominated the East. In 1054 the two churches broke off relations with each other.

Modern period.

Early in the 16th century a split occurred in the Roman church. Since that time the church in the West has been divided primarily between the Roman Catholic and Protestant segments. The term Protestantism has come to refer to nearly any denomination that is not affiliated with either the Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox branches. Among the older Protestant denominations are the Lutheran, Anglican, Presbyterian, Reformed, Methodist, and Baptist.

In the 20th century there have been attempts to revitalize and reunify the church. The World Council of Churches, founded in 1948, is an organization made up of most denominations except for the Roman Catholic. In the 1960s the Roman Church, in its Second Vatican Council, strove for spiritual renewal and modernization. Thus, after many centuries, most of the denominations that make up the worldwide church are in contact with one another. Many are involved in cooperative projects, and others have undertaken actual merger negotiations. The Roman and Orthodox churches resumed contact in 1965.

Additional references about Christianity

Barrett, C.D. Understanding the Christian Faith (Prentice, 1980).

Barth, Karl. The Word of God and the Word of Man (Peter Smith, 1958).

Dawson, Christopher. Christianity in East and West (Sugden, 1981).

Frend, W.H.C. The Rise of Christianity (Fortress, 1984).

Gaustad, E.S. A Religious History of America (Harper, 1966).

Johnson, Paul. A History of Christianity (Atheneum, 1976).

Lewis, C.S. Mere Christianity (Macmillan, 1964).

Marty, Martin. Christianity in the New World (Winston Press, 1984).

To cite this page:

• MLA Style: "Christianity." Britannica Student Library. Encyclopædia Britannica 2009 Student and Home Edition. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica, 2009.
• APA Style: Christianity. (2009). Britannica Student Library. Encyclopædia Britannica 2009 Student and Home Edition. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica.

Delete Selected Notes

Christianity Beliefs: Creationism and intelligent design

Christians who take the Bible literally believe the world was created by God in seven days. In recent years, some Christians have put forward the idea of an 'intelligent designer' as an alternative to the science of evolution.

Introduction

Virtually all religions include an explanation for life on Earth in their scriptures. In the UK, and even more so in the USA, the creationism debate largely involves Christians.

In March 2006, Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, joined the evolution versus creationism debate when he said in an interview with the Guardian newspaper that he did not believe that creationism - the scriptural account of the origins of the world - should be taught in schools.

I think creationism is, in a sense, a kind of category mistake, as if the Bible were a theory like other theories. Whatever the biblical account of creation is, it's not a theory alongside theories. It's not as if the writer of Genesis or whatever sat down and said well, how am I going to explain all this... 'In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth...' - Rowan Williams in The Guardian, 21 March 2006

So what is creationism all about - what does it mean, and why does it matter so much to many religious people? And what is intelligent design and how does it differ from creationism?

Creationism

The main points of creationism are these:
- All life was created by the actions of God
- Some Creationists say God did this in a single creative event
- Some Creationists don't limit creation to one event
- All the forms of life existing today were created by the actions of God
- The organisms created by God can't produce new forms of organism - only God can do this
- The most common theory follows the accounts in the Biblical Book of Genesis, but most religions have their own creation story
- Modern creationism uses scientific evidence to support scripture
- Most scientists say the creationism theory is false and unscientific

Intelligent design (also called neo-Creationism)
- The current state of life on Earth has come about through the actions of an intelligent Designer
- This is because
-Some living things contain certain types of complexity that are best explained as the result of an intelligent cause
- Some aspects of the universe show positive evidence of having been designed by some form of intelligence
- This designer need not be God but most proponents of intelligent design seem to have God in mind
- This theory has been accused of being creationism in disguise
- Although a few scientists have supported intelligent design, the majority of those working in the field regard the theory as false and unscientific

Creationism in depth

Creationism teaches that:
- everything in the universe has God as its ultimate cause
- the nature of life on Earth is the direct result of God's creative actions

An alternative way of putting the same idea is:
- the universe and everything in it could not have come into being without a supreme being causing it to happen

Creationism is largely based on religious belief, but gains much support from what its protagonists see as the failures of other theories to explain the evidence properly.

Different religions and cultures have different creation theories, but this article deals with the Jewish/Christian version.

Forms of creationism
Forms of creationism

Creationism teaches that life on Earth is the result of God's creative action, and not the result of blind scientific processes. Creationism doesn't attempt to explain how God did this:

We do not know how God created, what processes He used, for God used processes which are not now operating anywhere in the natural universe. This is why we refer to divine creation as Special Creation. We cannot discover by scientific investigation anything about the creative processes used by God. - Gish, Evolution? The Fossils Say No!, 1979

It comes in a variety of forms, and the most common are listed below. But there are other forms of Creationism which include different combinations of the ideas mentioned:

Young Earth creationism

Young Earth creationism teaches that:
- The Book of Genesis is literally true
- the Earth and all forms of life were created by God in 6 days, around 10,000 years ago.

Scientists are almost unanimous in saying that as the Earth is 4 billion years old, and that the Young Earth theory is false.

Old Earth creationism

Old Earth creationism teaches that:
- The Earth is as old as scientists say (around 4 billion years)
- The universe, Earth, and life were created by processes in which God played an active part
- There have been countless divine acts of creation throughout history
- God acts both by direct creation and by guiding the processes he created
- Humanity was directly created by God
- The difference between this theory and Theistic Evolution is that in Theistic Evolution God doesn't play an active part after the original creation of the universe and the forces that operate in it.

Gap creationism

Gap creationism adds a new idea:
- There were two creations - one before Adam, and a second one, which included Adam and Eve, after a lengthy time gap
- This theory reconciles the age of the Earth with the story in Genesis

Most scientists say that the geological evidence shows that this theory is false.

Day-Age creationism

Day-Age creationism adds an element that reconciles the long period of time shown by the fossil record with the story in Genesis.
- Each 'day' in the Biblical '6 days' of creation wasn't really a day, but a period of millions of years
- The theory is supported by Biblical references that show that one of 'God's days' is a lot longer than 24 hours

For a thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by... - Psalm 90:4

With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. - 2 Peter 3:8

Progressive creationism

Progressive creationism accepts the scientific timetable of creation, and gives evolution a small part to play in the story of life.
- God created the various 'kinds' (some people would say 'species' but other categories have been suggested) of plant and animal one after another - according to the timetable shown by the fossil record
- The scientific timetable of creation reflects the timetable that God used to create life on earth
- God created each kind of organism as we find it
- Different forms of organism are separate creations, not the result of evolution from an earlier form
- Some created organisms do become extinct
- Micro-evolution can take place within a kind of organism to produce subtle variations
- Lions, tigers and cats within the cat family
- Different sizes of beak within the Galapagos finches

Islamic Creationism

Creationism is not just a Christian issue. Muslim creationists base their thinking on similar scientific arguments and on passages such as this in the Qur'an:

And God has created every animal from water. Of them there are some that creep on their bellies, some that walk on two legs and some that walk on four. God creates what he wills for verily God has power over all things. - Qur'an

Intelligent design
Intelligent design

The Intelligent Design theory claims that some sort of supernatural designer was involved in the creation of life on Earth. It differs from Creationism because it divorces Creationist ideas from their roots in Scripture.

The argument in favour of Intelligent Design has two parts:
- Evolutionary theory doesn't fully explain the origin and development of life on Earth
- Life on Earth - and more generally the universe - shows so much order, purpose and design that there must have been a designer

The important part of the Intelligent Design theory is "design", and the idea that the Universe and life must somehow be designed is a very old one, going right back to Aristotle.

Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century used the argument to try and prove the existence of God:
- wherever complex design exists, there must have been a designer
- nature is complex
- therefore nature must have had an intelligent designer

Most intelligent design arguments avoid any reference to scripture and try to eliminate anything that might look as if it was derived from religious belief.

This may be partly to ensure that the theory doesn't fall foul of the separation of Religion and State in the US constitution, since there seems no inherent reason why the designer shouldn't be 'God'.

In this discussion, Harry McDonald, President of Kansas Citizens for Science defends Darwinism, and Doctor William Harris, a medical academic, attacks the theory


In the case of Kitzmiller v. Dover (USA 2005) the key issue was whether intelligent design was or was not science, because if it wasn't science then it would be a religious theory like creationism, and so could not be taught in US publically funded schools under the constitutional provision of the separation of religion and state. Judge John E Jones III ruled that ID was not science.

The modern concept of intelligent design owes much to Phillip Johnson, an American professor of Law. Johnson published the book Darwin on Trial (1991), and in 1996 established the Center for Science and Culture at the Discovery Institute.

Johnson put ID forward not as a creationist theory, but as a theory that acknowledged that there was more to the development of life on Earth than could be explained by a totally naturalistic account.

The theoretical foundations of ID were provided by Michael Behe (author of Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution, 1996), William Dembski and others.

The implications
Why is this subject important for Religion and Ethics?

This subject has a number of implications for religious beliefs and ethics.

In the US and UK, significant groups of Christians believe that evolution is an unproved theory which may devalue religious belief, and want schools to teach pupils that creationism or intelligent design are alternative theories that should be considered.

USA

This argument is very important in the USA because publicly funded schools must be religiously neutral under the Constitution, and so neither creationism nor intelligent design can be taught in such schools if they amount to religious theories.

Proponents of intelligent design and creation science have made several attempts to get these theories taught in school science lessons as alternatives to evolution, but American court decisions have generally concluded that both creationism and intelligent design are religious theories rather than scientific ones, and so are barred from the school system.

Creationism might be losing the battle in the courts, but it's very much alive in other aspects of US life. One example: the $25m Creation Museum in Kentucky.

UK

A poll for the BBC Horizon programme in January 2006 revealed that fewer than 50% of Britons accept the theory of evolution as the best description for the development of life.

Furthermore, more than 40% of those questioned believe that creationism or intelligent design should be taught in school science lessons.

Over 2,000 participants took part in the survey, and were asked what best described their view of the origin and development of life:
- 22% chose creationism
- 17% opted for intelligent design
- 48% selected evolution theory
- and the rest did not know.

Some Christian schools in the UK teach creationism as well as evolution.

In 2006 one UK examination board admitted that a biology course due to be introduced that September would encourage schools to consider alternatives to the theory of evolution.


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