Huff Post: By Micheal Zimmerman: Among many memorable lines in President Barack Obama’s second inaugural address was the following: “We cannot mistake absolutism for principle, or substitute spectacle for politics, or treat name-calling as reasoned debate.”
To a large extent, it is the last phrase of that sentence, “or treat name-calling as reasoned debate,” that gave rise to The Clergy Letter Project. Simply put, when I became completely frustrated over the language used by a small but very vocal contingent of fundamentalist preachers to refer to those who understood and accepted evolutionary theory, I decided it was time to act. These preachers were (and, unfortunately, still are) asserting that if you “believe in evolution,” you’re going to hell. They were (and, unfortunately, still are) loud in their condemnation of the many deeply religious people who have no problem reconciling their faith with the best science has to offer. They were (and, unfortunately, still are) asserting that Christian religious leaders, in particular, who were fully comfortable with evolutionary theory can’t be “true” Christians.
Categories: Americas