The General Conference overwhelmingly approved the
Clergy Letters Project, an endeavor to demonstrate that science and faith can be compatible without compromising either. The letter that thousands of clergy have signed sayWe the undersigned, …believe that the theory of evolution is a foundational scientific truth, one that has stood up to rigorous scrutiny and upon which much of human knowledge and achievement rests. To reject this truth or to treat it as “one theory among others” is to deliberately embrace scientific ignorance and transmit such ignorance to our children.
The UMC is now urging its clergy to participate. But that is not all.
Actions at the General Conference also
amended its statement on “Science and Technology” in The Book of Discipline to read:We recognize science as a legitimate interpretation of God’s natural world. We affirm the validity of the claims of science in describing the natural world and in determining what is scientific. We preclude science from making authoritative claims about theological issues, and theology from making authoritative claims about scientific issues. We find that science’s descriptions of cosmological, geological, and biological evolution are not in conflict with theology. We recognize medical, technical, and scientific technologies as legitimate uses of God’s natural world when such use enhances human life and enables all of God’s children to develop their God-given creative potential without violating our ethical convictions about the relationship of humanity to the natural world. We re-examine our ethical convictions as our understanding of the natural world increases.
But wait, that’s not all. The final resolution adds a new statement to the United Methodist Book of Resolutions dealing with creationism and intelligent design. The wording reads as follows,
Therefore be it resolved that the General Conference of the United Methodist Church go on record as opposing the introduction of any faith-based theories such as Creationism or Intelligent Design into the science curriculum of our public schools.
I think it is important that the UMC has gone on record in its support of science and its rejection of Creationism and Intelligent Design. Now, if we could just get that body to take science seriously in its pronouncements on homosexuality.
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