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“Creationism creeps into NSW Schools”

Evolutionists aghast Scripture teachers teach that their faith is true

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6-day creation

Creationism creeps into NSW Schools” is the headline of an article by Jodie Minus in The Australian newspaper of 25 June 2010, which reports on a survey of religion in schools by Cathy Byrne of Macquarie State University. The article expressed horror that some children in religion education classes in New South Wales, Australia, had been given “kits called ‘Creation for Kids’ containing colouring books, calendars and DVDs deriding evolution, and claiming that the universe was only 6,000 years old”.

“Creation for Kids” is the name of CMI’s regular children’s page in Creation magazine, and we do have a factual and balanced book entitled Days 1–7: Your complete children’s guide to the 7 days of Creation Week. This does not “deride evolution” but presents what the Bible says about the origin of the universe, the world and life, while showing how Creation solves some of the huge problems involved in the evolutionary explanation. If this is the material referred to, we would commend those responsible for distributing it, but we suspend further comment until we see what (else) was involved.

Another cause for alarm to the newspaper was the fact that:

“70 per cent of scripture teachers think children should be taught the Bible as historical fact and 80 per cent believe students should not be exposed to non-Christian beliefs.”

Yes, Christians believe that Bible records the true history of the world. Atheists don’t—and for this very reason we can understand the fervent desire of atheists to prevent Australian schoolchildren from being taught it. But the parents of these children have given permission for their children to attend a Christian-education class, not an atheistic one. So yes, Christian Scripture teachers should teach Christianity and not other religions like Buddhism or Hinduism … or atheism. Anyway, that great ‘engine’ of atheism, the philosophy of evolution, is already taught within the mainstream curricula in the science class.

Secularists have managed to ban alternative ideas, including creation and intelligent design, from being aired or discussed in science classrooms. Not even any questioning of the atheistic evolutionary explanation of how the universe, our world, and life came into being is permitted. Now, it seems those who rule our school curricula want creation banned from Christian religious education classes as well. Next, they will want to ban it from being taught in churches. They don’t like hearing people saying that creation is true and giving reasons for it.

Researcher Cathy Byrne of the University’s Centre for Research and Social Inclusion is reported as saying: “most parents would be shocked to learn what goes on in some religious education classes.” This is nonsense. Religious education is a voluntary subject in Australian schools, and requires the agreement of both the student and the parents. Any parents who do not like what is taught are free to withdraw their permission. Ms Byrne and Ms Minus both write as if all the children belong to them. They don’t.

Ms Byrne is further reported as saying: “Most parents and trained teachers want critical thinking about religion, individual responsibility for moral decisions and empathy towards others.” Critical thinking? Yes, let’s have some! And let’s include all subjective beliefs about God, including evolutionary “science” which assumes, for all practical purposes, that God does not exist. Yes, the critical faculty is so important to develop in children; why then does the evolutionary establishment so vehemently oppose the idea of questioning the theory of evolution?

And what is the basis for “individual responsibility for moral decisions and empathy towards others” that Ms Byrne talks about once God and His Word, the Bible, is set aside? There is no basis for morality in evolution any more than there is in atheism. When the Judeo-Christian ethic of the Ten Commandments is superseded by the survival-of-the-fittest ethic of evolution, the result is the Holocaust. It would seem that Cathy Byrne of Macquarie State University is keen to push her beliefs into the schools; something that should be subjected to critical analysis.

Published: 6 July 2010

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