Be Warned: This Post Will Be Long

Evolution and Religion.

Although I probably always knew that this issue would come up, I don't think I was ready for how hard it would hit me with confusion. Some of my classes go pretty intensely into the topic of evolution, and I didn't really consider that this would cause any problems for me; I have learned about it before, and I know that the concept is real. I also know the Bible was not meant to be a science textbook. I just think that I assumed that I would easily be able to reconcile the two, but so far I feel like I've had to just look at the two separately, and that is not what I want to do. Reading about some evolutionary theories, I found this song from Inherit the Wind (an excellent movie if you are into that sort of thing) playing in my head:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mo8I-UnRnao

But I don't think that is a sign that I'm going to have to choose one or the other; if anything, maybe its the opposite. I know it's got to be possible to reconcile them. After all, there are plenty of people who both share my beliefs and study science. Actually, I think I have a book by Henry B. Eyring at my house titled The Faith of a Scientist that I will definitely be checking out when I go home. It would also be really helpful if maybe there was an Institute class about "Religion and Science" or something, because I can't be the only one having these kinds of thoughts. I'll work on it.

There's something else that is similar that I've been having some problems with. I really love the gospel, the plain and simple truths and especially anything having to do with Christ. There are sometimes just little things that make me uncomfortable. Such as today, when we were talking about Christopher Columbus and the Founding Fathers, and their roles in the coming forth of the gospel. It's not that I don't believe that God has had his hand in everything that has happened throughout history, and I do think that the story of America is a great one, it's just that it is a great one that has been built upon the slaughter of millions and the back of slavery to, at least initially, favor white landowning males. During this discussion I couldn't help but think about this passage from one of my favorite books, God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian (in it, the narrator is talking to John Brown. Also it is fictional, if you didn't know.):

"I congratulated him on what he'd said on his way to be hanged before a gleeful, jeering throng of white folks. I quote, 'This is a beautiful country.' In only five words, he had somehow encapsulated the full horror of the most hideous legal atrocities committed by a civilized nation until the Holocaust.

'Slavery was legal under American law,' he said. 'The Holocaust was legal under German law,' he said.

John Brown is a Connecticut Yankee, born in Torrington. He said there was a Virginian, Thomas Jefferson, who had actually encapsulated God in only six words: 'All men are created equal.'

Brown was twenty when Jefferson died. 'This perfect gentleman, sophisticated, scientific, wise,' John Brown went on, 'was able to write those incomparable sacred words while owning slaves. Tell me: Am I really the only person to realize that he, by his example, made our beautiful country an evil society from the very first, where subservience of persons of color to white people was deemed in perfect harmony with natural law?'

'I want to get this straight,' I said. 'Are you saying that Thomas Jefferson, possibly our country's most beloved founding father, after George Washington, was an evil man?'

'Let that, while my body lies a-moulderin' in the grave,' said John Brown, 'be my truth which goes marchin' on.' "

Now I am not saying that I think Thomas Jefferson is "evil," and I don't hate America. America is great. I'm also not expecting that everything will be easy in the path of the Restoration of the Gospel. And I further know that I only know pretty much the basics of history and that there are almost infinite layers of story. I guess the real issue is that I don't really like when people equate what happens to others, and especially groups of people, to things that happen in the scriptures. I also realize this is kind of contradicting what I said above, where I said I want to bring my secular life together with my religion so they are one, as I think they should be. So really, I guess the bottom line is that I'm uncomfortable with attributing my religion, as much as I believe it to be truth, to other people. I find it to be a very personal thing, and for some reason I just don't get a good feeling when I hear people say things about God's reactions to things people have done or something like that, regardless of whether or not it may be true. I guess I just believe that things between God and a person should be between them, and I don't like when other people get involved in that.

I should probably just not worry about it and focus on my own life and figuring out exactly what I know and believe.

Well. Glad I got that out. In other news, I'm really diggin' this "no homework on Sundays" thing I'm doing, because it leaves me plenty of time for things like three-hour naps and listening to the entirety of Les Miserables. Hopefully I can stay up on things enough to keep it going.