Southern Baptist Seminary Appoints Creationist to Head Center for Theology and Science
by Jim Brown
May 10, 2006
(AgapePress) - - A Young Earth creationist will be replacing a leading intelligent design (ID) proponent as director of the Center for Theology and Science at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. The new center will be led by Dr. Kurt Wise, who recently directed the Center for Origins Research at Bryan College, a school located in Dayton, Tennessee, home of the famous Scopes evolution trial in 1925. The new director of the Center for Theology and Science at SBTS says he intends to take a different approach than that of his predecessor, leading ID theorist Dr. William Dembski.
While Dembski was an outspoken participant in the debate between the religious and secular scientific communities over evolution and a vocal promoter of ID in opposition to mainstream Darwinist theories, Wise says he hopes to "focus more on the Christian world and how Christians should respond to the entire issue of origins."
As a creationist who holds a master's degree and a doctorate in paleontology, Wise contends that scripture provides what is by far the best evidence for creation. "I'm very interested in the specific claims the Bible makes about science," he notes, "and I'm less interested in the secular world's response to those things."
Interestingly, the new head of the Center for Theology and Science received his doctoral degree in paleontology at Harvard under the advisement of famous evolutionist Dr. Stephen Jay Gould. Yet while the creationist scholar personally believes in the biblical account of the origins of life, he does not feel Christians should be trying to get either creationism or intelligent design taught in public schools at this time.
Public schools today need far more than the introduction of ID or creation science into their curricula, the theology and science scholar suggests. "I think we need to change all of science education," he says. "We need to teach what science really is."
In actuality, Wise asserts, science is not a product and should never have come to be understood as being "the answers," collectively, to the questions people ask. "Science is the way we find the answers to the questions people are asking," he insists. "It's a process."
And until science is taught that way in the classroom -- as a process rather than a finite product, the Christian paleontologist adds, "I don't think we have any business being in there or trying to get a creationist or an ID theory in there."
Dr. Wise is looking forward to leading Southern Baptist Theological Seminary's Center for Theology and Science. However, he acknowledges that his appointment as director is likely to cause consternation within even the Christian community, as Young Earth creationism is a minority position in the church.
Jim Brown, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
