Another way to look at it is as follows: God, in whose image we are created, expects us to make and not to destroy or unmake. Just as He created Nature as a set of harmonious rules, He expects from us the same harmony amongst ourselves. Nature has droughts and floods, yet taken together, they each serve a purpose. Those opposites maintain the delicate balance of life, nourishing and sustaining. So it is with us. We can vary widely in beliefs and ideas, yet together, despite our differences, we are capable of growth and greater understanding. The history of man has shown that our greatest advances have occurred when there is little or no strife among us. The fact that there are differences between us has little to do with our working toward the common end of good.
The biblical tale of the Tower of Babel is a good example of what I mean. When there was one language (perhaps a metaphor for the collective human hubris), man set out to meet God, as an equal. God responds by instilling different languages, to foil communication amongst the builders of the Tower, making its construction impossible.
God did not destroy the Tower. Instead, he actually encouraged differences. This is an important distinction. There are those that talk about 'universalism,' as if there is a single point of view only. This is patently false. Mankind's greatest achievements have been in the free marketplace of ideas and thoughts. It is accumulation, acceptance, and productive application of various and disparate ideas, thoughts, and cultural accomplishment that have resulted in true achievement.
God is an agent, Satan a reagent. God is about positive, Satan the utter absence of positive things. God works to instill love in us, Satan works to undo that love. God creates, Satan imitates, or undermines.
There are two things within us that I feel points irrefutably to the presence of God. First is the feeling of love; and, second, is the feeling of guilt. I was recently married and I must attest that my love for God grew commensurably with my love for my wife. If we were just another animal, we would not feel love and we would not feel guilt or shame. Taking an extra cookie? Feel bad. Doing an act of kindness? Feel good. How can one explain these feelings otherwise? Why are humans above all blessed with all of our gifts? How does one explain it? If evolution is such a deliberate process, why has it appeared to stop? Why are humans the only civilized species? (Dolphin-lovers, think about it, huh?) (I personally believe in Intelligent Design, after a fashion.)
Article comments
1 - Eric Olsen
Fascinating and extremely thoughtful (and thorough, as you noted). I agree with most of it but have a few thoughts: absolute certainly in the rightness of your own beliefs is as dangerous as moral relativism: this is what fundamentalist Muslims have - terrorists or not. I think we must all leave room in our minds that we might be wrong and therefore respect the beliefs of others as long as they do not cause us harm. In the case of Islamists, however, (and all fanatics) they are doing harm and are not to be respected.
Thanks for sharing this Paulie!
2 - JR
If evolution is such a deliberate process, why has it appeared to stop?
Actually, evolution appears not to have stopped. This group is studying the effects of living at high altitudes. From Nature news:
Not to mention all of the evidence of continuing evolution that is observed among other life forms. Didn't you learn in seventh-grade about those moths in industrial England that adapted to soot-covered trees? And why do you think they have to make up a new flu vaccine every year?
A more thorough understanding of evolution would reveal that, like entropy, it simply occurs with the passage of time. There is no stopping.