Now that creationists have succeeded in removing the theory of evolution from the public school curriculum in Kansas, let's assume that God created the Earth. How did he do it? How long did it take? Did he do it about 10,000 years ago, as many creationists believe? Did it happen all in a moment? If it did, it wasn't in a Big Bang-because that theory, too, is now suspect.
Perhaps he did it in seven days, as the Bible tells us. We think of a day as having 24 hours because that's how long it takes the Earth to make one rotation. So before God created the Earth, a day had no meaning, and it is just as likely that God's day took a billion years as that it took 24 hours, since God exists entirely outside of time.
If God created the Earth that recently, from scratch, he then inexplicably filled it with relics that seem to be more than 10,000 years old. He designed it with fossils and dinosaur bones, and he filled its deep spaces with coal and oil that would take much longer than 10,000 years to form.
Why did he go to that effort? Why would he lead science down a blind alley just to disguise the majesty of his creation? I don't think he did. God is not a practical joker.
I believe that whether God created the Earth or whether it was created according to a natural process, it the same length of time and that and that evolution was the process by which life appeared and higher forms evolved.
I believe it is our duty as intelligent beings to examine the evidence and draw the best conclusions we can. If we want to believe that God set evolution into motion, that is our privilege. But surely if there is a God, then it is a sin against his creation to ignore the evidence he left us and make up a theory of our own-to make it against the law to admire the handiwork of the creator.
.....writing to be continued.
By Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times, August 16, 1999.
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