Conservative approaches

• what are the two conservative approaches?

  evangelical protestants and catholic views
• many evangelical protestants hold what is called a fundamentalist view of the nature and authority of the bible
• what do fundamentalist evangelical protestants believe?

  • the bible is the infallible word of god; it contains no mistakes of any kind
  • the authors were directly inspired by god
  • apparent contradictions in content are due to the limitations of the human intellect, i.e. they are not real contradictions
• when it comes to the genesis story of creation, there are different approaches among fundamentalists, but all agree that the account given is true:

  • those known as young earth creationists have a literalist approach the the bible and reject any theories that contradict the literal meaning of genesis 1
  • those known as old earth creationists regard genesis 1 as giving a scientifically correct account of the origins of the universe; they do not adopt a literalist approach
• what are the two approaches by fundamentalists regarding the genesis creation story?

  young earth creationists and old earth creationists
• young earth creationists:

  • creation occurred about 6000 years ago (using bible genealogies)
  • literalist understanding of the text
  • creation in six days means literally six days
  • humans essentially different from animals
  • scientific theories rejected as products of limited and mistaken human intelligence
  • some say that fossil evidence was planted by god to make the earth look old and test faith
• old earth creationists:

  • acceptance of scientific dating of universe, i.e. circa 13.8 billion years ago
  • not literalist
  • creation in six epochs/stages
  • acceptance within limits of darwinian evolution
  • humans a 'special creation', i.e. different from animals
  • genesis 1 and modern science compatible, e.g. 'let there be light' refers to the Big Bang and the six days match the six stages of the evolution of the cosmos according to scientific thinking
• catholics believe that the bible is inspired by god, but was written by human beings. the inspiration, i.e. the way in which it is the word of god, relates to the bible as a whole rather than to each word or verse
• catholics distinguish between the key messages in the bible regarding salvation, which they believe are without error, and the account of the individual authors who were products of their time and culture, and need to be understood in that context
• catholics believe that genesis 1 was never intended as a scientific or factual account of the origins of the universe; the author used the genre of myth to convey truths about the nature of god as creator and the nature of humanity and of the created world
• catholics believe that guidance in interpreting the bible comes from tradition and the magisterium, as well as the use of the individual's informed conscience and reason
• tradition

  refers to teachings, customs and practices of the church passed down through the centuries and seen as equal in importance to the bible by catholics
• magisterium

  refers to the teaching authority of the pope and bishops who preserve and interpret the bible and tradition