Tales From the Burning Prairie

As a nursing student, I am taking a lot of science classes. Mostly life sciences, to be sure, but science none the less. And one thing, in all my studies, that I have noticed is how all life is intimately tied together in evolution’s intricate dance. Just look at mitochondria. Another thing I’ve noticed is that my science professors either side-step this entirely or refer to it only obliquely. Yes, this is Oklahoma, the buckle of the Bible Belt, but still. I wish that at least one professor would come out and say something along the lines of: “Life on this planet, over the course of billions of years, evolved from single-celled organisms to the myriad life forms we see today.”

One of my professors, who happens to be demonstrably conservative, very nearly came close to acknowledging this, but stopped short. He was discussing the harmful effects of artificial fats, like partially hydrogenated fats, on the human body. He told us that naturally occurring animal fats were more easily processed by the human body because…..then he stopped himself here. What he didn’t want to, couldn’t, acknowledge was that humans process animal fats more efficiently than laboratory-created fats because we evolved on this planet eating the other animals that also evolved on this planet!!!!!! But his conditioning could not allow him to admit to this simple truth. (I am in no way advocating the eating of animals or animal by-products to my readers that might have a problem with this, I am simply illustrating a point.)

But I have to say that I get it. I know why professors are reluctant to state the facts of evolution, a lot of christians get all bent out of shape and scared by the very thought of evolution. For folks that frequently decry “political correctness”, they sure are hypersensitive about this; and they stamp their widdle feet and get all pouty when presented with things that don’t fit into their neat little packages. To me, this speaks of a very childish kind of faith. If a person’s faith is shaken and devastated by learning about The Big Bang and evolutionary fact, well it wasn’t much of a faith to begin with, so he or she isn’t out much.

As a Christian, my faith is in no way threatened by evolution, or the Big Bang, or the true age of the Earth or the Universe, heliocentrism, and that the earth isn’t flat. But I don’t find it necessary to completely segregate faith and science. For most other christians, I would have to say, please separate science and religion, you aren’t any good at mixing them. Setting aside the fact that I do not hold with biblical literalism, the bible is not a scientific text!

So why do people want to use the bible as a science book? That’s easy: fear. Let’s look at the number 2 billion, that’s about how many years multi-cellular organisms have been on earth. 2,000,000,000. Looks harmless enough, right? But that is not an easy number to truly contemplate. Once a person starts really thinking about how many years that is compared to the 80-odd most people get, well, bless their pea-pickin’ little hearts, they just can’t abide it. 80 (one zero) to 2,000,000,000 (nine zeros), not really a fair fight is it? Don’t even ask most people to start thinking about the age of the universe. Which is, according to Cosmology 101, 13.7 billion years old! If we were to state that comparing the age of the universe to that of a human, with 1 year=1 billion years, then the universe is a teenager! And multi-cellular life on earth, at 2 billion, is but a mere toddler. As for homo sapiens (that’s us!), according to The Smithsonian Institution, we’ve been kicking around for only 130,000 years. If I’m figuring right, we haven’t even been conceived yet. This is where the analogy breaks down, I tend to think of humanity as in its toddlerhood. Currently raising toddler number two, I know how destructive, selfish, and unthinking toddlers can be. And yep, that’s pretty much us as a species: given to tearing stuff up and throwing temper tantrums when we don’t get absolutely everything just the way we want it and in a timely manner.

Seems like a lot of people have a real problem with not being the biggest grown-up on the block. How many among us would be comfortable admitting how scary everything can be? This fear of fact, fear of the astronomical, is a form of agoraphobia, some people have it and some people don’t. I can stand under the big, Oklahoma sky and love it, not fear it. My physical position on Earth is much like that of a microbe clinging to the surface of a soccerball, but I never fear that I will loose the bond of gravity and go spinning off into space. While I can’t truly grasp the enormity of 13.7 billion years, I don’t fear it, I don’t have to deny it. I embrace it in whatever dim fashion I can.

As for faith and science, I see the Hand of God in the majesty of the Big Bang. I cannot claim to know the mind of the Almighty, but it seems more probable to me that He is more present in the terrifyingly large number of 13.7 billion than in the mere 6000 or so that young earthers want to grant Him. As if we could box God into a less fearful package for our own comfort! The sheer sacrilege of such a thought is undeniable.

And why should my faith be threatened by the notion that my ancestors were much hairier apes and didn’t just spring from the mud wearing the latest style hat, as it were? Please don’t burden me with the “In His image” line. Here again, people want to limit God, make Him just like us, only older.

And to those who don’t want their children to learn about anything that isn’t in the bible, like dinosaurs (I’m not kidding), well don’t come crying at my door when your precious babies finally learn the facts for themselves and hate you for deceiving them. Didn’t God give us these questioning minds? These searching souls? If so, why would He want us to freeze our knowledge base at that level more suited to a nomadic, desert tribe 5000 years ago, at that time void of education and rife with superstition? The Creation Story is just that, a story, presented to a people with no scientific knowledge, in a manner that was comprehensible to them at the time. Humanity has matured in the intervening years, even if only a little and only in some ways.

I have my Truth, you have your Truth, everybody has their own, individual Truths, but facts are the same for everyone, whether you like it or not. My challenge to other Christians, heck to anyone who needs to grow a little, is this: don’t try to make God, or your Truth, more manageable by trying to shrink Him down to your size. It won’t work. Grow in your own faith, or Truth, until you can accept that others might not share that Truth or faith, but that the difference doesn’t lessen yours at all. And try not to fear the astronomical, it can’t hurt you. The only thing that will weaken your faith is fear-fear of the unknown, fear of the different, fear of feeling insignificant.

But science, science is not to be feared, but embraced. The God of Abraham, the God of Jesus, the God of the Big Bang, the God of evolution, He gave me a scientific mind and I won’t deny His gift.

This vacation was not turning out the way Irene had envisioned at all. It was bad enough that Bob’s mother had insisted on coming with them, but then she wouldn’t pay for her own room. Bob and Irene hadn’t spent more than thirty minutes alone in the past week. So much for the second honeymoon.
She liked Frances, really she did, but this week was pushing her to the very limits of her patience. The evenings were the worst. After the day’s activities were done, there was nothing more to do than pass endless minutes watching the tiny television and then try to fall asleep listening to mother and son snore the same snore. Tonight would be different. Tonight she would be so tired that she would fall asleep first!
Morning had passed quickly at the Desert Museum. Lunch had dragged on at its customary, old lady’s pace; but she was here now, finally. The Petroglyphs were the centerpiece of their vacation. Irene spent several days at the Central Library studying the Mogollon people and their rock art, and here she was, looking at the rocks with her own eyes!
Frances decided against following them up into the rocks and stayed down at the gate, talking to the guard. The wind had picked up and was now whistling through the rocks, but she could still hear Frances’ voice as she chatted to the guard.
Bob, holding her hand, helped her climb to the top of hill. It wasn’t a very big hill, but the view from the top was still breath taking. Picking their way carefully down the other side, they stopped and kissed. She wrapped her arms around his waist and sighed into his chest. Why couldn’t they be here alone? This wasn’t the first time she thought it, but this time she didn’t try to squash the thought the moment it occurred.
There must be an airfield nearby, because a jet flew right over them, close to the ground at first but climbing quickly. Still, in the background, she could hear Frances. Mostly unintelligible, an occasional word would drift up on a gust of wind. “…Sciatica…”, she heard once, and then, “…coffee…” Irene had to smile. Frances loved her coffee.
Then Bob called to her. She couldn’t see him anymore. He must be behind that large rock, she thought.
“That’s odd,” she said aloud, as walked around the large rock. Bob wasn’t where she thought he would be, and now she couldn’t hear him anymore. “Bob?” she called, once and then again.
He’s around here somewhere, she thought, and then shrugged. The rock pictures were amazing here, deeper and cleaner looking than they were on the other side. Look, there was a picture of a man and something that looked like an elephant! Was that a flying saucer? She looked around for Bob again, because she wanted to share all these things with him. Where was that man? She stopped to listen and couldn’t hear him, or anything else for that matter. Had Frances finally run out of things to say? The stillness was unnatural and Irene was starting to get concerned.
“Bob!” she called out again, much louder this time. “Hello?”
Weird, she said to herself. Then she noticed something else. While she was calling for Bob, she was also turning in circles and now wasn’t sure which way to go.
Only one thing to do, she thought, go up! As she climbed up, she had a momentary spell of vertigo and grabbed a rock for support. Her hand was resting on a carved face, “Sorry,” she said as jerked her hand off the old face. She must be going in the right direction; the glyphs were starting to look older and more worn again.
That’s when she heard Bob. “Irene? Where are you?” he called, an edge of panic to his voice.
“I’m right here!” she answered.
Then she heard Frances, still talking to the guard. That woman could talk to anyone. Another a jet flew by, higher this time. The unnatural stillness was dispelled, which made Irene very happy.
“Where have you been? I thought I lost you!” Bob hugged her so tightly her spine popped a little.
“Just on the other side of that rock,” Irene answered and pointed.
“No, you weren’t. I just looked over there and you weren’t there!” Bob said, “It’s been almost half an hour. I thought I was going to have to go down and call the police, or the sheriff, or marshal or something!”
That couldn’t be right! “Honey, according to my watch it’s only been about five minutes.”
On the breeze, Frances’ words flew up to them again; this time they could hear the guard answer back. Then Frances giggled like flirting teenager. That’s when they looked down at the gate and saw that Frances had wedged herself inside the little booth with guard.
Shaking their heads at the same time, Bob and Irene made their way down to the gate and collected his mother.
Only later, did they notice that their watches were off by about 25 minutes.
Odd, thought Irene, right before she drifted off to sleep, snoring happily.