Wednesday, October 7, 2009

Happy Anniversary, Darwin?

How will you celebrate the 150th Anniversary of Charles Darwin’s The Origin of Species? I hadn’t really thought about it until I read an interesting article in Inside Higher Education. In his article, Darwin, From the Creationists, Scott Jaschik reports on a new strategy being cooked up by Kirk Cameron and Ray Comfort. Jaschik explains, “Living Waters, an evangelical group that argues for the literal truth of the Bible, is planning to distribute 175,000 copies of The Origin of Species on university campuses next month, just in time for the 150th anniversary of its publication. But these won't be ordinary copies. They will feature a ‘special introduction’ to Darwin's classic.”

The special introduction is an added 50 pages written by Comfort that provides a timeline of Darwin, connects Darwin to Hitler and, according to Cameron, “gives a clear explanation of the Gospel.”

So, I'm curious, what do you think of this strategy? What do you think of Cameron's assertions at the beginning of the video? In the end, do you think this "outreach" does more harm or good for the advancement of the Gospel on today's college campuses?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I will be celebrating the anniversary of On The Origin Of Species by publishing On The Destiny Of species (www.destinyofspecies.com)

Jeff Robinson said...

I seem to remember a story about Martin Luther doing something similar, with a book written against him; he added an introduction and then republished it. I believe it worked for him, I'm not sure it will work for these guys and their introduction to Darwin's book. It's a much better strategy than going on college campuses and ranting against "Origin of the Species" but that introduction would have to be a really good engagement with Darwinism and its effect on society for it to be taken seriously. I'm at least curious to take a look at it.