Scottish Government Rejects Creation Ban

I wanted to share some good news with you and give you an update to a blog post I wrote in September about a potential ban on teaching creation in Scottish public schools.

The Scottish government has decided not to ban teaching creation. According to the Herald Scotland, the head of curriculum unit at the Scottish government's Learning Directorate said, “I can (therefore) confirm that there are no plans to issue guidance to schools or education authorities to prevent the presentation of creationism, intelligent design or similar doctrines by teachers or school visitors.” This means that teachers in Scotland still have the freedom to present the problems with evolution and millions of years as well as possibly present other alternatives, such as biblical creation, to their students.* This is a victory for academic freedom in that country. Sadly, the secularists were trying to protect the teaching of their atheistic religion as the only worldview imposed on the current and future generations of kids.

The Religion of Atheism and Naturalism

Naturally, the group that was petitioning for the ban, the Scottish Secular Society, is unhappy with the decision. They don’t want any alternatives to their religion of atheism and naturalism to be presented to students. You see, you can’t teach origins without teaching a religious worldview along with it—I wrote about this in my earlier blog post about the potential ban:

Now, these scientists claim that “belief-based teaching should be entirely separate from science teaching” but what they don’t realize is that you can’t teach any model of origins without teaching a belief system. As I have pointed out many times, including in my debate with Bill Nye, there is a distinction between observational science and historical science. Observational science deals with the present and is what builds technology and advances medicine. This kind of science is directly observable, testable, and repeatable. All three of the scientists pushing this petition have won Nobel prizes for observing the present and developing useful technologies—atheists can be great scientists when using observational science.

Well, unlike observational science, historical science deals with what happened in the past and is therefore not directly observable, testable, or repeatable. What you believe about historical science is going to largely be determined by your presuppositions. Biblical creationists have the presupposition that God’s Word is an accurate account of earth’s history, and so we see the world through the lens of God’s Word. These scientists with the Scottish Secular Society have a presupposition that the world arrived through natural processes, and this directs their interpretation of the evidence. This worldview of naturalism is directly contradictory to what God’s Word teaches for it is a way of explaining life without God. It is a belief system and a religion!

So as these scientists push to ban creation from being taught in schools they are not separating “belief-based teaching” and “science teaching.” Instead, they are simply pushing their own religion of atheistic naturalism on students.

According to the Herald Scotland, the chair of the Scottish Secular Society said of the rejection of the ban, "Creationism should not be taught as fact anywhere within the Scottish education system.” A co-petitioner also commented that the “language [of the ban rejection] blurs the crucial distinction, built into the wording of our own petition, between learning about creationist worldviews, and being taught that such worldviews are tenable.” These statements clearly imply that their religion of atheism and naturalism is the right one, and that the biblical and creation worldview has no place alongside “facts.” But, as we’ve demonstrated many times on our website, there are major problems with a naturalistic, evolutionary worldview, and observational science actually confirms the Bible.

What Does the Scottish Secular Society Really Fear?

One of the co-petitioners also stated, “The SSS fear this will bring Scottish education into disrepute." Actually, I believe they really fear that kids will begin to think critically as they examine the strengths and weaknesses of different worldviews and realize that evolution and millions of years are, indeed, fallible ideas that do not hold up under scrutiny—and as a result, students might reject an evolutionary worldview in favor of a biblical one. Simply indoctrinating kids to believe in an atheistic, naturalistic worldview does not encourage the skill of critical thinking—secularists want to indoctrinate children with their beliefs and eradicate any mention of the truth of God. “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness” (Romans 1:18).

Now, while this is certainly good news for academic freedom in Scotland, ironically the situation is much worse here in the US, even though America was founded largely on biblical principles. There is a culture war going on right now where the biblical worldview is rapidly being replaced with a secular humanistic worldview. Secularists are aggressively reaching out to our kids and trying to convince them that the religion of atheism is the right one. Bill Nye “the Science Guy,” for instance, is putting a lot of energy in trying to denigrate creationists and impose his religion of naturalism on the education system.

We need to be bold in equipping our kids to answer the skeptical questions and objections that are thrown at them. We need to be purposeful in training up our children in the way that they should go (Proverbs 22:6) so that they can give a bold defense for the hope that they have (1 Peter 3:15). I encourage you to use the resources and materials on our website and in our online store to equip your children to stand for the truth of God’s Word, from the very first verse.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken

 

This item was written with the assistance of AiG’s research team.

*For AiG’s views on the teaching of origins in US government-run schools, see “Should Christians Be Pushing to Have Creation Taught in Government Schools?”