Evolution vs Creationism

Disagreements between religious figures and scientists have occurred many times since the 16th century when men like Copernicus, Kepler and Galileo discovered that our solar system was heliocentric, which seemed to be in direct contradiction to numerous scriptural passages. But science has nearly always won; few people today would argue that the sun circles the earth. And there were always some important religious figures, like Augustine, who understood that the every passage in the Bible could not and should not always be taken literally.

On the subject of Creation, all the book of Genesis states is the command "Let there be light." Genesis says nothing of how that command was implemented. Today, we know that nuclear fusion is the source of our daily light. Moreover, Genesis mentions a light of day and a "lesser light of night" as though they were two separate entities. It failed to mention that the lesser light of night was a reflection of that other light which illuminates our days. And there is nothing in Genesis about nuclear fusion or nuclear fission, nothing about gravity or any other physical force. Nor is there any mention of molecules or atoms or the subatomic particles like electrons, protons and neutrons which make it possible for the sun to generate light.

The Bible does mention God's laws, but not all of them. If God created the universe by commanding that the stars, the planets, the seas, rain and everything else should exist, then it is reasonable to assume that the physical laws which we have since discovered are additional laws not mentioned in the Bible. Perhaps the reason that they were not mentioned is that obedience to those laws is not a voluntary matter.

The one area that Genesis describes in some detail is the sequence of appearance of various life forms on Earth. And that sequence is remarkably parallel to what we know from the study of genetics and evolution. But the fact that certain people who claim to be religious and to value the Bible as sacred, reject the one science that actually confirms what the Bible says, makes me wonder why those people, who describe themselves as "Creationists," should not be considered heretics.