…But in showing that the liberal attempt at rescuing Christianity is false we are not showing that there is no way of rescuing Christianity at all; on the contrary, it may appear incidentally, even in the present little book, that it is not the Christianity of the New Testament which is in conflict conflict with science, but the supposed Christianity of the modern liberal Church, and that the real city of God, and that city alone, has defenses which are capable of warding of the assaults of modern unbelief.
…the liberal attempt at reconciling Christianity with modern science has really relinquished everything distinctive of Christianity, so that what remains is in essentials only that same indefinite type of religious aspiration which was in the world before Christianity came upon the scene.
J. Gresham Machen, Christianity and Liberalism (1923)
R. Scott Clark
R.Scott Clark is the President of the Heidelberg Reformation Association, the author and editor of, and contributor to several books and the author of many articles. He has taught church history and historical theology since 1997 at Westminster Seminary California. He has also taught at Wheaton College, Reformed Theological Seminary, and Concordia University. He has hosted the Heidelblog since 2007.
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Is there a distinction between ‘Scientism’ (a manipulation of information for the purpose of controlling, indoctrinating, and bullying people) and ‘Science’ which is the investigation of the evidence that validates or invalidates an hypothesis? With regards to the contributions of scientists in the second group, like Stephen C. Meyer, Senior Fellow – Discovery Institute
Program Director – Center for Science and Culture, are we investigating their findings to determine the validity of their Science?
As I study Intelligent Desgin, across the contributions of scientists in many fields of Science, I find every study validates our Triune God as Creator, Designer, and Sustainer. It appears that Creation required Divine information code, example: irreducible complexity of the rotary motor of the bacterium flagellum.
CP,
Surely!
It’s a strange stubborn idolatry, this bowing to the god, ‘Science’. Whose disciples regularly announce ‘truths’ which are later dispensed with and replaced by new contradictory ones.
sure but it’s more of a process, like a monolithic machine. theory’s are like ships, you plug up enough holes and what’s left is truth. that’s how theory’s work. but I totally understand what you mean.
I love Machen.
If my memory is correct, Michael Horton once said of him, “A casualty to fads, vindicated by time.”