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March 3rd, 2011
01:25 PM ET
My Take: The Bible really does condemn homosexualityBy Robert A. J. Gagnon, Special to CNN
In her recent CNN Belief Blog post “The Bible’s surprisingly mixed messages on sexuality,” Jennifer Wright Knust claims that Christians can’t appeal to the Bible to justify opposition to homosexual practice because the Bible provides no clear witness on the subject and is too flawed to serve as a moral guide. As a scholar who has written books and articles on the Bible and homosexual practice, I can say that the reality is the opposite of her claim. It’s shocking that in her editorial and even her book, "Unprotected Texts," Knust ignores a mountain of evidence against her positions. It raises a serious question: does the Left read significant works that disagree with pro-gay interpretations of Scripture and choose to simply ignore them? Owing to space limitations I will focus on her two key arguments: the ideal of gender-neutral humanity and slavery arguments. Knust's lead argument is that sexual differentiation in Genesis, Jesus and Paul is nothing more than an "afterthought" because "God's original intention for humanity was androgyny." It’s true that Genesis presents the first human (Hebrew adam, from adamah, ground: “earthling”) as originally sexually undifferentiated. But what Knust misses is that once something is “taken from” the human to form a woman, the human, now differentiated as a man, finds his sexual other half in that missing element, a woman. That’s why Genesis speaks of the woman as a “counterpart” or “complement,” using a Hebrew expression neged, which means both “corresponding to” and “opposite.” She is similar as regards humanity but different in terms of gender. If sexual relations are to be had, they are to be had with a sexual counterpart or complement. Knust cites the apostle Paul’s remark about “no ‘male and female’” in Galatians. Yet Paul applies this dictum to establishing the equal worth of men and women before God, not to eliminating a male-female prerequisite for sex. Applied to sexual relations, the phrase means “no sex,” not “acceptance of homosexual practice,” as is evident both from the consensus of the earliest interpreters of this phrase and from Jesus' own sayings about marriage in this age and the next. All the earliest interpreters agreed that "no 'male and female,'" applied to sexual relations, meant "no sex." That included Paul and the ascetic believers at Corinth in the mid-first century; and the church fathers and gnostics of the second to fourth centuries. Where they disagreed is over whether to postpone mandatory celibacy until the resurrection (the orthodox view) or to begin insisting on it now (the heretical view). Jesus’ view According to Jesus, “when (people) rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage but are like the angels” (Mark 12:25). Sexual relations and differentiation had only penultimate significance. The unmediated access to God that resurrection bodies bring would make sex look dull by comparison. At the same time Jesus regarded the male-female paradigm as essential if sexual relations were to be had in this present age. In rejecting a revolving door of divorce-and-remarriage and, implicitly, polygamy Jesus cited Genesis: “From the beginning of creation, ‘male and female he made them.’ ‘For this reason a man …will be joined to his woman and the two shall become one flesh’” (Mark 10:2-12; Matthew 19:3-12). Jesus’ point was that God’s limiting of persons in a sexual union to two is evident in his creation of two (and only two) primary sexes: male and female, man and woman. The union of male and female completes the sexual spectrum, rendering a third partner both unnecessary and undesirable. The sectarian Jewish group known as the Essenes similarly rejected polygamy on the grounds that God made us “male and female,” two sexual complements designed for a union consisting only of two. Knust insinuates that Jesus wouldn’t have opposed homosexual relationships. Yet Jesus’ interpretation of Genesis demonstrates that he regarded a male-female prerequisite for marriage as the foundation on which other sexual standards could be predicated, including monogamy. Obviously the foundation is more important than anything predicated on it. Jesus developed a principle of interpretation that Knust ignores: God’s “from the beginning” creation of “male and female” trumps some sexual behaviors permitted in the Old Testament. So there’s nothing unorthodox about recognizing change in Scripture’s sexual ethics. But note the direction of the change: toward less sexual license and greater conformity to the logic of the male-female requirement in Genesis. Knust is traveling in the opposite direction. Knust’s slavery analogy and avoidance of closer analogies Knust argues that an appeal to the Bible for opposing homosexual practice is as morally unjustifiable as pre-Civil War appeals to the Bible for supporting slavery. The analogy is a bad one. The best analogy will be the comparison that shares the most points of substantive correspondence with the item being compared. How much does the Bible’s treatment of slavery resemble its treatment of homosexual practice? Very little. Scripture shows no vested interest in preserving the institution of slavery but it does show a strong vested interest from Genesis to Revelation in preserving a male-female prerequisite. Unlike its treatment of the institution of slavery, Scripture treats a male-female prerequisite for sex as a pre-Fall structure. The Bible accommodates to social systems where sometimes the only alternative to starvation is enslavement. But it clearly shows a critical edge by specifying mandatory release dates and the right of kinship buyback; requiring that Israelites not be treated as slaves; and reminding Israelites that God had redeemed them from slavery in Egypt. Paul urged enslaved believers to use an opportunity for freedom to maximize service to God and encouraged a Christian master (Philemon) to free his slave (Onesimus). How can changing up on the Bible’s male-female prerequisite for sex be analogous to the church’s revision of the slavery issue if the Bible encourages critique of slavery but discourages critique of a male-female paradigm for sex? Much closer analogies to the Bible’s rejection of homosexual practice are the Bible’s rejection of incest and the New Testament’s rejection of polyamory (polygamy). Homosexual practice, incest, and polyamory are all (1) forms of sexual behavior (2) able to be conducted as adult-committed relationships but (3) strongly proscribed because (4) they violate creation structures or natural law. Like same-sex intercourse, incest is sex between persons too much structurally alike, here as regards kinship rather than gender. Polyamory is a violation of the foundational “twoness” of the sexes. The fact that Knust chooses a distant analogue (slavery) over more proximate analogues (incest, polyamory) shows that her analogical reasoning is driven more by ideological biases than by fair use of analogies. Knust’s other arguments are riddled with holes. In claiming that David and Jonathan had a homosexual relationship she confuses kinship affection with erotic love. Her claim that “from the perspective of the New Testament” the Sodom story was about “the near rape of angels, not sex between men” makes an "either-or" out of Jude 7’s "both-and." Her canard that only a few Bible texts reject homosexual practice overlooks other relevant texts and the fact that infrequent mention is often a sign of significance. It is disturbing to read what passes nowadays for expert “liberal” reflections on what the Bible says about homosexual practice. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Robert A. J. Gagnon. |
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The CNN Belief Blog covers the faith angles of the day's biggest stories, from breaking news to politics to entertainment, fostering a global conversation about the role of religion and belief in readers' lives. It's edited by CNN's Daniel Burke with contributions from Eric Marrapodi and CNN's worldwide news gathering team.  |
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Editor’s Note: 
Let's look at how utterly stupid and pathetic that joke book called the bible really us. For example, Noah built the ark. By hand. A challenging task for any carpenter. Even in this day and age with power tools and other modern carpentry tools I don't think one man and his family could make such a large boat.
Secondly, there are roughly 3 million different species of animal on earth. Safe to assume 2 or 3 million have become extinct since the ark was set afloat, so let's say there are 6 million species. Now double that for the two genders, and you have one hell of a lot of animals trying to get on that one ark. And where is all the food stored for 12 million animals? Wouldn't they just end up eating each other?
We've climbed to the top of the tallest mountain in the world, MT. Everest. In doing so we need to bring oxygen because there's not enough in the air up there. Yet we are to believe that since the flood covered the entire earth that a boat with 12 million animals with no food or no oxygen could last for the 370 days the bible said they were afloat. (http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_long_did_Noah%27s_flood_last)
Isn't it time for us as humans to work on our problems ourselves and not look to some imaginary creature in the sky that can't help us in any way.
I love that we have bible "scholars" who devote their whole lives to this trivialness. What it must be like to devote your whole life to being an expert on a singular work of fiction. Way to go.
Don't forget the fact that the Noah's Ark myth requires that every animal species on Earth can be found within WALKING DISTANCE OF NOAH'S HOUSE. It's not like he could have penguins sent to the Middle East from Antarctica by Federal Express.
There are so many myriad flaws in the Noah's Ark story that it's hard to figure out which one to make fun of. Personally, I enjoy making fun of the walking distance idea.
Since you've never studied the Bible, Noah's flood was not global, but regional. See Genesis 6:1-8 what the reason for the flood. The Flood was restricted to the area were Adam's tribe lived see Genesis 6:1-7. You need to know what it meant for "heavens", "earth", rendered "land, region, country via the Hebrew word definition versus English definition. The visible arch in the sky for as far as the eye can see due to earth's curvature. Other races were untouched by Noah's Flood because they lived in other parts of the earth. The only animals taken onto the Ark were the animals that were found in the region of the Flood (seven of every clean animal, and two of every unclean animal). Get cracking in your studying of the Bible versus Hebrew, Greek, English, Etc. words and their definitions.
Peace.
That's the problem with being a n angry athiest =) You miss out on the awesome SUPERNATURAL POWER of my God!!
God Bless you
I wonder what the garden gnome scholars have to say about this? I'd also like the Tooth Fairy intelligentsia weigh in on this matter.
the extinction event at the end of the pleistocene era around 12,000 b.c. is clear evidence of the flood. The large animals from the western hemisphere and australia all died out at the same time. In north america, this includes the saber tooth cat, the giant elk, and the mammoth. The large animals of europe, asia, and africa all survived. No palenontologist can adequately explain this, although some lamely try. This is clear evidence of the flood event described so briefly in the bible. There are other evidences available.
the bible does not necessarily provide a full explaination of such events. God told us what we need to know in order to serve him. So how about the ark, the effort to build it, and shoveling elephant poop for 370 days? We are left to speculate as to what level of divine and angelic intervention was involved in the whole business. God doesn't have to tell you everything. Ask God when you see Him the day you pass how He managed to pull this off.
HeavenSent did it ever occur to you that the Bible says the flood was regional is because that included the known world at the time. Can you even concede that your beliefs are not logical?
Isn't Angry and Atheist redundant?
Horay for the voice of reason.
Your lack of knowledge in your post is so evident that you should regroup and go back and start over... With everything in your life.
AngryAthiest,
Why, may I ask are you so angry? You have no God...no authority over you...no guidlines for morality. You're on an island, absolutely controlled by no one. And when you die, you will just ceese to exist...no heaven, no hell. Shouldn't you be jumping for joy? Shouldn't you be happyathiest, exuberentathiest, or overjoyedathiest? And if you're right and there is not God, then the rest of us don't have anything to worry about either. So don't be angry about me being a Christian. You know what I think? I don't think you're an Athiest at all. You're just a person that hates God. That where the anger comes from, I think.
You don't have to be angry just because you are an atheist. You have chosen Atheism. It is as likely as not the correct choice. Embrace your choice, move on, and be happy. Be happy you chose with your heart and made yourself a free man.
Two words.....BUY BULL
zombies
The Bible says that anyone who works, "gathers firewood" on the Sabbath should be "struck down". Also it says that the Sabbath should be kept holy–and the sabbath is NOT Sunday, but Saturday!
The Bible also says that "one should kill a person working on the Sabbath"...And the "sabbath" is NOT SUNDAY, but Saturday....so anyone who worships on Sunday only is going to HELL!!
The signs for a zombie apocalypse are everywhere.
Trying to prove the existence of god by reading the bible is like saying you can prove Orcs exist by reading the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
Great article. A relief to read a truthful interpretation and not a warped one. I think the importance is simply acknowledging a sin as a sin. Yes, it's a sin like any other. No ones perfect. With Christs help, each of us can identify, face our own and overcome through his forgiving power and saving grace.
That fairy tale book you lead your life with also says that you should kill anyone that works on sunday, as well as any woman who is not a virgin when married. It's in the bible... it's god's word. You must do as he says. Your all hypocrites... you'll only follow the parts you want to. I don't see all these mass murders happening. All religions are a joke and should be abolished. Then we'll have peace and prosperity. No more "my god is better than your god, and if you don't agree we'll invade and kill you all." Morons.
Thank you for writing this article. I always enjoy reading true scriptual evidence which combats the world's justification indecent acts.
GREAT ARTICLE!
Excellent – someone sticking up for the truth – I read Knust's Blog – and was amazed that should could call herself a minister – she's shooting for the other side...
That's her big ego (sin of Pride) blocking out Jesus' truth as she teaches the ways of the world to folks of what they want to hear instead of Jesus truth of what man (meaning women too) need to hear.
Big difference. Same with all those publishing rags of man's viewpoint instead of going humble to listen to Jesus' truth and comprehending what He teaches.
Oh, the ways of the world blocks out Jesus' truth.
His wisdom reigns for eternity. Man's (meaning women too) dies and goes back to dust. Dust to dust. Therefore, man's way of the world is dust. Only God is I AM. Alpha and Omega.
Amen.
Yup, everyone who knows ABSOLUTELY that they are right regarding who God and Jesus are is probably suffering from an inflated ego. 😉
I love how "Christians" feel the need to use their book to judge everyone around them. Funny how they never judge themselves. Hypocrites. There is more contradiction in "the bible" than any piece of written work ever produced, since words were first scrawled on scrolls.
Christians mean those that follow Jesus Christ by reading, comprehending and abiding in His truth. When we tell anyone they are not living righteously, it means they are not reading, comprehending and abiding (living) His truth. It has nothing to do with being a hypocrite, it has everything to do with saving your soul from the eternal flames and puff ... blotted out for eternity.
Just because you believe this life on earth is all there is to our spirits, you are blinded by this misconception of man (meaning women too) lies of the world. Jesus' teachings are about the truth of Life (while in human flesh) and why we are here and the afterlife of our souls (spirits being the intellect of our souls). We have to bodies. The one we have down on earth being of the flesh and our spiritual bodies that goes on forever, if you learn what Jesus is teaching us. All of us are to read His truth (the Bible).
Amen.
I typed too fast. I meant to type "TWO bodies", not to bodies.
Peace.
Mike, have you ever read the US tax laws? That is the largest collection of contradictions that I have ever encountered in writing. The Quran is also filled with many more obvious contradictions than the Christian Bible is accused of having.
C'mon, who cares what the bible says about this anyway? Only a fool would let an amalgam of bronze-age scribblings dictate their morality.
"Only sheep need shepherds."
Oh, we should listen to one that lives in darkness, refusing to come into His light? Does His light blind you?
What do we call a person like you, besides being clueless to His wisdom.
Bus2-
"Only sheep need shepherds."
And don't forget that the shepherd looks forward to the day when he can fleece the sheep and, eventually, butcher them. Great religious symbolism there.
Bo,
Hmmm, let us see what some of the con-temporary experts (NT, historical Jesus exegetes) have to say about the "Son of God, I am")
Matt 7:21
“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kin-gdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven."
Not said by the historical Jesus, but more embellishment my Matthew. -wiki.faithfutures.org/index.php/111_Invocation_without_Obedience
Matt 9:6 Passage notes "Son of Man" not Son of God.
wiki.faithfutures.org/index.php/127_Sickness_and_Sin
Matt 10:32-33, ""Everyone therefore who acknowledges me before others, I also will acknowledge before my Father in heaven; /33/ but whoever denies me before others, I also will deny before my Father in heaven"
"Ludemann [Jesus, 344] states " this is a prophetic adm-onition from the post-Easter co-mmunity. For it, Jesus and the Son of man were 'identical in the future: Jesus will return in the near future as the Son of man with the clouds of heaven. In his earthly life he was not yet the Son of man, since he will come to judgment only with the clouds of heaven (Dan. 7.13f) at the end of days' (Ha-enchen)."
"John P. Meier – Professor at Notre Dame
The second volume of A Ma-rginal Jew devotes considerable space to a study of John as "mentor" to Jesus. The historicity of the baptism is addressed on pages 100-105, before considering the meaning of Jesus' baptism on pages 106-116. On the basis of the cri-terion of emb-arras-sment, supported by a limited proposal for multiple attestation (relying on possible echoes of a Q version in John's Gospel and in 1 John 5:6), Meier concludes:
We may thus take the baptism of Jesus by John as the firm historical starting point for any treatment of Jesus' public ministry. (II,105)
Having established the historicity of the baptism event, Meier is ad-amant that the narrative must be seen as a Christian mi-dra-sh, drawing on various OT themes to as-sert the primacy of Jesus over John. In particular, Meier insists that the theo-phany must be excluded from all attempts to understand the event, since it is a later Christian invention rather than a surviving memory of some actual spiritual experience of Jesus.
Meier's discussion of the meaning of the baptism puts great weight on the fact that accepting baptism implied Jesus' agreement with John's apocalyptic message, and also engages at length with the question of Jesus' sinlessness."
Just because they call you SONNY, doesn't make you bright.
Use your own words for once, instead of cutting and pasting your nonsense to Bash Jesus' wisdom. What's the matter, tongue tied without using others' darkness that never came into His light?
Clueless. The Blind being lead by the other blind.
@heaven sent a tard
Lol cutting and pasting nonsense?
Don't like what he's saying and therefor you simply counter, not by facts or evidence, just simple bashing and name calling...
Better to have a blind man lead in the dark, but not during the light! (which we are in) 😛
@HeavenSent "Use your own words for once" LOL! You have left many comments that are not using your own words either. How ironic, you are truly lost and blinded by arrogance.
Sorry Mr. Gagnon, the gig is up.
More and more Americans are coming to understand how the Bible has been misused in the past to look upon others as inferior and undeserving of equality. You suggest the slavery analogy is outdated but you don't mention how the Bible was used to say interracial couples shouldn't marry (1960s and still today in some churches) or how the Bible was used to say women should not be treated equal as men in society. You see, Mr. Gagnon, Americans understand that it is OK if you want to tell the women in YOUR church "to keep silent" but you can't then apply that religious belief to all American women outside your church (have fun trying).
And the exact same is true with gay and lesbian Americans. If you want to condemn and judge them as inferior and undeserving in your church, you have the right to that. Unfortunately, you also have the right to cause them immense harm – especially gay youth – with your words and actions. Sadly, you even have the right to cause such harm in the name of Christian belief. But such vile and harmful bigotry in the name of religious teaching is a plague on religious ideals...history is the moral arbiter of this argument and not you.
We Americans and we Christians simply aren't going to allow you do that without calling your religion-based bigotry to question.
Note for CNN: You are being complicit in such harm to gay youth and others when someone makes a call for social justice as Jennifer Wright Knust did and CNN then allows a promoter of bigotry to have their say. Imagine if Knust had talked about how the Bible can no longer justify segregation and then CNN allowed a spokesperson for the Klan to respond. So CNN, why do you think it is OK when gay people are the target?
The lust of the flesh is sin. The sin of Pride being the ego that erases Jesus' truth about His spiritual teachings from our daily living. To choose individuals being sinful is not accepting all men/women sin if they are focused on their flesh and not the word of God as told to us by Jesus Christ when he came to earth to walk among us and taught us what God wants from us (to live righteously in the flesh by learning Jesus' truth and LOVE God) and for us (that we learn Jesus' truth so that we can live with God in Heaven, when we leave this world of the human flesh). The Book of Ecclesiastes (12 chapters) shows us how to live in human flesh while walking under the sun (meaning being here on earth.
Peace.
HeavenSent your pride and ego are definitely coming through loud and clear here! You are such a hypocrite.
Tracy,
Yes, HeavenSent's pride and ego are evident; but be careful calling her a hypocrite - we have no idea how she lives her daily life. I think that you need to look up the definition of 'hypocrite'.
She has much mistaken, misguided thinking and several delusions, but that's about all that we can see here.
Our health should always be our main priority. This should be the focus of all our hard works and perseverance.
The Bible also says a man shall not share his house with a menstruating woman. Does your wife sleep in a tent every month?
Very good question, but with over 1000 different "Christian" churches, all saying they represent Christ, and all with different interpretations of what His message was, not to mention the contradictions between the Old Testament and the New, it is no wonder this God of ours is so confusing.
Don't forget that the Bible also instructs you to bury your poop out in the back yard. (Deuteronomy 23:13)
Catholics don't believe in the 'literacy' of the bible and have no 'personal relationship with Jesus'.
That's not true of ALL Catholics. I know many Catholics that study the Bible with me and I'm not Catholic, just a Christian that reads, comprehends and abides in Jesus' truth. Catholics attend church to be with community. Don't be fooled, many of them read the Bible and aren't fooled by vipers up at the top.
HeavenSent-
But, if they 'understood' the Bible as you seem to then they would be rejecting said vipers and not really be Catholics anymore, right? If they are still practicing Catholics, and accept what the Bible says about the establishment of the papacy and the ascendancy of Peter, then they aren't actually getting the same read on the scriptures as you are. Something's wonky about the situation either way.
@HeavenSent
You said: "Catholics that study the Bible with me and I'm not Catholic, just a Christian that reads, comprehends and abides in Jesus' truth. Catholics attend church to be with community. Don't be fooled, many of them read the Bible and aren't fooled by vipers up at the top."
You are a bigoted idiot.
Notice how many denominations of Christianity there are (~ 38,000). Each denomination can show you scripture, that "proves" theirs is the true faith.
All of the denominations could not be correctly interpreting the bible. Many are contradictory.
Many of these denominations believe only their members will be saved.
Allowing people to read and comprehend, on their own, has resulted in there being thousands of different "opinions" on Jesus' truth.
Just because their opinion does not match yours, does not mean they are "vipers". Doesn't even mean they are wrong.
How do you know that your interpretation and comprehension is correct?
If the Christian god exists, and he is all knowing and all powerful and all good, why didn't He provide a bible that could not be misinterpreted? That everyone's understanding of His wants would be the same?
ambiguity – : a word or expression that can be understood in two or more possible ways : an ambiguous word or expression
1. If god exists, He would want everyone to know His wants, without ambiguity.
People attempt to discover god's wants by reading the bible.
2. The bible god provided, is ambiguous.
This fact is evidenced by there being 38,000 different denominations of Christianity.
3. Therefore, the Christian god does not exist.
Think of this: There is a flaw in my logic. The flaw is the Catholic Church. I wouldn't be picked as their spokesman but...
The Catholic Church teaches that the Scriptures are not the only infallible source of Christian doctrine. Scripture is but one of three equal authorities; the other two being Sacred Tradition and the episcopacy.
They also believe that the Church has authority to establish or restrict interpretation of Scriptures because, in part, it implicitly selected which books were to be in the biblical canon through its traditions.
Source: Wikipedia
You can thank the Catholic Church for your bible.
My logic of an ambiguous bible is flawed, because Jesus established His Church, to give the correct interpretation of His word. The Catholic Church can trace its history back to Peter.
The Evangelicals can only trace their history back to 1730. Am I to believe that Jesus did not have a church for 1700 years?
Jesus never stated, never expected, that scripture alone was the only source of Christian doctrine.
Allowing Sola Scriptura, as Luther proclaimed, has led to there being 38,000 Protestant denominations.
Cheers!
We are all sinners because we live in the flesh. Life on earth is our second chance after God destroyed the 1st earth age. Our spirits came through being born of woman. To either love and follow Jesus or love and follow satan.
That's why Jesus said to focus on Him and His spiritual teachings in the Bible and not the world (meaning our flesh). The more we learn what He wants for us and from us, the more we don't focus on being in human flesh which causes sin, but prepares our souls for the afterlife to be with Him in Heaven. Heaven is where God is.
Amen.
No thanks Jesus, I'll take responsibility for my own actions. You didn't have to die for me, without my consent, because I would have stopped the sacrifice or at least told you I'm on my own.
Why is it that all religious people can do is wallow in their own holy book reciting ancient scriptures, without first demonstrating that their ONE book is correct, and ALL the other books/religions are wrong??
Nt but you're still a nub, and have a long way to go...
@HeavenSent
You said: "We are all sinners because we live in the flesh. Life on earth is our second chance after God destroyed the 1st earth age. "
In the 20th century, with the rise of Darwinism and the continued discovery of allegedly very old human-like fossils, many evangelicals compromised by adopting theistic evolution.
They accepted a relatively young age for the Biblical Adam (if they retained belief in him at all), but said that the ‘old’ human fossils came from pre-Adamite human-like creatures.
Source: Creation Ministries International "Pre-Adamic man: were there human beings on Earth before Adam?"
by Russell Grigg
The existence of a Pre-Adamic flood is based solely on a loose interpretation of Genesis, there is no clear indication that any flood burst forth from the Earth, prior to the story of Noah.
Actually, there is no evidence that a worldwide flood occurred at the time of Noah, either. The Egyptian civilization (as well as others) existed at the time. They never mentioned drowning. Also the pyramids were built before the alleged flood. Guess what? No water marks.
The pre-Adamic humans is an old theory (1600's or even way earlier). Some Evangelicals have dusted the theory off, added a gap between Genesis I and Genesis II and by golly, they are in agreement with science on the age of the earth!
They have adopted theistic evolution, as a last ditch effort to keep their god alive. He is drowning in a sea of scientific discoveries.
Cheers!