Like so many evangelical Buddhists,
I was born in Brownwood and grew up in San Angelo. When I first moved to Abilene 30 years ago, the
local paper carried stories of a town awash in church culture and creationism, and
I saw at once that I had been called here, yes and summoned. I got busy writing
letters to the editor about evolution, and offering occasional rebuttal to the
Billy Graham column.
In those days, Christian
education mavericks Tommy and Carolyn Walden (Don’t miss their creation “science”
Discovery Center at S. 8th and Butternut!) were reportedly expected to
appear at all Abilene elementary schools with R.O.D.N.I.E. the religious robot.
I guess that program had subsided
later on, thank goodness, as my son attended K-12. By middle school I was at least able to find
the word “evolution” in his science books, but still many of our community’s
science teachers almost certainly fell in the category of skimming past the
topic or, worse, making positive mention of creation “science” as though it merited
consideration alongside reality.
I don’t know whether the exasperating
folly of creationism is presently indulged in AISD classrooms – oh wait, whom
am I kidding, of course it is, and
twice as much at Wylie and Clyde.
People have suggested to me
that the creation-evolution “debate” is an academic sort of matter, and of no great
practical relevance. I only wish it were
so, frankly, now that the consequences of malignant science denial come blowing
class 4 and 5, again and again. But I
suppose Texas incurred this sorrow and ruin by not going hard enough on Planned
Parenthood and LGBT residents.
Having teamed up with
Vladimir Putin and the white supremacist faction to pervert the presidential
election, now the cult of creationism is gleefully at work circumventing the “no
establishment” promise of the constitution –hoping to fulfill their mad fantasy
of a “Christian nation.” How tragic that despisers of intellect and education
have prevailed, replacing the worthiest statesman ever to hold the high office
with a pretender thereunto, a shameless panderer who’s Christian only in the
most hypocritical possible sense.
To the delight of the crazy
fringe that mis-elected him, this villain has of course done his blundering
best to dismantle the advances America enjoyed during President Obama’s enlightened
administration.
An immediate casualty was environmental
protection. Great! The fake religion
Trump pretends to belong to drives an evil initiative to abandon regulation of
industry, turning remorseless capitalism loose on a long-mistreated planetary
environment. Such an attitude can be
expected to come of the popular doctrine that all this was quickly and easily
poofed into existence just recently by One who’s going to come and carry us
away to paradise any day now, if we but make ourselves believe a few things
that fly in the face of, well, science.
Mind you, many American
churchgoers are not that way at all but have adapted to the news of the century
before last and manage to maintain Christian faith that is worthwhile and
beneficial. Apparently they contemplate a
God consistent with the actual supreme reality that science and Buddhism have
detected. I sure wish those good Christians all the best and hope they overtake
the others ASAP.
Diversity, diversity in faith
and philosophy is the treasure of constitutional liberty. My heart is with the underdog minorities –
Pagans such as my wife, and the Atheists and those who self-style on
metaphysics in what has been called a new age.
Blessed are they who, in such times as these, stand up for the
progressive ethic and resist the machinations of a dysfunctional regime. May future elections repair and restore
America!
