I was amused by the 8/2/05 letter entitled “Christian Taliban threatens freedom” written by Daniel Kelleher, and that entitled “Religious Belief is Just So Much Mysticism” by Frederick Spoerl dated 10/5/05. They are comic portrayals of the authors’ delusion that they are free-thinkers. Based on their writings, their concept of free-thinking is dropping the ballast of intellectual laziness and cowardice that arises from “religious beliefs/prejudices”, preconceptions, and other conditioning from society. As free-thinkers, they claim a belief system based on science, logic, and rational thinking. To quote Mr. Kelleher, the Christian’s “arguments often involve tortured logic, shallow understanding, stubborn denial of evidence…” Mr. Spoerl considers himself greatly courageous to “go against what the majority believed”, and he states with religious conviction that “most people believe in (religion) due to their upbringing…, respect for their elders without ever questioning…” The tone and content of both author’s letters suggest that they believe that, in contrast to the “very frightening” “Christian fundamentalist zealots”, those of their ilk are no “danger to American freedom”.

      Fanning the flames of their vaporous illusion is their belief that Creationism is what Mr. Kelleher called “junk science”. Macro-evolution and the Big Bang Theory of our origin are taught as absolute fact, yet science does not support them. Evolution-proponents accuse us of primitive thought like those who “believe the Earth is as flat as a pancake…and resting on the backs of four giant elephants” (ScienceWeek 1/23/05 editorial) yet they are truly the ones who have not caught up with the times. The following critical research that refutes evolution had not been available at the time Darwin published “On the Origin of the Species”.

      Gregor Mendel had not yet established his work on the laws of heredity and genetics that revealed the error of Darwin’s theory of “blending inheritance” by chance random processes. James Joule, R.J.E. Clausius and Lord Kelvin were just developing the now universally accepted laws of thermodynamics. The first law states that energy can neither be created nor destroyed (so the universe—matter, energy, time, physical space—could not have created itself), and the second law says that the universe is proceeding in a downward degenerating direction of disorganization (clarifies why there has been no proven case of evolution from one kind to a higher, more complex kind). The “scientific” theory of “spontaneous generation” had not yet been officially refuted by Louis Pasteur’s work. In Darwin’s time, it was believed that life could arise spontaneously from inanimate things such as dirt. The mathematical laws of probability, which show that the odds of life’s occurring by chance are effectively zero (improbability multiplied by improbability to reach incomprehensible numbers), had not been applied to the theory of evolution. Molecular biology had not yet been developed, with its revelation that the cell is so enormously complex that it could not possibly have been formed by chance. The fossil record had not yet been investigated sufficiently for paleontologists to be able to say, as they do now (including atheist Harvard evolutionary biologist Ernst Mayr 1 ) that chains of intermediate links do not exist. At this point, with billions of known fossils, no one has documented macroevolution.

      There are basic rules of logic which have governed valid reasoning since Aristotle. Belief that the universe came from nothing and by nothing defies logic. Based on the laws of logic, premises that support a Creator can be made: 1: Whatever begins to exist has a cause. 2: The universe began to exist. 3: Therefore the universe has a cause. It logically follows that this cause that created the universe must be uncaused, changeless, timeless, and an immaterial being of unimaginable power. The only way for the cause to be timeless is for the cause to be a personal agent who freely chooses to create. A personal creator is therefore not only supported by science but is logically consistent and infinitely more probable than blatantly self-contradictory atheism and Big Bang Theory. The writings of intellectual giants like Lee Stobel 2 and C.S Lewis 3 , whose tenacious probing brought them from atheism to Christianity, reveal how belief in monotheism and Jesus Christ’s claims is supported both by overwhelming evidence and rational thought.

      Mr. Spoerl claims his “honest love and happiness” is based on being free from religious “indoctrination”. Our brains are wired for the capacity of a feeling of elation from all manner of fantasy and mind-altering chemical substances. For happiness to be “honest”, however, it must be based on reality and freedom. “Free-thinkers” are truly shackled— to their agendas, presuppositions, blindness, and secular cultural influences. What they are free from is the true historical record, scientific validation, rational thinking, logic, and openness to truth. It requires more faith to maintain belief in atheism and the Big Bang Theory than to trust in Jesus Christ. The battle is not ultimately between individual belief systems but powers of principalities involving spiritual darkness and light. “The natural (unregenerate) man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned” (1 Cor 2:14). Jesus’ promise is reliable: “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” I pray that Mr. Kelleher and Mr. Spoerl come to know that deepest level of love that can only come from God.

Annie Bukacek MD