A Christian – Once an Anti-evolutionary Fundamentalist – Now Hears the Message of God in the Unfolding Evolutionary Process of the Universe

Michael Dowd, author of the forthcoming book, Thank God for Evolution: How the Marriage of Science and Religion Will Transform Your Life and Our World

Dowd was raised a Roman Catholic, but later moved to fundamentalist Pentecostalism.  As a student at Evangel College, he was sure that Satan had taken over when he discovered that a biology text included a discussion of evolution.  His views changed as he conversed with colleagues he respected and with a Buddhist monk who impressed him with his “Christian” behavior. 

Today, he and his wife, Connie Barlow (a science writer), travel the country preaching evolutionary theology and spirituality.  They have no home, but drive a trailer and live where they find hospitality. 

Evolution, he says, is “public revelation,” based on scientific evidence and methods.  Faith, by contrast, is “private revelation.”  Dowd begins with the 14 billion year evolutionary process, telling the story in a sacred way, hearing the message of God in the unfolding.  The vast majority of scientists, he notes – including most advocates of “intelligent design” – accept the reality of evolution.

He likens the universe to Russian “nesting dolls,” or “nesting centers of creativity.”  Thus, there are sub-atomic particles within atoms, within molecules, within creatures, within the earth, within the universe.  Using this image, God is the largest “nesting doll,” the “whole” – both transcendent – greater than any one thing or creature – and immanent, a part of everything.   Thus, nature does not exist for human beings; human beings exist to serve nature or the “whole” or “God.”

Dowd thus understands human beings as growing from the process of evolution.  We are, he says, nature reflecting on itself with the power to save the earth, to immunize it against disasters (like comets, for example) and to reverse the current trend of global warming.  This ethic, he says, is what it means today to “know, love and serve God.”

Although Dowd is himself a Christian, he says that this message is universal, and will, in fact, transform all religious traditions. 

Dowd and his wife talk to groups across the United States as diverse as atheists, conservative evangelicals, Unitarians, Jews, mainline Protestants, Catholics, Hindus, and others – and they find that 80-90% of their audiences relate positively to this message. 

Is he optimistic that the spread of evolutionary spirituality reverse the tide of climate change?  It will bring great changes, he believes, but will not likely prevent all catastrophes.  But these catastrophes, he believes, will call all religious traditions to greatness, transcending boundaries as they seek solutions. 

The Pope’s Favorite Rabbi Comments on the Pope’s New Book

Rabbi Jacob Neusner, author of A Rabbi Talks with Jesus, a book that influenced Pope Benedict XVI’s new book, Jesus of Nazareth

Rabbi Neusner has a “relationship of scholars” with Pope Benedict XVI, who wrote Jesus of Nazareth under his baptismal name, Joseph Ratzinger.  Neusner affirms that the Pope does not intend his book to be doctrinally binding on the church; it expresses his personal view of Jesus.

Rabbi Neusner, in his own book, A Rabbi Talks with Jesus, uses the Gospel of Matthew as his basic text because this is the gospel that is closest to the Jewish Torah. 

Using that gospel, he listens to Jesus respectfully, and dialogues with him.  He finds Jesus’ independence of mind especially attractive, but that’s also the core of his disagreement with Jesus.  When Jesus uses the phrases, “it was said of old….but I say unto you…,” the rabbi says he is claiming an authority over and above the Torah.  Rabbi Neusner says that is a thoroughly Christian concept, not a Jewish one.  Examples include Jesus’ view of who decides acceptable practices on the Sabbath, and a willingness to leave family to follow Jesus. 

Neusner finds that Pope Benedict XVI is totally respectful of the Torah and the Jewish tradition in his work.  He also goes out of his way to exonerate Pius XII in his relationship to rescuing Jews in World War II. 

Why are these books on Jesus important?  Because, says Neusner, they show us what makes Christians Christians and what makes Jews Jews. 

Interfaith Families and the Issue of Circumcision

Mary Helene Rosenbaum, Executive Director, the Dovetail Institute, and co-author of Celebrating our Differences: Living Two Faiths in One Marriage

A recent court case in Oregon raised the issue of circumcision – or more broadly – who decides the religion or religious practices of children in interfaith marriages.  In this case, the father – a convert to Judaism – sought to have his son circumcised over the health objections of his wife, from whom he is divorced.  The Oregon Supreme Court has yet to rule in the case. 

Mary Helen Rosenbaum said that Judaism usually requires male circumcision, but that the issues of who decides are complex. Religious decisions, she says, should not be confused with “control issues.”  And this gets much more complicated when the parents are separated or divorced.

She cited a case in which a Catholic mother baptized her child a Catholic even though the father was Jewish.  In this unusual case, the Catholic bishop actually annulled the baptism because the woman had misrepresented the sacrament to the child and because the children considered themselves Jewish. 

One cannot, however, draw broad implications from a case about circumcision, she says, because circumcision is an irreversible procedure and often a very emotional issue.