It has happened again. I recently had a friend share that her child, a college student, was seriously questioning her faith, and now has lost it. This child was raised and homeschooled K-12. "What happens?" my friend asked, "Do kids just lose brain cells when they get to college?" Upon further questioning, I learned that my friend's child began questioning her faith when she was presented with the "facts" of biological evolution in her freshman class.
What shocked me was my friend never formally taught her child the creation vs. evolution model side-by-side and explained what each teaches. Now, normally this wouldn't appear odd. You would consider this a matter of choice for any homeschool parent. But, this person knows me well, knows about my curriculum, (I often feel badly for my friends because I get so excited about recent findings in the ongoing creation and evolution debate and share with them all the time.) What I didn’t know was her child had no education pertaining to this debate and they used general high-school curriculum, lacking the specifics.
You see, many of my own friends don't use my curriculum. And you know what? That's okay. But whatever curriculum you are using...please make sure you teach both models. Yes, Christian kids know that God created the world. The problem for a Christian? Most lack the scientific basis that confirms the Genesis account. Yes, science really does confirm Genesis. A parent teaches their children that they must believe God created. But many fall short of stepping outside the Bible. So, it goes to reason that secular universities (and sadly, many Christian as well) teach science from a non-Biblical and scientific basis. So, what happens is our Christian kids who are taught that God created the world will lose (or seriously question) their faith when presented with overwhelming "evidence," against this “myth,” which is Genesis. No one cares that the scientific evidence is unsubstantiated. When you hear evoltuion spoken about in the media we hear words like this..."We know that Dinosaurs roamed the world over 65 million years ago." How do they "know"?
In the Astronomy class I am currently teaching we've covered some major points. The biggest is that astronomers, to be funded by our US Government dollars, must believe in the Big Bang as fact or they will not get telescope time or money to research. A scientist recently lost his telescope time for questioning the Big Bang and coming up with another theory (not Christian in the least, but against the Big Bang!) We also have learned that CDM (Cold Dark Matter) the "glue" if you will that holds the universe together is "out there" but we don't know "where" it is...."what" it is...or "how" it came to be...but we are taught it IS there because how else is the universe sustained? (No faith allowed in science? Think again.)
Sorry for the soap box. It hurts when another friend’s child has left her faith because of supposed evidences of evolution. (I have lost count of the number of parents who have shared variations of this story with me at conventions, via email or in person.) It further hurts that I could have been a help, directly or indirectly in this child's life through my curriculum. You know what? I don't care if you buy my books, attend my classes to learn the other side, or purchase from another Creation Scientist's organization. Please, just get some Creation books and study, please. For the sake of your child, and their faith, maybe not today but when they are adults.
