{"id":130,"date":"2009-12-18T08:09:00","date_gmt":"2009-12-18T08:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/thinplaces\/2009\/12\/darwin-andor-jesus.html"},"modified":"2009-12-18T08:09:00","modified_gmt":"2009-12-18T08:09:00","slug":"darwin-andor-jesus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/2009\/12\/darwin-andor-jesus.html","title":{"rendered":"Darwin and\/or Jesus?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two quotations worth pondering, the first from one of the most influential thinkers of the past two centuries:<\/span><\/p>\n


<\/span><\/div>\n
“With savages, the weak in body or mind are soon eliminated; and those that survive commonly exhibit a vigorous state of health. We civilised men, on the other hand, do our utmost to check the process of elimination; we build asylums for the imbecile, the maimed, the sick; we institute poor-laws; and our medical men exert their utmost skill to save the life of every one to the last moment. There is reason to believe that vaccination has preserved thousands, who from a weak constitution would formerly have succumbed to small-pox. Thus the weak members of civilised societies propogate their kind. No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man. It is surprising how soon a want of care, or care wrongly directed, leads to the degeneration of a domestic race; but excepting in the case of man himself, hardly any one is so ignorant as to allow his worst animals to breed” (Charles Darwin, <\/span>The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex<\/span><\/i> (London: John Muarry, 1906).<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
Contrast these words with one of the most influential thinkers of the past two thousand years:<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
<\/p>\n

<\/span>“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. <\/span>For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, <\/span>I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span>“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? <\/span>When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? <\/span>When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span>“The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.'”<\/span><\/p>\n

(Jesus, in Matthew 25:39-41)<\/span><\/p>\n


<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Two quotations worth pondering, the first from one of the most influential thinkers of the past two centuries: “With savages, the weak in body or mind are soon eliminated; and those that survive commonly exhibit a vigorous state of health. We civilised men, on the other hand, do our utmost to check the process of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":88,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-130","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-disability"],"yoast_head":"\nDarwin and\/or Jesus? - Thin Places<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/2009\/12\/darwin-andor-jesus.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Darwin and\/or Jesus? - Thin Places\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Two quotations worth pondering, the first from one of the most influential thinkers of the past two centuries: “With savages, the weak in body or mind are soon eliminated; and those that survive commonly exhibit a vigorous state of health. 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Two major life experiences have shaped her writing and her faith\u00e2\u20ac\u201dcaring for her mother-in-law as she battled cancer and welcoming her daughter Penny into the world after she was diagnosed at birth with Down syndrome. Both experiences expanded and enriched her understanding of what it means to be human and to receive each and every person as a gift.\u00c2\u00a0 A graduate of Princeton University and Princeton Theological Seminary, she is the author of Penelope Ayers: A Memoir, and the forthcoming A Good and Perfect Gift (Bethany House). Her essays have appeared in First Things, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Christian Century, ChristianityToday.com, and Bloom, among other online venues.","sameAs":["http:\/\/amyjuliabecker.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/author\/amyjuliabecker"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/88"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=130"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=130"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=130"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=130"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}