But in an ironic twist, it now turns
out that the NCSE itself is using federal tax dollars to
insert religion into biology classrooms. Earlier this
year, the NCSE and the University of California Museum of
Paleontology unveiled a
website for teachers entitled "Understanding
Evolution." Funded in part by a nearly half-million-dollar
federal grant, the website encourages teachers to use
religion to promote evolution. Apparently the NCSE thinks
mixing science and religion is okay after all — as long as
religion is used to support evolution.
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The purpose of the "Understanding
Evolution" website is to instruct teachers in how they
should teach evolution, and the federal government
(through the
National Science Foundation) came up with $450,000 for
the project. As might be expected, the science presented
on the website is rather lopsided. Although there are
vigorous arguments among biologists about many aspects of
neo-Darwinism, teachers aren't informed about those
scientific debates, ignoring guidance from the U.S.
Congress in 2001 that "where topics are taught that may
generate controversy (such as biological evolution), the
curriculum should help students to understand the full
range of scientific views that exist."
But the strangest part of the website,
by far, is the section that encourages educators to use
religion to endorse evolution. Teachers are told that
nearly all religious people, theologians, and scientists
who hold religious beliefs endorse modern evolutionary
theory, and that indeed such a view "actually enriches
their faith." In fact, teachers are directed to statements
by a variety of religious groups giving their theological
endorsement of evolution.
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For example, educators can read a
statement from the United Church of Christ that "modern
evolutionary theory... is in no way at odds with our
belief in a Creator God, or in the revelation and
presence of that God in Jesus Christ and the Holy
Spirit." Needless to say, statements from thoughtful
religious groups and scholars who critique Darwinism
because of its claim that the development of life was an
unguided process are not included. Nor is there any
indication of the fact that, according to opinion
surveys, the vast majority of Americans continues to be
skeptical of Darwin's theory of unguided evolution.
This effort to use religion to
endorse evolution is part of a larger public-relations
strategy devised by the NCSE to defuse skepticism of
neo-Darwinism. On its own website, the group advises
inviting ministers to testify in favor of evolution
before school boards, and it has created a Sunday-school
curriculum to promote evolution in the churches. The
NCSE even has a "Faith Network Director" who claims that
"Darwin's theory of evolution... has, for those open to
the possibilities, expanded our notions of God."
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Eugenie Scott, the group's executive
director, is an original signer of something called the
Humanist Manifesto III, which proclaims that "humans
are... the result of unguided evolutionary change" and
celebrates "the inevitability and finality of death."
Although a non-believer herself, Scott apparently
understands the political utility of religion.
Of course, as a private group, the
NCSE has every right to use religion to promote its
pro-Darwin agenda, whether or not it is sincere. But
what about using government funds to do so?
Taxpayers might wonder why it's the
government's business to tell them what their religious
beliefs about evolution should or shouldn't be.
Presumably this government grant was supposed to be
spent on science, not on convincing people that
evolution comports with "the revelation and presence
of...God in Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit." Where's
the ACLU when you really need it? It's difficult to see
how the website's presentation of religion even comes
close to following Supreme Court precedents on the
establishment clause of the First Amendment.
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One wonders whether those at the NCSE
appreciate the irony of their situation. All over the
country they have tried to prevent the teaching of
scientific criticisms of evolutionary theory as an
unconstitutional establishment of religion. But here
they spend tax money to promote evolution, explicitly
invoking religion, and that's supposed to be okay.
It seems the Darwinists have overseen
the evolution of a new species of religion-science
crossbreed: one that fits their agenda.
— John West is
a senior fellow at the
Discovery Institute and an Associate Professor of
Political Science at Seattle Pacific University.
This commentary first appeared on
The National Review
