Christian and Secular Education Current Issue

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secular society, Christian values, beliefs, and worldviews are systematically excluded from the educational system. Parents who can afford costly private schools can help inculcate their children into a Biblical worldview, but the majority of Christians who cannot do this and whose children attend public schools need to find ways to resolve the ideological conflicts presented to their children. Children regularly receive disparate information about crucial issues such as those related to gender roles and norms, human sexuality, and the origin of life on earth. While all of these core topics challenge Christian educators to adapt their curricula to conform to legal and societal expectations, the most contentious of these might be the evolution and intelligent design debate. Christian educators continue to struggle with presenting a more balanced worldview to their students, but legal and societal expectations persist in silencing minority voices. One of the most important contemporary issues in education, intelligent design, shows how Biblical principles sometimes clash with legal and societal expectations.

One of the foundational principles in the Bible is the creation of the universe by God, a perspective not espoused by the legal, educational, cultural, or scientific establishment. "In the Beginning, God created the heavens and the Earth," (Genesis 1:1). While a specifically Christian education can straightforwardly incorporate the intelligent design model into its curriculum, a secular school administration cannot except in specific contexts and not alongside evolution teachings in science courses (Anti-Defamation League, n.d.). The most recent legal challenges to intelligent design have therefore led to the Center for Science and Culture (2015) recommending that intelligent design be actively removed from all school curricula in favor of a new approach that instead discusses "both scientific strengths and weaknesses of evolution." In this way, evolution can be discussed in a more sensible and open manner without introducing the Christian concepts of creation, which might offend secular educators, parents, and lawmakers.

American law has wavered on the issue of how to teach both evolution and intelligent design. Recent trends have suggested that intelligent design may be taught in courses that provide overviews of religion and other elements of culture but not in science courses (Anti-Defamation League, n.d.). However, the Center for Science and Culture (2015) further points out, "there is nothing unconstitutional about voluntarily discussing the scientific theory of design in the classroom." When intelligent design is discussed in "an objective and pedagogically appropriate manner," then it should be discussed alongside its counterparts like the theory of evolution. It is interesting that "the political urge to defend science education against the threats of religious orthodoxy, understandable though it is, has resulted in a counterorthodoxy, supported by bad arguments, and a tendency to overstate the legitimate scientific claims of evolutionary theory," (Nagel, 2008, p. 187). In other words, backlash against Christians in American society has led to an unintelligent presentation of the theory of evolution.

The 1925 Scopes trial was the first of many important legal debates over the teaching of evolution in public schools. In this case, a school teacher named John Scopes had been teaching evolution in his public school classrooms in Tennessee. William Jennings Bryan, future president, presided over the case; "he believed that evolution theory led to dangerous social movements. And he believed the Bible should be interpreted literally," ("Scopes Trial," n.d.). Scopes was fined for "violating the law" of the state of Tennessee ("Scopes Trial," n.d). A lot has changed since 1925. Since then, the Scopes trial decision has been overturned, particularly in the case of Edwards v. Aguillard, in 1987. In Edwards v. Aguillard, the Supreme Court of the United States overturned what was known as the Balanced Treatment act in Louisiana, which required the teaching of Creationism where evolution was taught and vice-versa. Essentially, the Balanced Treatment Act maintained that teachers in a science class would have needed to teach both evolution and intelligent design, or neither one. The result was a "culmination of a series of court battles and cultural conflicts that can be traced to the famous Scopes trial of 1925 in Dayton, Tennessee" (Center for Science and Culture, 2015, p. 461).

Clearly, the origin of humanity is a contentious issue in current American culture, politics, and society. Christians have been marginalized in this debate, their views ridiculed by the secular majority. Even when intelligent design is discussed in a similar pedagogical manner as the theory of evolution, it has become too controversial for Christian teachers to maintain good relations with parents who oppose Christian values.

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One reason for the controversy may be due to the fact that the intelligent design debate draws attention to the deep disagreements in American society over the purpose of education. Many Christians believe that education should prepare the individual for healthy moral and spiritual growth, in order to provide a positive contribution to humanity. When spiritual values are removed from the classroom, the results can be disastrous. Education must be considered integral to the evolution of a culture. In 1934, John Dewey stated that "any education is, in its forms and methods, an outgrowth of the needs of the society in which it exists," and therefore education in ancient Greece or in the Aboriginal bush of Australia would be characteristically and qualitatively different from education in 21st century America (ACSD, 2012). Given that 21st century America remains committed to secular values, we content with an educational system that shies away from treating religious convictions with the respect they deserve.

Furthermore, it is possible to simultaneously believe intelligent design and evolution. Many intelligent design theorists show that the two views can in fact be fused and make more sense when they are understood in such a context. Their mutual interaction makes intelligent design and evolution politically viable and it is certainly possible that in the future, Christian educators would be permitted to return to a more balanced presentation of the origin of humanity. Nagel (2008) notes that intelligent design is "best interpreted not as an argument for the existence of God, but as a claim about what is reasonable to believe about biological evolution if one independently holds a belief in God that is consistent with both the empirical facts about nature," (p. 188). In other words, intelligent design is compatible with the theory of evolution, and provides a more nuanced lens of looking at the evolutionary process in biology. Currently, however, the secular majority in education wish to avoid the political controversies surrounding the debate entirely. The backlash against Christianity has led to a complete reversal of what took place in Scopes. Whereas Scopes was fined for teaching evolution, teachers are being censured for mentioning intelligent design or even questioning evolution. The result is an attempt to "demonize and blacklist" those who point out the weaknesses in Darwinian evolutionary theory, which seems potently unscientific and which stifles creative and critical thinking in American classrooms (Crowther, 2005). If the purpose of education is to stimulate learning and critical inquiry, then hard-lined evolutionists are doing a disservice to the education system itself.

As a current issue in American education, the intelligent design debate is bound to balance out in the near future. The Scopes trial represented an unbalanced point-of-view in that it censured a teacher who presented evolutionary biology; similarly, the current situation is unbalanced because teachers are censured for presenting intelligent design. Intelligent design is, as the Center for Science and Culture (2015) suggests, a "a scientific theory that is open to critical scrutiny, not as a sacred dogma that can't be questioned." The same can be said for Darwinian evolution. Whereas the Bible itself cannot be used in public school science classes as a primary source document, it can be taught in religion classes as a valid component of culture. Intelligent design goes beyond Biblical teachings; Biblical teachings are only one of many sources that would support the theory of intelligent design, which is non-denominational.

The intelligent design and evolution debate in education highlights some of the underlying philosophies of education prevalent in America. The overall function and goals of education change as the culture itself changes, and the needs of the economy change too. Moral and social development are crucial in education, and so too are the needs to teach critical and creative thinking. The shift toward a test-based education system in which common core pedagogy replaces common sense has undermined the quality and validity of the educational system in the United States. Regardless of these changes, education remains a fundamental right for all persons in the United States.

All persons deserve equal access to education under the law, and all persons deserve the same caliber of education. Christians know "all things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made," and are increasingly being called upon to support those beliefs with a level of scientific scrutiny that does not apply to matters of the spirit. This is to be expected in a secular society, which.....

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