Thoughts in a Haystack

According to this story, "Lutheran camp plans creation-science learning center," the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod and its Lutheran Island Camp in Otter Tail County, Minnesota, is planning to open the first creation-science environmental learning center in the state and possibly the country:

"There are 64 environmental learning centers that are run by the state of Minnesota or the federal government. You couldn't teach creation science at any one of those," said Bill Schultz, who heads planning and resource development at Lutheran Island Camp.

All I can say is "thank goodness!"

Not only will this be opening in PZ Mxyzptlk's back yard but there is even an alumni involved:

"What we're finding is, many kids are subject to ridicule, lower grades, being laughed at, just because they lay forth different arguments and different interpretations of the same information," Schultz said.

The Rev. George Sagissor, who is working to help create the learning center, said he ran into similar reactions when he attended the University of Minnesota-Morris in the 1960s.

He recalled one lecture when he said he politely raised his hand to ask a question from a creation standpoint and was asked to leave the class.

"We don't get a chance to let our point of view be heard because we're put down and we're asked to shut up," Sagissor said.

Well, if someone interrupts a science class to spout religious doctrine, I'd hope they would be directed to the nearest theology class and asked to take it there. Of course, there is the usual creation "science" bafflegab:

"We often hear creationism versus evolution. In a sense, it's creationism versus evolutionism. Both are faith issues," [Brian Young, founder of Creation Instruction Association] said.

In fact, it is not "evolutionism" or even "scientism," it is science, which has a set of rules that creationists are not willing to play by, because their beliefs have long ago lost that game, and so they come in and try to kick over the board and stomp on all the pieces and then act surprised and hurt that they are asked to leave. Sometimes they even have a glimmer of what the problem is:

Schultz said from the church perspective, questions about the age of the earth or whether evolution is valid, are more than academic.

"When we have children who are, from the age of infancy on, inundated with a message that is contrary to what the church teaches and what the Bible teaches, we have a lot of parents and a lot of children who begin to question their faith, their salvation.

"This really, from our perspective as a ministry, has more to do with salvation and redemption and the fact that we are sinners, than it has to do with trying to prove some kind of a scientific argument," Schultz said.

Yes, it is not "academic" ... which is why it is so wrong to call it a "learning" center, instead of an "apologetics" center or "indoctrination" center. And he's also right that they are not interested in scientific arguments. But then you have to wonder why they are going to pretend to teach science there.
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