Eddie Asks: Does God Govern Evolution?

[Jordan (Jordan Mantha)]

@Eddie

BioLogos used to be dominated by Arminians, often in the form of Nazarenes, who are significantly Wesleyan in their roots

Right, but Falk and Giberson are Nazarene scientists, not Nazarene theologians. Oord is/was a Nazarene theologian, that is true. But now you’ve got Haarsmas and I’m also thinking of Alvin Plantiga, Oliver Crisp, Bruce Waltke, Pete Enns, and Tremper Longman III. BioLogos, to me, seems more Reformed-leaning.

I was at the ASA meeting this summer and I felt it was dominated by Reformed (Presbyterian, Lutheran) and Anglican voices. That is just my impression though.

@Eddie

In short, I have always found the suggestion that Wesleyans think differently about evolution than Calvinists to be murky, and theologically and philosophically unclear.

Yeah, me too, but I’m a scientist so I always suspect my theology is suspect.

@Eddie

If you can be clearer than Falk, Giberson, Venema, etc., about how the actual teaching of Wesley (or of Arminius, if you prefer) would cash out in terms of God’s role in the evolutionary process, I for one would be very grateful.

I would like to work on this. I have some Wesleyan theologian friends I hope to work on that with. I think this is part of the struggle with having interdisciplinary work – theologians will often find the theology of scientists to be shallow and half-baked, scientists are appalled at theologians lack of scientific literacy. I do hope to facilitate that cross/inter/multi-disciplinary work at my institution.