Persuasion, Pluralism, Perseverance
Let's Talk Creation debuted its 100th episode recently with a recording of the Creation Together event from last summer. The episode presents a public meeting with me and Darrel Falk describing our relationship and differences and where things currently stand. You might have read about this in our book The Fool and the Heretic. Whenever we have an event like this or advertise what we've been doing, I always feel like the complexity and challenges of what we've done get reduced by the listeners to easy categories they're familiar with. With those reductions come reactions that sort of cluster around one of two extremes: excitement or condemnation. I'm always left feeling like people don't quite get it. So let me see if I can put my thoughts into words, which will undoubtedly be misunderstood yet again, but I'll give it my best try.
As usual, let me preface this by reminding readers that this is my own perspective, not Darrel's nor anyone else involved in Creation Together. This is how I see things.
When people of ideological opposition get together to chat and discuss and wrestle with their differences, I feel like the modern culture pigeonholes the event into two simple categories. Either these opponents are engaging in persuasion or pluralism. In the political arena, I suppose you could also add actual negotiating in order to govern, but we don't have much of that left in the American political system. And Darrel and I aren't politicians, so it feels like the reactions squeeze us into the persuasion or pluralism categories.
In the persuasion model, the objective of our meetings is to convince the other person that he's wrong. Consequently, we should be lobbing our best arguments against each other, rebutting the opposition, and landing those devastating rhetorical blows that leave our opponents speechless. Or something like that. For these folks, debate is the only reason to chat with someone from a different ideological view. Naturally, these persuasion folks get pretty antsy when we don't really try to do that in our public events. If this is a debate, it's a total failure! Todd should confront Darrel more! Darrel should show how Todd is delusional!
The amusing part of this reaction is that we have tried these sorts of things in our private discussions. It's not that we're formally debating, but you can't really explain your position and why you hold it without explaining various evidences or arguments that you find persuasive. When you do that in the presence of someone who fundamentally disagrees with you, there will always be that moment where you get to hear the response. That's when things get sticky. Sometimes the other guy has a good answer. Sometimes you realize as you're talking that your argument is very hard to articulate or fallacious in its most common form (yes, that's happened to me). Some arguments are just not that persuasive. Issues that are very important to me just don't bother Darrel, and decisive points in Darrel's mind just don't impress me. Because there's no audience and we're not in high school debate class, we don't just shoot a bunch of points at each other and smugly watch as we struggle to respond to them all. Scoring debate points is not the point.
Since the persuasion model is obviously not the best fit for what Darrel and I do, then the only alternative in most folks' minds is pluralism or your basic liberal tolerance. Since we can't persuade the other, then our objective must be denying the truth content of our positions and affirming that we're all equal and there's nothing to argue about. In this case, pluralism would involve me affirming that Darrel's position is valid and does not pose any threat to Christian theology, and then vice versa. Darrel would have to affirm that my position is valid and poses no threat to science or Christian theology. Neither of us believe that, so those who seriously worry about pluralism must be thinking that we're on a slippery slope.
To be fair, there are also those who still think pluralism is the point but not because we're denying truth but because we're ignoring it. These folks imagine that we must not really be discussing our differences because we'd just get into a fight. How else could we get along? We must be focusing on other matters that unify us and then deciding that our differences, as substantial as they may be, must be of less importance. So we're not denying truth, but we're saying it just doesn't matter.
That's not it either though. We both make a point to explain that our differences DO matter. Our views have serious theological and practical consequences. We do not pretend that they don't, and I can tell you truthfully that my own anger and grief have boiled over on more than one occasion over the years. This disagreement really does matter a lot. Once again, if you really think pluralism is the great danger here, you can only think that Darrel and I are on the slippery slope. We don't say our differences don't matter, but eventually maybe we'll decide that the creation/evolution debate doesn't matter. Or maybe people listening or watching will come to that conclusion.
Honestly, that slippery slope argument I think has some validity to it, at least in terms of the audience. Given how often people misunderstand what we're doing as pluralism, then it stands to reason that people will come away thinking that our differences don't matter to us or at all. Hence, here I am again trying to explain this to people. Creation Together and my relationship with Darrel is not about persuasion or pluralism. Our culture simply lacks any reference point for this, and that's the sad bit. We Christians, more than anyone else, ought to excel at loving our enemy and striving together towards the truth. In the absence of any other reference, I guess I should try to encapsulate what we're doing (one more time). I'll call this perseverance.
What I describe here as perseverance is a uniquely Christian virtue. First, it acknowledges that there is a truth and that truth matters. It acknowledges that we don't always see the truth clearly. Most importantly, it acknowledges the frequent biblical admonition that we Christians need to stick together, and that is where I think it diverges most from every other ideological conflict. By being together, the Spirit of God can work to shape us into the image of Christ and to lead us into all truth. Because we can count on the promises of God, there is hope in perseverance. It doesn't have to degrade into arguments or bland tolerance. Perseverance has a purpose and a goal all by itself.
Perseverance involves minimally coming together in person, as Christians, in the name of Christ, to directly address important differences. Beyond that, there's not much formula to it. Practice Christian disciplines together. Read the Word. Pray. Having a referee can help manage the actual discussions, but you should also spend time just getting to know each other without the pressure of disagreement. The keys are being together and being Christian together. What will happen? What is the "point?" No one can predict what exactly will happen, but Christ promised that he would be with us when we gather in his name. Who knows what he will do?
For all you practically-minded people who find such spiritual talk unsatisfying, I think there are practical consequences to perseverance as well. Foremost among them are the growth and maturity that one can experience through perseverance. I've said more than once that Darrel has made me a better young-age creationist. He's exposed poor thinking. He's forced me to think much more carefully and critically about what I believe. The way I express my confidence in the young-age creationist position is very different now than it was 14 years ago when I first met Darrel. My understanding is much better. It's sharper and clearer and, I think, more convincing.
When you sit in your little echo chamber surrounded only by those who agree with you, poor thinking has a way of slipping by. No one is carefully examining those fundamental assumptions that you all share, and so all manner of goofy ideas can flourish without any real justification. That problem brings me to the fringers. Our basest tendencies when confronted with disagreements that we feel very strongly about is to separate and maybe even isolate. Over the years, I've seen this happen lots of times. The far edges of creationism blur right into cryptozoology, conspiracy and skepticism, and in a few cases, outright cultish con artistry. On the other side, the idea of a truly evangelical evolutionist strikes a lot of people as improbable. Evolutionary theology far too often moves into outright heresy, imagining a God that evolves with his creation or some other bizarre mismash of Christian terminology and panentheism.
I can't promise you that persevering with others who strongly disagree with you will prevent you from wandering off into madness or heresy. Then again, constantly having to articulate your position in the face of challenging responses can, as I've said, help you identify your own shortcomings. Can it actually help reach out to the fringers? I think it must. Am I ready to try? Maybe. We'll see how it goes.
Most importantly to my mind, perseverance is an act of obedience. Even if I couldn't see the benefits myself, I think it's important to follow Jesus' prayer to "be one" (John 17:20-21). We separate so easily. Maybe if we focused on togetherness in disagreement, we might see blessings we can't imagine. And even if we don't, it's still what Jesus wants us to do.
So there it is. It's not persuasion. It's not pluralism. It's much harder than both. Can it go terribly wrong? Oh yes, just like any other human endeavor, but it can also go marvelously right. Where will it go? God only knows, but I want to be there to see it.
Feedback? Email me at toddcharleswood [at] gmail [dot] com. If you enjoyed this article, please consider a contribution to Core Academy of Science. Thank you.
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