Reply #33: Letter on Intelligent Design I sent to Des Moines Register

[Hardrada]

Dear Editor:

I am continually puzzled by the attempts by the Christian Right to attempt to include Creationism or its more subtle variant, Intelligent Design, in the curriculum of public schools. I fail to see how that would advance their purposes. Even if one could somehow get past experimental science and reason to come up with some kind of Divine Watchmaker or Celestial Mechanic, one would still be only at the point of Jeffersonian Deism. It is totally inconceivable that one could then equate this remote Being to any of the menbers of the Holy Trinity as carefully delineated in the Ecumenical Creeds of Christendom: the Apostle's, the Nicene and the Athanasian. The distance to be travelled is too great. In fact, it would almost be better for those religious leaders who prosper on unanalyzed beliefs (Faith alone etc.) not to even make this kind of demand since it might actually lead to some uncalled-for speculation by some members of their flock!