Observers of Christian schools and the wider American culture know the depths of controversy elicited in recent debates by the topic of origins. Whether the age of the earth or the inception of human beings, concerns about the beginnings of things have led many Christians either to join in culture wars or to flee them. In fact, this topic has played a key role in some parents’ decisions to enroll their children in private Christian schools. And some of these educational institutions, for their part, have chosen to avoid the topic of evolution altogether in their science and Bible classes or to selectively expose students to material in hope that they will adopt a particular position on the issue. Earlier this year, my school decided to deal with the issue in a different way.

A Conversation on Origins

As director of the school’s institute on faith and culture, in the fall of 2015 I placed a call to the Colossian Forum (TCF), and before long the ball was rolling on a partnership to bring to the Denver metro area what TCF calls a “new kind of conversation.” On January 27, 2017, approximately 250 junior and senior high students from four different Christian schools gathered for an all-day discussion on the topic of origins. Instead of the vitriol commonly associated with the topic, we intended this annual symposium to show these young people the possibility—and necessity—for disciples of Christ to esteem and exhibit both truth and love in addressing contentious social issues.

Coming into any event on the topic of origins, we knew many in our community would likely view it within the framework of debate. They would come expecting to find a Christian creationist pitted against an atheist evolutionist, to listen attentively for errors in the “opponent’s” position, to applaud when their own side had the upper hand, and then to join in the celebration afterward as the other side slunk away, vanquished. There would be no desire to learn, except perhaps to pick up some informational tidbits that would reinforce and confirm the moral and intellectual superiority of one’s own views.

Debate as Default

In part, debate has become the default setting in our society because various stakeholders have defined the relationship between faith and science in adversarial terms. For some influential secular scientists and cultural intellectuals, religious faith is an obstacle to the progress that science can bring to the world. And some Christians highlight opposition by insisting that one must choose the Bible over the findings of science (although they may also seek to resolve the tension by embracing a creation science that does not conflict with their reading of Genesis). Finally, various media outlets promote the conflict framework since it is sensationalistic and will draw more eyes to their pages and screens than will a nuanced and less soundbite-friendly version.

While we believe there is a place for debate, with our symposium we wanted instead to facilitate a conversation that would encourage people both to speak their convictions and to listen with a posture of openness to what others might have to say. We invited two eminent scientists to join us for the day. They took very different positions on the age of the earth, the means by which God created the world, and the correct way to read the book of Genesis, yet each saw the other as a sibling in Christ. As we see it, since origins is a matter of contention not only between Christians and non-Christians but within churches and Christian educational institutions as well, it becomes imperative that we engage difficult topics in ways that bring unity to the body of Christ, even if its members don’t see eye-to-eye on everything.

Introducing Origins

Before spending the majority of a school day discussing origins, we wanted to ensure that our students and guests from other schools did not automatically jump to a focus on debate. Since one of the central convictions of the Teaching FASTly approach is that the relationship between faith and science is complex and not always adversarial, we considered how we might use FAST materials to accomplish this. In the end, we decided to use them in two ways:

1. Because we wanted all students to come into the symposium with some background to the origins topic and an awareness of its complexity, we asked our school’s Bible teachers (and teachers from visiting schools) to spend some class time in the weeks prior to the event walking their students through two lessons from teachfastly.com.

The lesson “Understanding Adaptation” gave students an overview of how populations, and not individual creatures, change over time in response to changing physical environments (see the “Understanding Adaptation” Activity Map at teachfastly.com). And the lesson “Meet the Cast” introduced students to versions of the three most prominent positions on origins, two of which would be represented by the scientists on the day of the symposium. For this lesson, some teachers chose to discuss a chart that laid out similarities and differences between the three views, while other teachers chose to dress up in various costumes to role-play fictional representatives of each of the three positions (see the “Do Faith and Science Conflict?” Activity Map at teachfastly.com).

2. After opening with a time of prayer and song dedicating the day to God, we began the symposium by introducing the relationship between faith and science. Using the lesson “Not Just Warfare,” I asked students in the auditorium to fill in blanks on a series of sentences identifying the degree to which they saw faith and science in conflict (see the “Do Faith and Science Conflict?” Activity Map at teachfastly.com). Although students didn’t indicate as much opposition as I had expected (possibly because they had completed the other FAST lessons beforehand or because their science teachers convincingly modeled how one could be both a person of faith and a person of science), it was still important to nest the upcoming discussion of origins within a more nuanced understanding of faith and science.

Following this brief exercise, we reinforced the message by breaking the students into small discussion groups with a teacher leading students through the remainder of the lesson, which entailed discussing a series of statements that were difficult to categorize as matters only of faith or of science. Then, after students reconvened as a whole group, I briefly led them through another lesson titled “Zero-Sum Games,” which illustrated how zero-sum thinking can be misapplied to issues of faith and science by asking people to think exclusively in either/or terms without admitting the possibility of both/and (see the “Do Faith and Science Conflict?” Activity Map at teachfastly.com).

Exploring Origins

After this introduction, students spent the remainder of the school day exploring origins. They attended breakout sessions on various dimensions of the issue, participated in small-group discussions, and observed the scientists as they described their backgrounds, presented their cases, interacted with one another, and responded to questions from the students. During this time, students were joined by a few curious (and possibly apprehensive) parents, whom we had invited to participate. In fact, that evening we held an additional event for the school’s parent community so they could get a taste of what their children had experienced during the day. We also invited people from local schools and churches who were interested in the topic to join us.

The Purpose of Conversation

During both daytime and evening sessions, a primary purpose of this “grace-filled conversation” was to cultivate within the school community a particular set of Christian virtues. Specifically, these were (1) the patience not to expect to solve a complex issue immediately, (2) the perseverance to stay engaged with a complex issue for an extended period of time, (3) the courage to pursue truth where it may lead and to speak one’s convictions boldly, and (4) the humility to acknowledge one’s limits and to listen well to others with whom one may or may not agree.

Students and adults alike were given the chance to see these virtues practiced by the scientists and, to some extent, to practice them themselves. In fact, we prepared students beforehand to recognize virtue during the symposium, and issued an assignment for them to complete afterward describing what they saw and reflecting on what it meant for them personally.

Community Reactions

We were greatly pleased by the students’ ability to identify virtue and to describe how it applied to their own journey as Christian disciples. Additionally, we were very glad to see a large number of adults indicate on a survey following the evening session that they appreciated the event and affirmed the importance of grace-filled conversation for the school and for the body of Christ. Thus, what could have been mere controversy instead became an opportunity for further growth into Christlikeness, both on an individual level and as a community.

Of course, not everyone was pleased that we had taken this approach to the topic. In the weeks preceding and following the event, we in school leadership conversed with some parents and teachers who were concerned either that we were highlighting the topic of origins or that we were not structuring the event to encourage students to embrace a particular position. We let them know, gently, that the school was not abandoning its traditional position as a school but that we believed it was important for students to hear the best arguments that Christians on different sides of the issue have to offer and to learn to love those with whom they disagree. We also let these parents know that we truly wanted and needed their voices to be part of our community’s conversation, as we discern together what it means to live as Christ’s disciples. As we strive to follow our Lord, we will often agree on what faithfulness looks like. But when disagreements and controversies arise, as they inevitably will, we hope that we will have learned to approach them as an opportunity to deepen our understanding of the truth and to grow in love for our Creator and for one another.

Kevin M. Taylor (PhD, Boston University) directs the Veritas et Caritas Institute at Front Range Christian School in Littleton, CO.