Thinking about fundamentalism
by Robert Fulford
National Post (Canada), page A21
April 5, 2008
The Creation Museum, which opened last spring near Cincinnati depicts dinosaurs among the animals sharing the Garden of Eden with Adam and Eve. The “young-earth” creationists behind the museum believe God made the world, all of it, about 6,000 years ago. Instructors explain that most dinosaurs were wiped out by the Flood and the two Noah crammed into the Ark later died because the post-Flood environment wasn’t dinosaur-friendly.
The museum’s theologians differ from “old-earth” believers who speculate that a “day” in Genesis could mean millions of years. And neither faction embraces intelligent design, the idea that creation evolved under detailed divine guidance. For those who think of fundamentalist Christianity as a monolith, the Creation Museum serves as a reminder that evangelical religion contains many disparate opinions even on a question like planetary history.
