The ‘creation science’ strategy raises several serious problems. As a scientific theory it is broadly out of sink with the rest of mainstream science, such as Big Bang cosmology. As a theology of creation, it relies on an implicit literal reading of Biblical texts which cannot be made genuinely compatible with the actual history of life on earth, nor can it do justice to what scholars have learned about them over the past two centuries of detailed Old Testament research.

The ‘intelligent design’ arguments fail to address the truly serious challenges raised by evolution for Christian faith - for example, the ubiquitous reality of death in nature billions of years before humans evolved. What are we to make of the Biblical connection between death and human sin? Any why would a loving and good God create life through the suffering of nature?