Evolutionists to Celebrate Darwin's Birth and Writings
By David N. Menton, PhD

      We are about to enter what will be for many ‘the year of Darwin.’  During 2009, much of the world will celebrate the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin and the 150th anniversary of the publication of his book The Origin of Species by Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.
    Back in 1959, when the world celebrated the 100th anniversary of the publication of The Origin of Species, evolutionists lamented that students in America’s schools were not being adequately indoctrinated in evolution.  They complained that evolution was often left to the last chapter of biology text books and that many teachers, either intentionally or unintentionally, never got around to covering it.  But that was about to change.  Evolutionist H. J. Muller angrily proclaimed the battle cry of the Darwinian centenary - “one hundred years without Darwin are enough.”
    The basic strategy of evolutionists over the last 50 years has been to ensure that evolution is the central theme of nearly every chapter of biology textbooks.  Toward this end, the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study (BSCS) was established in 1959 through a federally funded grant from the National Science Foundation.  The BSCS continues to produce several versions of evolution-laced high school biology textbooks written by a consortium of writers and editors and published by various textbook publishers throughout the world.
    The principal goal of BSCS is clearly stated in the first edition of their Biology Teachers Handbook: “It is no longer possible to give a complete or even a coherent account of living things without the story of evolution.” (1)  By 1975, nearly half of America’s high schools used BSCS textbooks and most other biology textbooks and curricula in America and throughout the world were deeply influenced by BSCS.  Indeed in 1975, Answers In Genesis founder Ken Ham was required to teach from a BSCS biology textbook during his first year as a public school teacher in Australia.

Go to Article

How the Economic Crisis Should Change You
By Howard Dayton

     Watching the ups and downs of the stock market can be unnerving. Since September, the emotions of the American people have been on a roller-coaster ride that rises and falls with good news one day and bad news the next.
    We’re all hoping for stability, but even if we escape a prolonged depression like that of the 1930s, we need to walk away from this crisis as changed people. Financial analyst Kevin Duffy notes that in the years building up to the crisis, the borrower was “a willing dance partner to the lender’s lead.” Duffy says that in June 2006, as many as 29 percent of mortgages taken on in 2005 were “already underwater.” The warnings were there, but our financial recklessness continued. (1)
    Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were among the major partners in the dance. Although both entities were profit-driven corporations owned by shareholders, they also were government-sponsored enterprises. As a result, they “reaped the rewards of the private sector while enjoying the security of the public sector. Seemingly insulated from all harm, they became reckless. They constructed a giant pyramid of debt on a very small base of capital.” (2)
    This year, we’ve witnessed one disaster after another as the seeds we planted in previous years bore their bitter fruits. And, in the midst of our own crisis, we may not have noticed the declines also taking place in countries like India, China, and Russia.
    In the world of mutual funds, the Eaton Vance Greater India fund recorded gains as high as 114 percent in 2003, 45 percent in 2005, and 55 percent in 2007, according to Morningstar’s Gregg Wolper. “The typical China fund roughly tripped in value between late 2005 and late 2007,”  Wolper says. “ING Russia gained more than 65 percent in three separate calendar years between 2003 and 2007.” But this year the markets in all three countries have “plummeted.” (3)
    For decades now, the philosophy of many in the industrialized world has been “me” and “more,” and people in other nations have adopted this thinking. But one thing we should learn from our current crisis is that this philosophy is a failed promise which often leads to disaster.

Go to Article