After the Monkey Trial by Rios Christopher M.;

Author:Rios, Christopher M.;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Fordham University Press

The Bube Era

Bube began his presidency with firm convictions about the controversies and challenges facing the ASA. He never hid his disregard for creationism, and he frequently allowed the frustration of others to speak for him. This was the context for the letter by Gordon Lewthwaite, offered at the beginning of this chapter, commending the ASA’s approach to the issues. In a similar letter from the winter of 1968, Bube quoted an anonymous member who urged the ASA to provide an alternative Christian view to young-earth creationism, because “Christians who are bound to the fetters of only 10 or 15 thousand years [for the age of the earth] are a laughing stock to scientists.”39 Nevertheless, Bube remained committed to the ideals he expressed in 1965 and consistently encouraged open dialogue about the issues that threatened to divide the ASA. Despite his own views, he recognized antievolutionary creationism as a theologically valid, if unnecessary, position that deserved a voice.

But Bube’s vision and concerns extended beyond any single issue. Soon after 1965, his frustration over the Encounter controversy fermented into dissatisfaction with the ASA’s broader accomplishments. Within two years he was lamenting the ASA’s anonymity among professional scientists and its inability to influence the scientific community. The entire organization, he wrote in 1967, was “virtually non-existent.” The results were twofold:

(1) The scientific community is almost completely unaware of the existence, purpose, and potential contributions of the ASA. (2) The majority of Christian men of science regard the ASA as rather an outdated organ of a narrow doctrinal view, in spite of the fact that a small minority of hyperconservative Christians consider the ASA to be constantly on the verge of apostasy.40

In other words, while most were unaware of the ASA, the rest were likely incorrect in their assessment of it. Such obscurity rendered the organization impotent. The situation, Bube insisted, required action. The ASA had to redefine and broaden its objectives so that it might become known for open conversation about important issues where truth was sought after rather than defined. It had to expand its publication program without censorship. It had to “affirm clearly the validity of the scientific endeavor in understanding the natural world.”41 And it had to communicate its ideas in Christian and scientific circles more effectively. After he became president, these convictions deepened. Emphasizing the dual identity of ASA members, he described them as both a “community of the faithful, who have committed themselves and their lives to Jesus Christ” as well as a part of the scientific community “who have committed themselves to the understanding, control, and utilization of the natural world through the scientific disciplines.”42 Only by fully embracing both aspects of its character could the ASA realize its potential. Accordingly, Bube began his presidency with an unambiguous challenge:

Is the ASA to be restricted to the activity of a small religio-scientific sect, forever fighting anew the battles of yesteryear, and speaking aloud to a constantly diminishing audience? Or is the ASA to be a fellowship of

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