Is Darwin in Heaven?

[awaz]

chickenwingmajor said:

I really dont like to say this person made it into heaven and that person didnt, since Jesus recommends us not to judge others.

Where does It say that? It would seem to me that we would be supposed to judge them.
By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?
Matthew 7:15-17
Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit.
Matthew 7:16-18
"Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is recognized by its fruit.
Matthew 12:32-34

It would seem we are to judge them by their fruit.
Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.
Matthew 7:19-21

[Triphus (Titanian)]

but isn't there a difference between recognizing people by their fruit and judging people? The first is seeing who a person is by their actions and words, the other is using your opinions to decide whether or not a person is either "qualified" or "good enough" to get into Heaven.

that's my definition anyways

also here are scriptures in the Bible telling us not to judge:

Matthew 7:1-2 "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."

Luke 6:37-38 "Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."

[steelsheen]

The thief hanging on the cross beside Jesus repented only a few hours before his death, yet he was forgiven- Darwin supposedly repented and became a Christian- therefore, why should he not be in heaven?

And who are we to judge? I for one can not judge him, knowing as I do the iniquity I am capable of. I have enough to worry about with Steelsheen getting to heaven without concerning myself if Darwin made it!

Anyway it's purely hypothetical at the moment- Darwin is, in fact, dead, and we do not know, in fact, if he went to heaven or hell.

[steelsheen]

Oh, and Awaz (judge not that ye be not judged) AND (whatsoever measure ye judge with, that measure shall you also be judged with)

We do not judge, God does.

[Geberia]

Yeah, and like, he's dead and we can philisophicolize on it all we want ( made up a new word there LOL) but all our guessing won't change anything. I would much rather focus on getting living people saved now who are not.

[awaz]

steelsheen said:

Oh, and Awaz (judge not that ye be not judged) AND (whatsoever measure ye judge with, that measure shall you also be judged with)

We do not judge, God does.

But if we judge them by their fruit we should expect to be judged by our fruit. Therefore our fruit should reflect what we believe and what we wish to be judged.

[Triphus (Titanian)]

umm if i'm following that correctly than yes you are right Awaz...lol

[meloreiel]

Hi, I'm a new member here. I have studied the works of Darwin and know that, even though he studied the creatures of the Galapagos Islands he did not publish the perverted form of the theory of evolution that we know today. He was deeply saddened by the fact that his thoughts were turned into a God bashing theory. Once you accept Jesus Christ into your heart He will never give up on you, even if you delve deeply into the scientific realm of evolution. I believe that Charles Darwin is in Heaven and I hope to meet him someday.

[steelsheen]

Woohoo! Meloriel! Let slip the dogs of war!!!!!

[nella]

Hmmm... interesting way to look at it, Mel. I have heard that Darwin was a devout Christian, and that he never intended his work to take the twist it did. Darwin did do a lot for the scientific understanding as we know it today (mircroevolution is true, for example), and even he himself couldn't justify a lot of the illogical leaps evolution is based on.

[Neniel]

Mel's right... Darwin was, in fact, a priest. (Nen wished for her Biology book.) He published his theory JUST ont he changes on species over time, and then, like any curious scientist, looked at the deeper implications. He didn't mean to refute Creation. In fact, he wrote in letters how sad he was that people were making such a big deal out of it, because it was jsut an idea. However, he was still excommunicated.

It's not so much that he repented before he died, but that he simply stated once and for all that he wished he's never even published any of his theories, since people took them the wrong way and the whole thing got out of control. And personaly, I think he'd turn over in his grave if he saw those ridiculous "Darwin" fish on people's cars.

[[Satanic] Mikor]

Yay for darwin.

He'll probably have reincarnated somewhere.

[Geberia]

mikor said:

Yay for darwin.quote]

yup. i'll say "yay" for him too, if he truly is in heaven. the future isn't too bright for him if he isnt.

[Aslan the Great Lion]

was he a Christian when he died? that is the answer to if anyone goes to heaven, if you are a Christian, you can still turn away and go to hell, it doesn't matter what you were, it matters what you are

[[Satanic] Mikor]

xanatos said:

This is to go off the evolution thread. They say Darwin, before he journeyed on the H.M.S. Beagle was a firm Christian. He was the only christian on the boat. He then preceded to have his believes washed away, and published his theory, which is now one of the top enemys of the Bible. Did he go to heaven? explain your answer.

Just felt like correcting this a bit, Darwin was a christian, so were the rest of the people on board. The captain commited suicide when darwin published his theory because he thought that he had helped an unholy man. If darwin was a firm christian, he would never have thought of the theory, he cant have been that strong in his faith.

[heartofgold]

"Charles Darwin came from a Nonconformist background. Though several members of his family were Freethinkers, openly lacking conventional religious beliefs, he did not initially doubt the literal truth of the Bible. He attended a Church of England school, then at Cambridge studied Anglican theology to become a clergyman and was fully convinced by William Paley's teleological argument that design in nature proved the existence of God. However, his beliefs began to shift during his time on board HMS Beagle. He questioned what he saw—wondering, for example, at beautiful deep-ocean creatures created where no one could see them, and shuddering at the sight of a wasp paralysing caterpillars as live food for its eggs; he saw the latter as contradicting Paley's vision of beneficent design. While on the Beagle Darwin was quite orthodox and would quote the Bible as an authority on morality, but had come to see the history in the Old Testament as being false and untrustworthy.

Upon his return, he investigated transmutation of species. He knew that his clerical naturalist friends thought this a bestial heresy undermining miraculous justifications for the social order and knew that such revolutionary ideas were especially unwelcome at a time when the Church of England's established position was under attack from radical Dissenters and atheists. While secretly developing his theory of natural selection, Darwin even wrote of religion as a tribal survival strategy, though he still believed that God was the ultimate lawgiver. His belief continued to dwindle over the time, and with the of his daughter Annie in 1851, Darwin finally lost all faith in Christianity. He continued to give support to the local church and help with parish work, but on Sundays would go for a walk while his family attended church. In later life, when asked about his religious views, he wrote that he had never been an atheist in the sense of denying the existence of a God, and that generally "an Agnostic would be the more correct description of my state of mind."[1]

Charles Darwin recounted in his biography of his grandfather Erasmus Darwin how false stories were circulated claiming that Erasmus had called for Jesus on his bed. Charles concluded by writing "Such was the state of Christian feeling in this country [in 1802].... We may at least hope that nothing of the kind now prevails." Despite this hope, very similar stories were circulated following Darwin's own , most prominently the "Lady Hope Story", published in 1915 which claimed he had converted on his sickbed.[2] Such stories have been propagated by some Christian groups, to the extent of becoming urban legends, though the claims were refuted by Darwin's children and have been dismissed as false by historians. His daughter, Henrietta, who was at his bed, said that he did not convert to Christianity."

Now, this is from Wikipedia, so I not entirely sure how accurate it really is, but for now, we'll use it. So, according to this, he did lose all faith in Christianity in the end, and never came back, so you can take from this what you will.

Oh, and he wasn't a priest. And if he was, he probably wouldn't have had time to write scientific theories (they do more than you might think). And even if he had, he wouldn't have been excommunicated. The Catholic Church actually has absolutely no problem with evolution as a theory, its when you try to use it to explain away God (but then your an atheist, and the Church doesn't worry about excommunicating you seeing as how you've already done it for yourself).