Gwenyfur said:
Charles Darwin held a Degree in Theology and was a preacher .... he had been exposed to Christianity quite thoroughly.
He studied theology. I don't know that he ever preached. Certainly he never became a priest.
..however, after he read the works of James Hutton. "theory of the earth" 1795 (causing doubt the earth was 6000 years old) THen Chalres Lyell invented the Geologic column in 1830, "In the Minds of Men", "Principles of Geology". Then came the writings of F. Sherwood taylor, "Geology Changes the Outlook". (causing doubt of the flood) Thomas Malthus wrote a book (can't find it now, it's on the bookshelf somewhere here!) that said more offspring were poduced that could survive with the limited food supply so it was best that the weak die off... something to that effect.
"invented" the geologic column? How could anyone invent the geologic column and be taken seriously by other geologists? Why is the same geologic column still found by geologists today? Lyall summed up the conclusions of the previous century's work in geology.
I am not sure that Malthus said it was best that the weakest died off. He said it was inevitable that once populations outstripped their food supply that famine, disease or (in the case of humans) war would reduce the population.
Then along came Challes Darwin, who in 1859, after 20 years of writing published "The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection of The Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life [Yes, folks, that's the full title!!!!]
And?
Since
Origin was not about humans, what meaning of "races" was Darwin referring to?
(causing doubt of the Creator)
Maybe for some. But many Christians affirmed that if God had not used special creation, God was still the Creator. If you like reading old books, you might look up the works of James McCosh, a 19th century professor of theology at Princeton (then called the College of New Jersey). Look for
Christianity and Positivism: a series of Lectures to the Times on Natural Theology and Christian Apologetics, published in 1871.
He fully accepted evolution without denying his faith in God. He took the stance that religious and scientific accounts of creation were complementary to each other. What religious accounts ascribe to the orderly workings of the Creator, scientific accounts interpret as the results of natural law. Each expounds the plans of God in its own way.
(Paraphrased from
Darwin's Forgotten Defenders, David N. Livingstone p. 109)
McCosh was not alone. Here is another pertinent quote from a 19th century Christian.
"The scientific evidence in favour of evolution, as a theory is infinitely more Christian than the theory of 'special creation'. For it implies the immanence of God in nature, and the omnipresence of His creative power. Those who oppose the doctrine of evolution in defence of a 'continued intervention' of God, seem to have failed to notice that a theory of occasional intervention implies as its correlative a theory of ordinary absence." AL Moore, Science and Faith, 1889, pg 184.
Which led directly to the rise of humanism.
You have your history backwards. Humanism existed well before the mid-19th century. Some well-known humanists who died before Darwin was born include the French philosopher Voltaire and the American writer, Tom Paine.
Evolution =/= atheism or humanism. Evolution is accepted by scientists ranging in belief from atheists and humanists to Catholic biologists and Pentecostal preachers.