What Challenges Does the Theory of Biological Evolution Pose to Christian Theology?

Abstract

For many Christians ‘evolution’ is a horror-word; something to be against - whatever it is and whether it truly describes the natural world or not. In this chapter I start from the opposite point of view. I accept that the theory of biological evolution, as it has developed since the publication of Darwin’s Origin of Species in 1859, is a robust scientific theory, still undergoing change, 1but in its core positions an accurate description of what science can currently know about the way life has developed in the last 3.8 billion years or so. I then ask: what issues does this theory currently present for thinking Christians seeking to understand to the full the world they confess God as having created, loved through its long history, and redeemed in Jesus Christ?