Thirteen years ago I was browsing at a bookstore — I don’t remember which one or where. I came across an apologetics book by Peter Kreeft, a Roman Catholic theologian and philosopher. I don’t even remember the title, but I remember skimming a section where he argued that Genesis can be read metaphorically. That stuck with me, and I decided to actually give evolution a fair shot.
My background was entirely the other direction. I had studied Christian apologetics and taken Creationism courses, all from the standpoint of why evolution couldn’t be true. After Liberty University I landed on Old Earth Creationism — the idea that the “days” in Genesis 1 are long ages rather than literal 24-hour periods. Some Old Earth Creationists accept evolution for everything except humans. I’m not sure any one thing pushed me there. I just found the young Earth evidence weak, and I wasn’t ready to seriously engage evolution yet. Hugh Ross’s organization was my on-ramp.
After reading Kreeft’s take, I decided to find a book that actually made the case for evolution. As a Christian, I don’t think you should be afraid of truth. I picked up Why Evolution Is True by Jerry Coyne. Coyne is a scientist and one of the minor figures of the New Atheist movement — which has, fortunately, largely faded. In the book itself though, I found him pretty non-antagonistic toward religion. I was able to separate whatever metaphysical baggage he brought from the actual evidence. And there was a lot of evidence.
Honestly, it didn’t take half the book. The evidence was just too strong. The creationist arguments reminded me of a defense attorney who only pokes holes in the prosecution’s case without offering anything in return. Evolution, by contrast, had a convergence of independent lines of evidence — genetics, fossils, geography, cosmology — all pointing the same direction: that all life on Earth evolved from a common ancestor. Even where there are gaps or disputes, none of it brings down the theory itself.
But I remember my exact “aha” moment.
Scientists had found evidence of modern marsupials in Australia going back around 50 million years, and ancient marsupials in the Americas going back even further — into the Cretaceous period, over 65 million years ago. The prediction was that marsupials migrated from North America through South America to Australia using Antarctica as a land bridge — and that intermediate fossils from that period should exist in Antarctica.
They found exactly that.
Two things hit me immediately. One, evolution is how we got here. Two, a young Earth is simply not possible. Even if you entertain the “apparent age” argument for starlight, why would God plant a fossil trail through Antarctica connecting the Americas and Australia? You can maybe explain away other things, but fabricating a migration record in the rocks would just be deceptive — and nothing I’d ever learned about God pointed in that direction.
This was a significant moment for my faith. It forced me to reckon with things I’m still working through, and those are topics for other posts. But the journey has been more rewarding than I expected. It pushed me to take the Bible seriously in ways I never had before. My faith has deepened — not in a way that gets rid of doubt or provides certainty. I have plenty of doubts. But I’ve found a faith that means more to me than I would have anticipated. For that I’m grateful.