Yes, this week is a busy one. Tonight, Tuesday night, the Elmbrook School board decides on Pilgrim Park Middle School's HVAC replacement. Will they opt to include air conditioning?

I won't be there tonight, because I am heading out to Concordia University to hear Dr. Gary Locklair speak at the Creation Science Society of Milwaukee meeting. His "Teach the Controversy, Creation and Evolution" lecture starts at 7:30pm, Tuesday, March 24th.

Wednesday, March 25th, is the Public Hearing on Gov. Doyle's budget, at State Fair Park, at the Tommy Thompson Youth Center behind the Petit Ice Center on 84th Street. The hearing is during working hours--10am - 4pm. If a worker really wants to attend, they must take time off of work! (The crowd might not be as friendly as anticipated if unemployed workers attend?) There is an online  Comment Form if you wish to weigh in but cannot attend.

A mini Milwaukee Tea Party is brewing prior to the hearing at 9am. Marv Munyon, founder of Wisconsin Capitol Watch, will be discussing the Doyle budget and joining the party.  

Wednesday evening, March 25th, there will be an Elm Grove Village Trustee Candidate Reception and Forum at the Elm Grove Village Hall. The reception begins at 5:30pm with the forum/debate running from 7 - 9pm. Municipal water is an issue on Elm Grove residents' minds. If you live in Elm Grove, attend and get to know the candidates: Charles Wickens, David Cook, Andrew Azpell, John Nelson and Christine Torkelson. Village residents vote for 3 out of the field of 5 candidates.

On Thursday, March 26th at 7pm, there is another Elmbrook School Board Candidate Forum at the School District administrative offices at 13780 Hope Street. At Large Candidates Meg Wartman and Charles Wickens and Area 4 Candidates Jean Lambert and Donald Moore will be answering your questions. Remember, all Elmbrook residents vote for both candidates regardless of what part of the district they live in.

What is on Friday? I think that needs to be a day off!  You could gather a few non-perishable food items and toiletries for the Boy Scout Food Drive pick up on Saturday, March 28th. Leave your donation bag by your front door by 9am.

Saturday, March 28th, Town Hall meeting with Congressman Sensenbrenner and State Rep. Leah Vukmir at the Wauwatosa Library (North Ave and 76th St.) at 9am. I understand attendance is up at these Town Halls. That is good news; people need to be more involved in government. Speaking of involvement, I wonder if State Senator Jim Sullivan will attend?

Links: 

The Creation Science Society of Milwaukee is featuring a presentation by Dr. Gary Locklair, Ph.D. of Concordia University, Wisconsin on Tuesday night from 7:30 - 9:00pm, entitled "Teach the Controversy, Creation and Evolution".

According to the flier from CSSM,

In origins, teaching and learning both sides of the controversy is necessary. Doing so helps you to understand the issues better and allows you to hone your reasoning skills. In order to understand and appreciate your own view of origins, you must understand the other, competing view also. This is especially important for school-aged children. Often times students from a Christian school background will "panic" when they first encounter serious evolutionary ideas at the university. While presenting "teach the controversy," two other important topics will be discussed. The first concerns the role of Origin science and its unique characteristics compared to Operational science. The second relates to the role of worldviews in the study of origins.

 

Dr. Locklair will present a model for how to approach teaching both ideas (creation and evolution) of origins. He has used this approach for a number of years as he teaches Science 303 - Cosmogony at Concordia University Wisconsin.

 

Creation Science is a subject I am very interested in and believe to be true. It is a shame public education has pretty much shunned it and Intelligent Design completely, choosing instead to teach the theory of evolution exclusively. (More often than not, evolution is taught as fact instead of as a theory.) I am interested in Dr. Locklair's approach to teaching both.

Unfortunately, many children, young adults from Christian homes, and adult Christians lose their faith (or confidence in their faith) when they hear evolution taught as factual instead of as a theory. Because it is taught as fact, they start to doubt the Biblical accounts of creation.

Ken Ham [Answers in Genesis] reports that a Christian University professor had the following to say:

After 30 years of ministry on a secular campus I have concluded the number one reason Christians lose their faith is the teaching of evolution as an inarguable fact. The same professors invariably attack the reliability of the Bible - Number One Reason Christians Lose Their Faith at Around the World with AiG’s Ken Ham

Kitty Foth-Regner, a Waukesha County resident and author, who spoke at a CSSM meeting last year, "From feminist Atheism to Biblical truth" stated the teaching of evolution was the reason she embraced atheism in high school. She later became a Christian primarily because she started studying the evidence of Creation Science. 

The Teach the Controversy lecture will take place at Concordia University at the Lakeshore Room. Concordia is not difficult to find. It is north of the Mequon Road and Port Washington Road intersection. Continue north on Port Road to Highland Rd. and head east on Highland. "Follow the campus road toward Lake Michigan to the Administration Building. Once inside, follow the corridor turning next right following windowed hall to the Lakeshore Room."

Links: 

Brookfield7, Fairly Conservative, BetterBrookfield, Vicki McKenna, Jay Weber, The Right View Wisconsin, Randy Melchert, Mark Levin, The Heritage Foundation, CNS News

Author Kitty Foth-Regner is the featured speaker at the Creation Science Society of Milwaukee's September meeting. (See bottom of post for location.) The speaker's name means nothing to me*, but her story is compelling. She was an atheist/agnostic for 30 years but now is a Bible believing Christian. (It does happen, and Creation Science played a part in her conversion.)

For those who assume that any Bible believing Christian who also believes in Creation must check their brains at the door, Kitty graduated summa *** laude from UWM. She is a a freelance copywriter, co-author, and author.

So how did this atheist become a believer? Unfortunately, it took a tragedy. From the Creation Science Society newsletter,

When a mother dies, science and prophecy lead a grieving daughter from feminist atheism to Biblical Truth. Is there a God? A heaven? Will we be able to spend eternity there with our loved ones? And if so, can we find out for sure how to get there...before it is too late?

These are the questions asked eight years ago by a heartbroken woman in the wake of her mother's death--questions that she spent more than a year investigating...

There is a happy ending to this story, as is to be expected whenever someone sets out in sincere pursuit of the truth. 

Kitty Foth-Regner writes about her quest to find the truth in her book, Heaven Without Her: A Desperate Daughter's Search for the Heart of Her Mother's Faith. "Her book is helpful for anyone seeking the truth about eternity, as well as for equipping Christians with a reason for the hope of heaven. Kitty Foth-Regner describes in often witty and moving detail how topics as earth-bound as origin via creation, genetic mutation and irreducible complexity can lead to heaven-bound joy."

I would think her talk would be of interest to anyone wondering if there is a God and did He create the universe. She is sure to strengthen the faith of believers and encourage them not to give up praying for atheist friends and family. Kitty lives in Waukesha with her husband and assorted pets.

Hear her speak on Tuesday, September 23, at 7:30 pm at Milwaukee Lutheran High School Library, 9700 W. Grantosa Drive, Milwaukee, WI (near the Greek Orthodox Church). Once at the high school, walk westward, under the roofed walkway, and use the main doors walking up the stairs to the library. 

*Talk about a small world. Kitty's name rang a bell with my sister who said, Kitty is a member of our church!  

Brookfield District 7 Info meeting, Wed., Sept. 24, 2-3pm or 6:30-7:30pm

Please, comment content should relate to the subject of the post. Although I try to respond to many, do not interpret my lack of a response as agreement.

Links: 

Brookfield7, Fairly Conservative, Betterbrookfield, Mark Levin,  Vicki Mckenna

After weeks of anticipation, I went to see the movie Expelled today. It is a documentary by Ben Stein on how the scientific community routinely suppresses legitimate scientists and doctors from expressing any point of view other than that of evolution.

The full name of the movie is, Expelled, No Intelligence Allowed. It is called that because of the many scientists Ben interviewed that have been fired and blacklisted since they published papers hinting that Intelligent Design, I.D., is a valid explanation for how life began.

Despite Ben Stein being a comedic actor, he is deadly serious about this subject. He does a great job of making his series of interviews with numerous scientists and doctors from both schools of thought engaging. Old black and white movie clips from movies such as Frankenstein, Wizard of Oz and I think Inherit the Wind, as well as news clips of Hitler, the Berlin Wall, etc. are used to emphasize various points. Their inclusion makes the documentary more interesting to the viewer.

Ben visits and interviews scientists from all over the world, including the Discovery Institute, Center for Science & Culture, a think tank "challenging various aspects of evolutionary theory." The Discovery Institute is not a religious organization.

Intelligent Design is not faith based. The media and most mainstream scientists, universities, and institutions, however like to brand it as such. I admit, I was not really familiar with exactly what Intelligent Design meant. Although I.D. dove-tails with Creation Science, I.D. does not specify who or what the intelligence is. It just tries to answer the question of who or what started that first cell or created the universe.

I.D. questions evolution and Darwinism in that evolution cannot explain how the one cell began. Some evolutionary explanations defy logic. One scientist, Dr. Ruse (sp?) insisted life got started by certain molecules piggy-backing on top of crystals. (No explanation where the crystals or molecules came from.)

An I.D. Scientist countered that thinking by stating 217 proteins are needed to create life and that those 217 proteins would need to be arranged by accident 250 times in succession for life to have started. That defies logic. Therefore some intelligence had to have created it. 

Back when Darwin published his theory in 1859, little was known about the complexity of the cell. Now, thanks to modern science and sophisticated equipment, doctors and scientists are constantly amazed at how intricate each part of the cell is. The deeper they look, the more complex cellular structure and physiology is.

The real kicker came at the end of the movie. Stein again interviewed Dr. Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion. Dawkins is an avowed atheist and evolutionist.

Ben asks Dawkins, who created the universe and how did life start? Keep in mind Dawkins cannot accept Intelligent Design in any way, but he answers something akin to this: some other sort of life could have evolved elsewhere and it planted its seed here.

In other words, some sort of alien from another world evolved into some very intelligent being and then came here and planted that first seed of life. (No explanation of how that alien life got started.) I think Dawkins went on to say something about how it (life) couldn't have just happened all at once. (Watch for this part when you see the movie.)

To Dawkins, Alien Design is OK, Intelligent Design, not OK--even if who or what is that intelligence is not identified? 

Judeo-Christian religious beliefs and science are not polar opposites. Noteworthy scientists such as Galileo, Newton, and Kepler were all Christians. If Ben Stein, who is Jewish, has his way, men of other religions besides that of atheism and evolution will again be able to have their voices heard without fear of termination and blacklisting. 

This weekend promises to be quite awful weather wise. It might be a good time to investigate Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed for yourself. I saw it at Mayfair at their $5, 10AM showing. It is also at these theaters.  

The movie is rated PG, possibly because they showed some scenes from German death camps? 

Links: Upcoming events in Brookfield

4th Annual Weed Out, May 3rd, Mary Knoll Park