As a fundamentalist, evangelical Christian, I naturally believe the literal truth of the Scriptural statement, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." In that sense I proudly proclaim myself to be a creationist. As an experimental scientist with a Masters degree in biochemistry and over ten years experience as a protein chemist, enzymologist and immunologist, I naturally acccept the evidence that establishes the fact of evolution as a natural phenomenon and which establishes natural selection as the main force behind microevolution and an important force behind so-called "macroevolution". In that sense I proudly proclaim myself to be an evolutionist.

These proclamations are not mutually exclusive for two simple reasons. The first is that the Bible was meant to be a book of faith, not one of science. I am not a literalist; that is, I do not believe that every word of the Bible was written by God Himself. Rather I believe it was written by men who were inspired by God to present a spiritual message and who embellished that message with historical and poetic detail. They wrote what they believed was true, but since they were men of faith writing what essentially was a bare-bones spiritual message, they used mythology, folklore and current events to fill out the message, to strengthen it and to help interpret it. As such, like Galileo I am not surprised that the Bible is scientifically inaccurate, because I look to the Bible for spiritual truths that only God can reveal, not for scientific truths that are best determined by the direct observation of nature.

This in turn leads me to my second reason why I am both a creationist and an evolutionist. The purpose of science is to determine the mechanisms by which the universe operates, of which evolution is one, whereas the purpose of religion is to determine the meaning the universe, its purpose for existence. As such, it is perfectly legitimate to believe that a supernatural entity created by supernatural means the foundation of space-time and the natural laws and forces that operate and control space-time, then used those very laws and forces to create the universe from the Big Bang and to control its development. Or not, since by themselves these laws and forces could create and develop our modern universe without divine intervention. The point is that I distinguish between the ultimate origin of space-time and the way space-time subsequently operated. Science probably may never be able to tell us for certain where space-time came from, but it will be able to explain - from the moment of the Big Bang onward - where the universe came from and how it developed. Religion on the other hand can tell us that space-time was created by God, and offer possible reasons why He chose to do so.

Religion, however, cannot explain how the universe functions. Any such explanations would involve the use of miracles, but for miracles to be legitimate explanations for natural phenomena they would have to allow us to understand how and why the phenomena happen, not simply describe what happens. Theology was created to debate religious explanations, but theology was not designed to test these explanations against physical reality. Only the scientific method can do this, but science was designed to deal only with what is predictable and reproducible. By definition miracles are neither, so science cannot be used in place of theology to test miracles. And if science cannot study miracles, then it certainly cannot use them as explanations for natural phenomena. Science can only use explanations that are themselves reproducible and predictable; in other words, science can only use natural, mechanistic, materialistic explanations.

This is why science has "a prior commitment to materialism"; not as an overriding philosophy that determines how we interpret the universe, but as a simple methodological expediency. Science can only explain natural phenomena using natural forces, therefore as a scientist I must use materialistic forces to explain the phenomena that I study. But as a theist I also have a prior commitment to spiritualism. This commitment allows me to see the glory of God's creation in its intricate details, to try to understand the mind of God Himself through the one thing that is indisputably His work alone. Unlike the Bible, if God did indeed create the universe, He did it by Himself, without the need for human intervention. As such, if we want to understand God we should first understand the universe.

So in conclusion, as a scientist I seek to understand the mechanism of the universe, but as a theist I also seek to understand the meaning of the universe. Therefore I look for materialistic explanations for the former and look for spiritualistic explanations for the latter. Since both involve their own methods in their own domains, I am able to keep both separate even as I use both simultaneously. So I can be both a creationist and an evolutionist, a Christian and a scientist, without betraying or subjugating one to the other.