Scientist Fights Church Effort to Hide Museum's Pre-Human Fossils

[Odin's Lawyer]

Famed paleoanthropologist Richard Leakey is giving no quarter to powerful evangelical church leaders who are pressing Kenya's national museum to relegate to a back room its world-famous collection of hominid fossils showing the evolution of humans' early ancestors.

Leakey called the churches' plans "the most outrageous comments I have ever heard."

He told The Daily Telegraph (London): "The National Museums of Kenya should be extremely strong in presenting a very forceful case for the evolutionary theory of the origins of mankind. The collection it holds is one of Kenya's very few global claims to fame and it must be forthright in defending its right to be at the forefront of this branch of science." Leakey was for years director of the museum and of Kenya's entire museum system.
Evolving Issue

The museum's collections include the most complete skeleton yet found of Homo erectus, the 1.7-million-year-old Turkana Boy unearthed by Leakey's team in 1984 near Lake Turkana in northern Kenya.

The museum also holds bones from several specimens of Australopithecus anamensis, believed to be the first hominid to walk upright, four million years ago. Together the artifacts amount to the clearest record yet discovered of the origins of Homo sapiens.

Leaders of Kenya's Pentecostal congregation, with six million adherents, want the human fossils de-emphasized.

"The Christian community here is very uncomfortable that Leakey and his group want their theories presented as fact," said Bishop Bonifes Adoyo, head of the largest Pentecostal church in Kenya, the Christ is the Answer Ministries.

"Our doctrine is not that we evolved from apes, and we have grave concerns that the museum wants to enhance the prominence of something presented as fact which is just one theory," the bishop said.

Bishop Adoyo said all the country's churches would unite to force the museum to change its focus when it reopens after eighteen months of renovations in June 2007. "We will write to them, we will call them, we will make sure our people know about this, and we will see what we can do to make our voice known," he said.

It was these comments Leakey termed outrageous. Calling members of the Pentecostal church fundamentalists, Leakey added: "Their theories are far, far from the mainstream on this. They cannot be allowed to meddle with what is the world's leading collection of these types of fossils."

For its part, the museum sounded like it was trying to walk a tightrope. It said it was in a "tricky situation" in trying to redesign its exhibition space for all kinds of visitors.

"We have a responsibility to present all our artifacts in the best way that we can so that everyone who sees them can gain a full understanding of their significance," said Ali Chege, public relations manager for the National Museums of Kenya. "But things can get tricky when you have religious beliefs on one side, and intellectuals, scientists, or researchers on the other, saying the opposite."

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[Addendum]

The church has no authority over science, just as science has no authority over the church.

If the church is offended over a skeleton, too bad

[thedeadite]

you don't see the scientific community saying "you can't preach about creationism in church...it's not fact..it's just one theory".

[NyteWing]

People are nuts. Evolution is still a theory i suppose, but only because we're missing maybe 10 of 40,000 links in the evolutionary chain. C'mon, how much closer does it need to be?

[Tyrinus]

Evolution is only a theory to people who don't understand what a scientific theory is.

[Spider-Bite]

I want to write a letter to those church leaders and tell them to pull their head out of the sand.

[Spider-Bite]

I just sent an email to Adoyo or whatever he's called.

[C.F. Kane]

Originally Posted by Addendum

The church has no authority over science, just as science has no authority over the church.

If the church is offended over a skeleton, too bad

Religious thought has no place in education, just as educated thought has no place in religion.

[Addendum]

However, there is nothing wrong with having in public schools, an elective course about religion, as long as it doesn't favor one religion over another.

And some colleges offer courses in religion as well.

[xwolverine2]

ugh........ ****ing church.

and im sort of ashamed to be called a catholic

[Odin's Lawyer]

The problem is that the theory of evolution is backed by scientific evidence while most religious theories are based on hear-say evidence (at best). The very definition of the word "faith", imo, serves as nothing more than a cop-out to protect large institutions from justifying ideals that are so important to the way humans interact with one another.

[Motown Marvel]

well, i say once the church can actually come up with some factual evidence of their "theory", then it can be displayed along side these fossils.

[Caliber]

Originally Posted by Tyrinus

Evolution is only a theory to people who don't understand what a scientific theory is.

And religion has taught them to be lazy and to not learn about evolution or science.

[Kritish]

The Church has no say in the operations of science.

[ang_hulk]

dumb.A friend of mine was taken in by a christain based cult,they gave him a "bible guide" in which states that most bones found by "men of science" are mistaken for current animal bones..........gaint carnivorous racoons.....Its sad how far they go.What do they base wanting to hide these bones on??? they are real bones for god sakes,mabey if they produced some eveidence of there own theyd have somthing to go by.

[samurai black]

Originally Posted by Kritish

The Church has no say in the operations of science.

Yeah, it's sad when a religious organization extends their influence into the realm of the political world. The two are like oil and water.

[Kyalesyin]

Sad, but is anyone really that surprised? When you grow up getting told the world works a certain way, that is your comfort zone. Someone challenges those beliefs, threatening to take you out of your comfort zone, you're gonna dig your heels in.