TWENTY YEARS ago, Phillip E. Johnson, a law professor at Berkeley, published his now famous critique of Darwinism, Darwin on Trial, which argued that Darwinism is philosophy, not science. In the most recent issue of Touchstone magazine, Johnson reflects on developments since publication of his book. Scientists still risk their careers by pursuing research that exposes the Darwinian fraud, but a movement has been born and Johnson is optimistic, especially in light of the continuing inclination of Darwinists to obfuscate their position. It is only a matter of time before the dam will break. He writes:

I am confident that when we finally get a fair hearing before a scientific community that concurs with the principle that important terms must be defined clearly and used consistently, then the better logic will prevail and Darwinism will be relegated to intellectual history. 

The article is not available online. However, here is an interesting 2003 interview with Johnson which also appeared in Touchstone. Johnson became a Christian not long after his marriage broke apart. His wife became a feminist and left him. He says in the interview with James Kushner:

I became disillusioned during my thirties. The whole idea of the exciting campus ferment and student ideas became a disappointment. The academic career was also a disappointment. I think my motives for going into it, for everything I did, were rather shallow. I was basically an academic careerist seeking tenure, writing law review articles and a casebook. I had the career, but I was bored with it. I thought life ought to be more fulfilling than that. I was beginning to grow up.

I had been very happily married for some years, and then my marriage went bad. My wife got a heavy dose of the ideas that were rolling around in the ’70s. She lost interest in our home and family and went off into artistic politics. After we split up, I took care of the kids. So I was disillusioned with my home life, my marriage, and my academic career.

In terms of my religious views during this period, what I usually say is, “I was raised as a nominal Christian and then I became a nominal agnostic.” I didn’t have any passion for it. In fact, I had read some of C. S. Lewis’s books when I was in college and law school and admired them. I thought that they were attractive but not for people like me in modern times. “Too bad they aren’t true” was my reaction.

When my marriage ended, I wondered what I was going to do with the rest of my life. That’s when I had my conversion experience. This, I think, is true of many people; what leads you to a conversion is the loss of your faith in something else. My faith had been, “If you’re a bright person with the right credentials, you’ll have a happy and meaningful life.” I expected that I would go from one distinguished position to the next, advance my career, be happy and satisfied, and that’s what life would be about. It seemed to me that wasn’t happening, and I was just going to be a law teacher for the rest of my life. It wasn’t very meaningful or as good as I thought it would be. So I lost faith during that pragmatic period. Instead, I thought, “What makes me think that what I have is better than the Christian life?”

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Paul writes:

Professor Johnson has summed up something that has been on my mind for years: “I expected that I would go from one distinguished position to the next, advance my career, be happy and satisfied, and that’s what life would be about.” I am still struggling emotionally with this because I was taught to work always. I have worked always and probably always will. But I question, particularly during the Christmas season when I watch the Hallmark Channel as women do, whether the cost was worth it. 

I remain unmarried and childless but honest, kind, and financially secure, the last goal being the one that kept me unmarried and childless, I guess. I have worked hard at my career, and long ago I stopped working at having and maintaining relationships. Relationships and children require a lot of work, and I believed I was incapable of both relationships and making-and-saving money. Yeah my mother had a lot to do with that because she was financially insecure as a child, and it rubbed off on me. (When I became an adult, I became wholly responsible, not my mother.) She is financially secure, and so am I. 

So now I am thinking seriously of retiring and finding a fertile, kind lady to marry and have some children with. I feel guilty because I will be lucky to have only 20 years left (by then 78), but I would leave my children financially secure and loved. I would make a lot of videos that they could view later, if they still loved me. I am in good physical shape but for my weight gain over the last two years. I want to pass on my gifts, as I expect is instinctual: brains, handsomeness, thrift, loyalty, personality, athletic ability, goodness, and a work ethic. I feel I would be letting my ancestors down if I had no children. So I suppose it is more about having children than having a relationship. I would tell the lady this up front. 

“I still haven’t found what I am looking for.” U2. (Sorry that this link is from a Spanish-speaking site, but the Spanish lasts only a few seconds before the original starts.)

Laura writes:

Relationships and children do require a lot of work. There’s no way of getting around the work of sincerely loving the mother of your children. That would be your first duty to them.

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