Science vs. Creationism ... no need to fight boys

I love science! I adore it, there is SO much to learn about life, the universe and everything.

And I am Catholic, so there's the whole belief in God thing going on. 

Here's the thing: I don't buy the whole Bible-must-be-taken-literally hooha. In fact I was taught by the brothers in Catholic high school NOT to take the Bible literally -- especially the Old Testament. I was taught that the books of the Bible were written at all different times and that the stories recorded therein are teaching stories -- the way that Jesus taught by parables. Based on oral traditions handed down through generations with a probable bit of truth here and there (since every culture has a flood story that probably happened for example) but not these stories are not literal verbatim archives of what happened down to the minute. I mean come on really did people live to be 900 hundred years old? Seriously? In my classes that notion was one of wisdom not actual years.

I was also taught that the religious concept of God having created the world in only six days (resting on the seventh) is not literal. After all, is a "minute" to an all-seeing, all-knowing, omniscient God going to be the same as a minute on Earth. Does such a being look at time the same way we do? Who is to say that a minute to God is the same as a minute to us? Consider, a day on Mars is not 24 hours as it is on Earth. A day is a little more than 24 1/2 hours on Mars. Jupiter rotates so fast that a day is less than 10 hours!! Then you have Neptune where the length of the day varies depending on where you are on the planet. Different parts of Neptune spin at different speeds. So 16 hours on average with 18 hours at the equator but 12 hours at the poles. And don't get me started on the length of a year planet to planet. With so much variation in our own little solar system how arrogant we are to think that the God who created ... well, everything ... would look at time exactly the way it passes on Earth. Maybe a minute is a billion years or more. Or maybe God doesn't keep track of time since when you're omniscient you don't need a watch?

Think on this, if you subscribe to the Big Bang Theory ... which I do ... at some point you have to ask: what caused the Big Bang to happen? Science can only go back so far, can only explain so much and then it hits a wall. Over time the wall moves back but then there is another wall. The point of "x" that point our science can NOT explain ... that is God. 

Science tells us that a catalyst is needed for reactions to occur (typically, I'm sure there are exceptions) to me that catalyst is God. The trigger of the Big Bang; the "event" that set evolution off on its merry way ... was God. Why is that so hard to comprehend?

Why is it so hard for literal creationists to consider that time from God's perspective moves differently than for humans? Why with all the layers upon layers of fossil record can people honestly think the Earth is less than 10,000 years old? Carbon dating, fossil record, ice cores, tree rings even ... everything points to a planet far older than that and yet ... the literal interpretation of the Bible tells these folks otherwise. 

You do not have to be one or the other: Christian OR scientist. You can be both. You can reconcile science and religion. There is no need to be just one or the other. No need to argue, debate, drive each other nuts. Some would call that perspective "intelligent design" I suppose ... when I was growing up, we called that being Catholic.