Many years ago, a minister by the name of Harrington and an atheist named Madalyn O'Hair conducted a series of debates in various places throughout the United States. They would yell at each other, verbally abuse each other, and try to get the audience to vote on who won the debate by passing a plate and seeing whether the believers or the atheists gave the most money, thus casting their votes. Harrington always won as far as I know, but some people in the atheist group have called that period the most prosperous in its existence.
It seems that a similar phenomena is taking place today. The American
Biology Teacher, a magazine pushing evolutionary explanations of biology,
recently published an income information sheet based upon the tax returns
of Creation Science Ministries of Kentucky (now called Answers in Genesis).
Here is the data they had on page 196 of the April, 1997, vol. 59, no.4,
issue:
| Salary of General Manager (1994) | $48,000.00 |
| Salary of Spokesperson (1994) | $48,000.00 |
| Salary of President (1994) | $70,000.00 |
| Salary of President (1995) | $91,000.00 |
| Total sales in 1995 from mail order | $1,450,000.00 |
How The American Biology Teacher got this tax data is not clear, but the coin has two sides. Pro evolution groups also have huge sales promotions and have their own anti religion publishing company called Prometheus Press. The National Committee for Science Education, the American Humanist Association, the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Paranormal Phenomena, the Skeptical Society, the Skeptical Review, the Rationalist, and the Freedom From Religion Foundation all have symbiotic relationships with the creationists groups; i.e., they are financially beneficial to each other. Many times the issues batted back and forth have to do with a pet theory of someone and have nothing to do with evidence or a logical approach to the real questions of the Bible and its relationship to science.
Back to Contents Does God Exist?, Jan/Feb98.