Former Director of the National Institutes of Health Francis Collins and President of the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) Walter Kim are joining forces on July 27th to lead a talk on Truth, Science, Faith, and Trust and all the ways to rebuild trust in these institutions, an ironic endeavor given the outside roles they have played in eroding it. The event abstract reads:
As the COVID-19 pandemic revealed, we have become not just a hyper-partisan society but also a deeply cynical one, distrustful of traditional sources of knowledge and wisdom. Skepticism about vaccines led to the needless deaths of at least 230,000 Americans. “Do your own research” is now a rallying cry in many online rabbit holes. Yet experts aren’t perfect either: they (we) can make mistakes, and institutions can lose their moral compass. So how can we navigate through all this? And how can scientists and people of faith play effective roles in re-anchoring us?
In this talk, I plan to review the four core sources of judgment and clear thinking that have anchored all successful societies down through history, but that are now under significant threat in our divided nation: truth, science, faith, and trust. ..I will shine a light on how deterioration in our traditional support for these foundational anchors has led to distrust of science and public health, partisanship, emergence of racist messages, denial of climate change, and threats to our democracy. But as followers of Jesus, we are not without hope: God is still sovereign and there are specific actions that each of us can take.
We could not think of two less qualified people to give this talk.
Collins, who was pushed and promoted hard by Russell Moore, David French, Tim Keller, and Ed Setzer, played a massive role in destroying trust. He released a statement for PRIDE month in which he publicly revealed himself to be thoroughly compromised on the Christian’s view of LGBTQ issues and the scriptures, offering them his personal support as an “ally” and regurgitating all the progressive talking points he could muster.
During COVID, he was trotted out to push 6-foot social distancing, lockdowns, and the absolute need to mask, criticizing anyone who offered alternatives.
He argued that in-person public schooling was a higher priority than in-person church, openly supported doing experiments on fetal tissue on account that he doesn’t believe human embryos to be life but only ‘potential life,” and has argued that scientists should use bodies of aborted babies for scientific experimentation.
He also shamed Christians for having vaccine hesitancy, arguing the culture war waged by evangelicals during the pandemic was in part responsible for over 100,000 people dying unnecessarily, offering that many white evangelicals have been “victimized by the misinformation and lies and conspiracies that are floating around, particularly on social media and some of it in cable news.”
Couple all that with a refusal to condemn “pregnant people” language and being a propagandist for unscientific pandemic protocols, Collins was utterly exposed.
As far as Kim, we covered him in our Op-Ed The National Association of Evangelicals Fiddles While Healthy Breasts Burn, where his organization released a sweeping 96-page report designed to address some of the most pressing matters of this current age, which almost exclusively turned out to be about climate change.
Two years ago, the NAE, the lobbying group that represents tens of thousands of churches from over 40 denominations, supported a nasty legislative initiative called Fairness for All, which sought to codify sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes, adding them to federal nondiscrimination laws.
Then, they wrote to Senators Tammy Baldwin and Susan Collins to pressure them to support the Respect for Marriage Act. This act was passed to butress Obergefell and requires the federal government to recognize a marriage if it is valid in the state where it was performed and guarantee that valid marriages are given full faith and credit in other states.
More importantly, it serves as a pretext to punish groups who don’t recognize and approve of same-sex unions, as well as grant activists the ability to sue Christian organizations over their lack of support for it.
These actions by the NAE resulted in Christian scholar Robert Gagnon expressing his disbelief, calling for the resignation of Kim for supporting “the worst legislation in my lifetime, which pulls the rug out from any reasonable definition of marriage.
Let’s call this event for what it is: just another excuse for Collins and Kim to engage in revisionism history about their record while lecturing evangelicals on why they need to be more like them.
