Phillip Johnson once wrote about the “two-platoon” strategy by which Darwinists successfully infest biology. First, there is the real Darwinist, an atheist materialist like 78% of evolutionary biologists. Then there is the Christian Darwinist (cf BioLogos) on whose lips Jesus and Darwin are ever praised together. Charles Kingsley was one of the latter.
In “Darwin’s Other Bulldog: Charles Kingsley and the Popularisation of Evolution in Victorian England” ( Science & Education , November 2011), Piers J. Hale writes,
Abstract The nineteenth-century Anglican Priest Charles Kingsley (1819–1875) was a significant populariser of Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection. Kingsley was successful in this regard because he developed such diverse connections throughout his career. In the 1840s he associated with Chartists and radical journalists; in the 1850s and 1860s he moved freely in scientific circles and was elected Fellow of the Linnean Society of London in 1856 and Fellow of the Geological Society of London in 1863. In 1859 he was appointed Chaplain in Ordinary to the Queen. In 1860 the Prince Consort was willing and able to secure Kingsley appointment as the Regius Professor of Modern History at Cambridge University and he subsequently became tutor to the Prince of Wales. Thereafter he was frequently invited into high Victorian Society. A friend of ‘Darwin’s Bulldog’ Thomas Huxley, of the eminent geologist Charles Lyell and a correspondent of Darwin, at every turn he sought to promote Darwin’s ideas as theologically orthodox, a life-long campaign in which he was eminently successful.
Why was he “eminently successful”? Because the fact that the atheist Darwinists are usually prominent and the Christian Darwinists are usually negligible in the field is – for some reason – seldom made explicit by the latter.
Recent years, may have seen the development of a third type, the consensus science supporter, like ASA’s executive director, Randy Isaacs: Believe whatever they tell you, no matter what. There, the loyalty has subtly been transferred from Darwin to “whatever they say about Darwin,” which will prove convenient when the story needs to change.
Hat tip: Pos-Darwinista