Duane Caldwell, Author at Rational Faith

About Duane Caldwell

Duane has served in many different capacities including pastor, elder, project coordinator and flight instructor. He is an ordained minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ by the Evangelical Church Alliance and holds a Master of Divinity from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, a Trinity International University school and a BS in Aeronautics from Parks College, St. Louis University.

Disney, Beauty and the Beast, and Boycotts

Posted on March 31, 2017 by Duane Caldwell

Emma Watson and Dan Stevens in Beauty and the Beast (2017)

With Disney’s increasing support of the gay agenda (“Gay Days” at it’s theme parks, increasing exposure of gay scenes in its films aimed at kids) and now with a “gay moment” overshadowing Disney’s new live action version of its classic “Beauty and the Beauty” it has some wondering out loud, “Is it Time to Kiss Disney Goodbye.” [1] Sadly, I have to say “yes” as I note in this tweet. And to further note my opposition to Disney’s move toward encouraging the gay agenda, I encouraged others to boycott Disney’s new Beauty and the Beast film: Continue Reading

UnMasking Mistakes in Memes of Evolution – Part 2

Posted on March 19, 2017 by Duane Caldwell

Unmasking Mistakes in Memes 2

As I explained in the opening article of this series, the purpose of this series is to unmask the faulty logic and science behind defenses given for evolutionary thought. These faulty reasons wind up in memes presented as pseudoscientific (read false) explanations for why creationists are supposedly wrong when pointing out the various and numerous problems of evolution. So in this series I’ll point out why the claims evolutionists use to defend their faulty theory are wrong and why such explanations actually provide no defense for the failed theory of evolution.

In this group of evolutionary memes we’ll see primarily three types of problems:

1. Denials of basic evolutionary belief
2. Claims with no evidence, and/or no defense
3. Claims which avoid the issue and never address the problem that has been pointed out

Okay, so here we go. Links are provided for easy sharing Continue Reading

UnMasking Mistakes in Memes of Evolution – Part 1

Posted on March 4, 2017 by Duane Caldwell

If you spend any amount of time on social media you will inevitably come across memes. The concept of the meme has been around for some time, but has been rediscovered and adapted for use on the internet. In it’s current incarnation, a meme, as defined by Google is:

“a humorous image, video, piece of text, etc., that is copied (often with slight variations) and spread rapidly by Internet users.”[1]

Memes are perfectly suited for the internet and social media, where attention spans are short and tolerance for reading an entire article (like this one) on a topic is even shorter. Memes tend to be very visual, and therefore memorable, perhaps leaving a lasting impression. But when the meme expresses a false idea, you now have the problem of a falsehood being re-enforced by a false, but perhaps memorable meme.

Another problem is that since memes are short, the idea they express is almost never backed by sources you can consult to affirm or deny what is being expressed in the meme. And being short, as a rule they leave out critical detail and context and thus are prone to the fallacy of suppressed evidence – failing to give all the information needed to come to the correct conclusion. All these problems are particularly true of memes that are propagated in support of evolution.

So given that: Continue Reading

The Expanding Big Bang Fairy tale

Posted on February 17, 2017 by Duane Caldwell

Back in August of 2015, I predicted the Big Bang magicians (those who promote the big bang and go by various titles such as cosmologist, scientist, theoretical physicist etc.) would eventually propose a new fairy tale to explain yet another unexplained fact recently discovered about the wonderfully designed universe that we live in. That fact is the existence of rings of galaxies, in concentric circles, spanning the mind boggling distance of 5 billion light years. The Big Bang theory requires that the universe is homogeneous and isotropic – the same everywhere[1] so you should not see in it structures organized in a geometric pattern like concentric circles. Thus this discovery must somehow be explained and made to fit into the Big Bang theory somehow.

I discussed the discovery of this super structure and the problem it poses in an article titled The coming Big Bang fairy tale where I also made both the above referenced prediction, and guaranteed we’d see a new fairy tale:

To close, let me borrow from the former president of the men’s warehouse:
Another big bang fairy tale is coming. I guarantee it.[2]

“Silence” – A Review of Scorsese’s latest attack on the faith

Posted on February 8, 2017 by Duane Caldwell

A scene from Scorsese’s “Silence”

Most Christians should skip Scorsese’s “Silence”

If you were expecting an uplifting film for Christians from Martin Scorsese’s “Silence” you will be sorely disappointed. Because this film is neither made for Christians nor uplifting. To clarify my point, let me define my terms.

As a Christian, I expect a film made for Christians to:

Be supportive of the Christian faith
Proclaim the gospel; or at minimum Biblical principles
Show the benefits of faithfulness and the punishments or pains for rebelliousness
Show the ultimate triumph of the gospel, Christ, and of the Christian living faithfully
Not recommend anti-Biblical actions
Not put anti-Biblical words in the mouth of God the Father or Christ

Silence fails on all counts save for some small support of the first item by showing a number of poor Japanese peasants, who are believers and are martyred for their faith – preferring death over denying their Lord and God Jesus by “apostatizing” – a formal denial of their faith done in this case by trampling on a plaque with an raised relief image of Jesus. Continue Reading

Lessons from Pluto

Posted on January 27, 2017 by Duane Caldwell

New Horizons approaches Pluto

On January 19, 2006 the “fastest spacecraft ever launched”[1] – the New Horizons space probe – lifted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida on a mission to Pluto. In February of 2007 it collected data from Jupiter as it flew by for a gravity assist catapult as it continued on to Pluto. On July 14th, 2015, New Horizons made its closest approach to Pluto. Scientists have now had an opportunity to review the initial data and pictures from New Horizons about the dwarf planet[2] Pluto, and many have been forced into a stunning but unavoidable admission: they’ve been wrong about Pluto for a long time.

What they found on Pluto was not at all what they were expecting to find. Scientists were expecting to find it heavily cratered, “a flat, dead world similar to our moon.”[3] Instead, what they actually found was:

Icy Volcanoes
The heart shaped area (right side partially faded) visible in the picture above named sputnik planum, of which scientists note “…this Texas sized basin of ice appears to be boiling.” [4] Planetary scientist Jani Radebaugh likens it to “a lava lake in slow motion”[5] made of nearly frozen Nitrogen cooled until the texture is that of tooth paste.
Other areas feature a young looking surface, with no record of crater bombardment as expected. “These features are very, very young…Pluto is active today. That’s the headline.”[6] says Planetary scientist Dan Durda.
An active geology driven by heat
and “there’s pretty good circumstantial evidence that Pluto has a massive ocean in its interior”[7] says New Horizons mission principle investigator Alan Stern.

Secular Blindness

While scientists are willing to fess up to being wrong when confronted with objective data like that supplied to them from their own instruments aboard the New Horizons space probe, it is unlikely that they are willing to acknowledge error with regard to the below lessons, save the first, which they cannot deny without being accused of being science deniers. Continue Reading

Pulling Back the Veil – What Cosmologists are Hiding

Posted on January 11, 2017 by Duane Caldwell

The Hand of God (nebula) behind the Veil of Science

(Or: Big Bang Magic Part 3:
Pulling Back the Veil on the five biggest questions about the universe)

Contrary to what you may have been led to believe, cosmology these days is not an objective science, devoted strictly to the scientific explanation of the origin of the universe. There is an agenda that rules cosmology. An agenda that has nothing to do with science as confessed by Richard Lewontin: Continue Reading

A Modest Proposal for a Christmas Experiment

Posted on December 24, 2016 by Duane Caldwell

Sump’n Claus with helpers

A Christmas day meditation from a Santa iconoclast

Since I don’t expect non-Christians to understand my concern here, let me state up front this meditation is written specifically for Christians, for all who confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.

It’s Christmas time again. So once again churches, pastors and diligent Christian leaders try to get us to focus on the reason for the season and refresh our memories on what’s part of the original Christmas account and what isn’t. So you’ve probably been reminded and/or challenged on how many wise men there were (we don’t know, the Bible doesn’t say; three are depicted because of the three gifts of incense, gold and myrrh (Matt 2.1; 11)); whether Jesus’ Birth really happened on December 25th (unlikely, shepherds don’t keep their sheep in the fields at night during the cold months (Luke 2.8)), and that a manger isn’t a cute little wooden crib – it’s an animal feeding trough (Luke 2.16); etc. etc.

It’s in this vain of helping people focus on the real events and meaning of Christmas that I’m sure this article titled “Santa Claus and Christian Kids – What’s a Parent to Do?” was written. A perennial concern for Christians at Christmas time is what to do about Santa? That article is a good read, and I recommend it, but I will take a different tack on what parents should do about it. Continue Reading

Are Biblical accounts copied from pagan religions? Part 2. The Resurrection

Posted on December 12, 2016 by Duane Caldwell

Depiction of the empty tomb of Jesus

Since the original sin in the garden of Eden, mankind has searched for reasons not to believe God so he could live a life independent of God. In the garden, the serpent convinced Eve not to trust God. Why? Supposedly because God was holding back the knowledge of good and evil to the detriment of Adam and Eve. The serpent suggested God was wrong f0r withholding that knowledge, but that if they were to discover the truth, they would be “like God”. (Gen 3.5) That was a big lie. God was indeed withholding the knowledge of evil, but he was not wrong in doing so because he knew that (experiential) knowledge of evil (like disobeying God) would lead to death. And the biggest irony is – they were already like God (Gen 1.26), there was nothing to be gained from what the serpent offered.

Today there is another lie circulating to destroy belief in God: The claim that the biblical accounts are not history, but rather stories borrowed or stolen and then adapted from the made up stories of pagan religions. If there’s no reason to believe the pagan religions, then there’s no reason to believe a made up story based on it either. Continue Reading

Are Biblical accounts copied from pagan religions? Part 1. The God of Creation

Posted on November 30, 2016 by Duane Caldwell

Recently while at work I overheard a discussion among some of my co-workers. They were agreeing among themselves that the Biblical accounts of things like the creation of the universe and the major events of Christianity – like the birth of Jesus and his resurrection – were all just stories borrowed (or copied or plagiarized – whatever you want to call it) from the stories of the religions of other cultures.

I’ve heard that charge before, and as a Christian, I find the entire idea repugnant. It’s not like they’re talking about something inconsequential like a comic book or the like. After all scripture reminds us the biblical accounts “are not just idle words for you–they are your life.”(Dt 32.47) The fact that such discussions are still being entertained and the idea affirmed is proof that many people are still taking the bait and falling for the trap: being persuaded that this lie is true. Since people’s eternities are a stake the only question is how best to respond? Continue Reading