The faithful and the faithless are identical, in ways,
And it’s silliness to tease the two apart
The parsing of their language, the dissection of a phrase,
Needn’t mean they take these differences to heart
Denying evolution, or contending God’s behind it
Is just one of many issues, don’t you see?
If you simply look around you, why, agreement’s where you find it
And there’s lots of stuff on which we all agree.

Why, there’s levers, wedges, pulleys, all that simple physics stuff,
And the useful things that chemistry can find
And cellular biology—and isn’t that enough?
The important things that God Himself designed!
Though the evidence is plentiful, we part at evolution
And the big bang theory’s more than we can take
If we say that God’s behind it, that’s a reasonable solution
Though that’s not a move the atheists might make

Yes, the faithful and the faithless are identical, in ways,
Like bipedal locomotion, for a start.
There appears to be an equal part their nervous system plays
And they mostly have four chambers in their heart
We can list the similarities, though most of them are trivial,
Cos “trivial” is not the same as “wrong”
And claim that there’s no reason that we can’t all be convivial
No reason that we cannot get along

The majority of Christians have no qualms respecting science
Which apologists take pains to often note
The problem is, their tribal faith is where they put reliance
When their leadership reminds them how to vote.

Context and blather, after the jump:

In an op-ed in yesterday’s Los Angeles Times, John H. Evans argues that “on most issues, there is very little conflict between religion and science.” It’s true; by numerical count, there are very few specific issues on which there is disagreement. Just little things, like evolution, or the big bang. The little things that underpin everything else. The things that challenge the view that we are God’s Special Creation. And even there, most believers will finagle an agreement; it really is a minority on the fringe that are out-and-out young earth creationists.

The problem is, that minority is vocal and active, and that minority loudly identifies as christian. To the extent that the majority self-identifies as christian, they will support their tribal fellows well beyond what their agreement on the mere issues would warrant. As we know, the hypothetical well-qualified atheist does not stand a chance at the polls. And when elections are close, the ability to sway a minority segment, or to partially sway a larger segment, is enough.

On most issues, there may be very little conflict, but there does not have to be, for real damage to be done.

(The comments at the article are mostly taking the author to task. I like that.)