You could forgive little Jack Rabbit for thinking that trucks have got it in for him. Why else would they bowl down the road, threatening to squish him? Of course, the truth is that the truck driver is only intent on delivering his load, and the occasional squished rabbit is an unfortunate side effect.
Some say that evolution was "invented" as an atheistic attack on God and God-belief. In this essay, I aim to explain that this is not the case, and that science is not intent on destroying faith. It is not intrinsically atheistic. It is merely intent on delivering knowledge. Truth-contradictory beliefs are collateral damage. Road kill.
Long before Darwin and Wallace presented their theory of evolution, geology had progressed to the point that a recent global flood was recognised as being an unworkable explanation for the geological column, and "faunal succession", the sequence of differing life forms in the geological strata was accepted. These were taught in mostly British universities by men of the cloth. What was missing was how and why the forms of living things changed over time. People who say that "deep time" was invented in order to allow evolution to work are mistaken - or misled. "Deep time", and the fact of life changing over time came first.
Enter Darwin and Wallace, who almost simultaneously came up with the idea that the reason why life changes over generations was due to the differential reproductive performance provided by undirected heritable variations. It was Mendel, an Augustinian friar and abbot, who pointed the way to the nature of the things that provide these variations - genes.
Darwin stated that he was not an atheist, but an agnostic who stopped church attendance. It appears that his abandonment of formal religious practices was largely caused by his agonising grief over the suffering and passing away of his most beloved little daughter, Annie.
Here is a section from Wikipedia on Darwin's religious views. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Darwin#Religious_views
Wallace, who was attracted to spiritual beliefs, disagreed with Darwin somewhat about the causes and "direction" of variation, but they both agreed on the effects of natural selection. Wallace was no atheist either. He was not motivated by atheism.
Regarding Darwin's motivation for his studies, a strong case can be made for him being motivated by his own extended family's cause, the abolition of slavery. https://www.amazon.com/Darwins-Sacred-Cause-Slavery-Evolution-ebook/dp/B00PF1PX88/
Moving on to Evolution and Christianity.
Wikipedia lists some 30 currently living (at the time of writing) prominent scientists who work in biological and biomedical sciences who are Christians. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christians_in_science_and_technology#Currently_living. While a very small minority reject evolutionary science (we used to call them cranks), the majority do not, and many have contributed to it. This is not an argument from authority, but rather an argument to say that Christianity and science are not necessarily at odds, and the best people to demonstrate this are leading scientific "evolutionist" Christians.
One scientist not on the list is Graeme Finlay, a world-recognized expert in genetic markers that put evolution beyond any reasonable doubt. This book of his is highly recommended. https://www.amazon.com/Human-Evolution-Graeme-Finlay-ebook/dp/B00E99YKSQ/ Finlay is a Christian preacher.
I've concentrated on Christians who are most closely involved in biological science, and most prominent in evolutionary studies. There are many more Christians and theists of other stripes, both scientists and lay people, who are accepting of evolution. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acceptance_of_evolution_by_religious_groups The idea that you cannot be a theist and an "evolutionist" is a lie. Even atheists fall for perpetuating it sometimes. It is a lie put about, not by all believers, but only by creationists.
https://barryhisblog.blogspot.com/p/evolution-its-acceptance-amongs.html
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