The future of Creationism and mankind's intellectual evolution.

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Perhaps that's somewhat of a bold statement to some. What I'm suggesting is the possible erosion of the Creationist and Young Earth philosophy due to mankind’s technological and scientific advancement.

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My opinion (and a humble one at that) is that creationism, and especially young earth creationism, is a knee jerk reaction from some in the christian movement to man's increasing technological abilities. Some christians see increasing non-religious knowledge and technology as a direct threat to spiritual life, somewhat like Quaker sects that separate themselves from current society. They see how the supernatural is kept out of science and then proceed to disregard what science produces because of this. Increasing knowledge will not matter because they will simply ignore it, or pull out the "atheist bias" card. They truly feel that religious conviction should sway scientific findings, and when they are denied this they disregard science.There is also the martyr syndrome. The more they are persecuted for their beliefs, the more they are ridiculed, the more they are shown to be wrong by a "godless philosophy", the more reason to feel tha they are right. Jesus said that christians would be persecuted and this translates into the YEC mindset. A former poster on this forum took this to extremes and was eventually banned for it.This is my view of how things work in the EvC debate. I could be totally wrong, but this is the feeling I get from the rhetoric used by creationists.

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I literally had a Christian youth group tell me "if you aren't being persecuted for your beliefs, you just aren't trying hard enough." Can you imagine such a sick thing to say to teenagers?

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I was told the same thing when I was in youth group as well. I can understand the philosophy and theology behind it, but it would be better for this to be brought up when these teens become adults. Luckily I didn't have self esteem issues, but I watched kids other kids form cliques within the youth group that actively sought out ways to be ridiculed by non-christians (however indirect their methods were). They seemed to all share the same need to belong to a group, and as such persecution only strengthened the group. I see the same thing happening within YEC organizations and loosely knit online YEC communities. Scientific accuracy is farthest from their minds. Evangelism is their only goal, and along the way they are encouraged that "atheist evolutionists" speak against them. You even see the "true christian" canard raised when they are confronted by theistic evolutionists.