Thanks Robo for a reasoned and interesting reply.
I don't "believe" in creationism or Darwinism or any other "-ism" - I do believe in God. Perhaps that's faith and a different thing. Semantics. But attacking someone (even W.!)for their beliefs, no matter how distasteful, seems a mite disingenuous when one is arguing for being "open-minded".

>>Science investigates what we CAN know about the universe. It doesn't address God as necessarily being or not being.<<
Doesn't that beg the question of whether God is a knowable part of the universe? I have read brilliant theologians who can elucidate this in great detail. I'm all for an open definition of the scientific method, which will consider the possibility of God. My only criticism is in response to scientific "popularizers" who let their philosophical biases show (I am thinking of Dawkins in particular, but also Sagan and Gould, among others).
I am also bothered by the simplistic, dogmatic way that evolution is taught as absolute "fact" - you know the poster, where the hominid starts on all fours and eventually leads to an upright Homo Sapiens. It implies that the connections are all there, and that such a thing is "proven"; this is misleading at best, propaganda at worst in the name of a definition of "evolution" that is at least as mythological as the opening chapters of Genesis.

>>When you find bones in the ground of critters that are not living now, and are totally different from critters living now, when you find remains of ancient critters EXACTLY THE SAME as some living now, and others that are not quite the same as those living now, it follows that there are forces it might be interesting to understand in the history of biology<<
What about those critters that are exactly the same - do they not throw a wrench in the "natural selection" postulate? Are they exempt from natural selection? Why are there still amoebas around anyway??

>>God exists because it ain't YOU and it ain't ME. More than one God does not exist because ONE's ENOUGH.<< Amen. :-) And believe me, I'm not wanting to be God. I got enough junk to deal with as it is.

I guess the other question is: does it matter? I would suggest that it does, in the manner that origin stories always tell us about people's views of the nature and destiny of humans and the earth. To those who would easily meld creation and evolution, I would counter that there is a great gulf, in implication if nothing else, between the ideas that: 1) humans are blessed creatures made in the image of the Creator, or 2) humans are the result of random, possibly anomalous biological events.

Sorry to drift somewhat off topic, but you have prompted an entertaining and engaging debate in this thread. Thanks, Robo!

Peace,
Bo