With a good telescope, it's possible to see new stars and planetary systems being formed all throughout the galaxy. In such clouds of gas and dust as the "Horse Head Nebula," or in the cloudy "arms" of the galaxy—and in distant galaxies—there are what might be called "nodules" (called "Bok globules" after astronomer Bart Bok [any relation to Gordon? I dunno]—in which the dust and gas seems to have formed a gravitational center and all of the matter is orbiting around that center. As it orbits faster and faster, it forms "sub-centers" of gravitation. Sooner or later, enough matter has been gathered in the center so that gravitational pressure sets up a nuclear reaction and the star ignites. These globules are sometimes referred to as "star nurseries."

The sub-centers congeal into planets, which continue to orbit around the new-formed sun. The left-over gas and dust on the periphery forms the Oort cloud, which spawns meteors and comets, which drift about aimlessly until captured by the sun's gravity and fall into a closer orbit around the sun.

Once you have made a few observations, you can formulate a theory. Then you confirm, modify, or abandon the theory based on further observations.

Those who wrote the scrolls that were later compiled into what we now call "the Bible" didn't have a clue about any of this. The "theories" set forth in the Bible are simply "best guess" as to how all of this came about.

Then—blokes like Copernicus and Galileo, instead of slavishly following the ancient writings in the Bible, had the audacity to simply look at the skies.

Interesting that the "Powers That Be" at the time threatened them with being burned at the stake for doing so.

And as far as the "theory" of evolution is concerned, discoveries made over a period of time in environmental adaptation and its continuity through genetics have pretty well established it as—FACT.

Sorry, Pete. But THAT is the way God did it!!

Don Firth