12. Religious opposition to Darwin was most prevalent in the United States
In the United States, the scientific community embraced Darwin, and praise for his work was nearly unanimous. The religious community reacted with revulsion, and was highly vocal in its opposition. To the religious community, particularly among the fundamentalist movement, Darwin’s theories presented earth populated with creatures locked in an eternal struggle for survival, a brutal and savage world in which only the strongest survived. The idea of survival of the fittest became linked with Darwinism, though the term did not appear in his work.
Early in the 20th century, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints issued its first official statement on the origins of humanity, stating that, “Man is the child of God, formed in the divine image, and endowed with divine attributes”. It was a position reflected in the beliefs of several of the religions of the United States, though some went further, challenging the theory of natural selection with biblical passages and claiming the account of creation in Genesis was irrefutable. The reaction to Darwin’s theory of natural selection in the United States created much of religious fundamentalism in the United States, which continued to argue against the science and its teaching in American schools into the 21st century.
