There have been times recently when I have scarcely dared to open the newspaper for fear of discovering the latest enormity committed by our fellow human beings. You all know the feeling. At this rate, will the human race survive? Does it deserve to survive? Significantly, the first to express this feeling of disgust at humanity was God himself. The Book of Genesis (6:5–8) records: “When the Lord saw that man had done much evil on earth and that his thoughts and inclinations were always evil, he was sorry that he had made man on earth, and he was grieved at heart. He said: ‘This race of man whom I have created, I will wipe them off the face of the earth—man and beasts, reptiles and birds. I am sorry that I ever made them.’”

There seems to be a fatal flaw in the human personality which has always been there, and which has been designated by the term “original sin.” As the philosopher Immanuel Kant put it, “Out of the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing can ever be made.” This propensity towards moral frailty contrasts strongly with the extraordinary and continuing physical success of humanity as a species. The universe we know is about 13 billion years old, and there have been success stories before. The dinosaurs thrived and dominated the earth between 230 and 66.4 million years B.C., but during this long period they did not develop mentally and so did not survive