Many are concerned that it seems that the Bible always has to give way to the advances of science. Regardless of the nature of the phenomenon that science cannot explain, that this is said at all reveals a concern that, as science explains more and more in naturalistic terms, there is seen to be less and less room left for God. While individual pieces of fundamentalist interpretation may bear a superficial resemblance to some of the literal biblical interpretation found in the Church fathers, it belongs to a very different theological understanding. For one thing, to assume, as the Fathers did in the absence of evidence to the contrary that the Genesis creation accounts are broadly historical is a far cry from making this assumption today in the face of such evidence. The creationists' more or less literal reading of Genesis is a world away from the richly layered depths of meaning which the Fathers find.
Science can neither verify nor disprove the supernatural.
The irony of this position can be seen, for example, in John C. Whitcomb's book, The Genesis Flood. Here, he discusses the fossil record and notes that certain organisms appear in the fossil record abruptly, without any apparent ancestors. He interprets this as evidence of creation, but nowhere in the book does the word creator appear nor is the reader told anything about this creator. More recently, some creation scientists, in a further attempt to distance themselves from the Bible, talk of a doctrine of abrupt appearance. If it is to be taught in the schools, it should not be taught as science but elsewhere in the curriculum.