The BioLogos Foundation is a
Christian
A Christian () is a person who follows or adheres to Christianity, a Monotheism, monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus in Christianity, Jesus Christ. Christians form the largest religious community in the wo ...
advocacy group
Advocacy groups, also known as lobby groups, interest groups, special interest groups, pressure groups, or public associations, use various forms of advocacy or lobbying to influence public opinion and ultimately public policy. They play an impor ...
that supports the view that
God
In monotheistic belief systems, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. In polytheistic belief systems, a god is "a spirit or being believed to have created, or for controlling some part of the un ...
created the world using
evolution
Evolution is the change in the heritable Phenotypic trait, characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, re ...
of different
species
A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...
as the mechanism. It was established by
Francis Collins
Francis Sellers Collins (born April 14, 1950) is an American physician-scientist who discovered the genes associated with a number of diseases and led the Human Genome Project. He served as director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) ...
in 2007 after receiving letters and emails from people who had read his book, ''
The Language of God''. The primary audience was Christians in the beginning, but Collins as well as later leaders of the organization have sought to engage with
scientific skeptics as well as general audiences invested in biological science.
BioLogos affirms
evolutionary creation
Theistic evolution (also known as theistic evolutionism or God-guided evolution), alternatively called evolutionary creationism, is a view that God acts and creates through laws of nature. Here, God is taken as the primary cause while natural cau ...
as a core commitment.
History
In his 2006 book ''
The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief,''
Francis Collins
Francis Sellers Collins (born April 14, 1950) is an American physician-scientist who discovered the genes associated with a number of diseases and led the Human Genome Project. He served as director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) ...
wrote that scientific discoveries were an "opportunity to worship" and that he rejected both
Young Earth creationism
Young Earth creationism (YEC) is a form of creationism which holds as a central tenet that the Earth and its lifeforms were created by supernatural acts of the Abrahamic God between about 10,000 and 6,000 years ago, contradicting established s ...
and
intelligent design
Intelligent design (ID) is a pseudoscientific argument for the existence of God, presented by its proponents as "an evidence-based scientific theory about life's origins".#Numbers 2006, Numbers 2006, p. 373; " Dcaptured headlines for it ...
. He wrote that his own belief was
theistic evolution
Theistic evolution (also known as theistic evolutionism or God-guided evolution), alternatively called evolutionary creationism, is a view that God acts and creates through laws of nature. Here, God is taken as the primary cause while natural cau ...
or
evolutionary creation
Theistic evolution (also known as theistic evolutionism or God-guided evolution), alternatively called evolutionary creationism, is a view that God acts and creates through laws of nature. Here, God is taken as the primary cause while natural cau ...
, which he described as "BioLogos", and that one can "think of DNA as an instructional script, a software program, sitting in the nucleus of the cell."
He appeared on ''
The Colbert Report
''The Colbert Report'' ( ) is an American late night television, late-night Late-night talk show, talk and news satire television program hosted by Stephen Colbert that aired four days a week on Comedy Central from October 17, 2005, to December ...
'' and on ''
Fresh Air
''Fresh Air'' is an American radio talk show broadcast on National Public Radio stations across the United States since 1985. It is produced by WHYY-FM in Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The show's hosts are Terry Gross and Tonya Mosl ...
'' radio to discuss his book. In an interview with
D. J. Grothe on the ''
Point of Inquiry
A point is a small dot or the sharp tip of something. Point or points may refer to:
Mathematics
* Point (geometry), an entity that has a location in space or on a plane, but has no extent; more generally, an element of some abstract topologica ...
'' podcast, he said that the overall aim of the book was to show that "one can be intellectually in a rigorous position and argue that science and faith can be compatible", and that he was prompted to write the book because "most people are seeking a possible harmony between these worldviews
cience and faith and it seems rather sad that we hear so little about this possibility.
In 2007, Collins founded the BioLogos Foundation to "contribute to the public voice that represents the harmony of science and faith." He served as the foundation's president until he was confirmed as director of the NIH. Collins has also spoken at the
Veritas Forum on the
relationship between science and religion and the
existence of God
The existence of God is a subject of debate in the philosophy of religion and theology. A wide variety of arguments for and against the existence of God (with the same or similar arguments also generally being used when talking about the exis ...
.
Presidents

The foundation has been led by the following presidents:
*
Francis Collins
Francis Sellers Collins (born April 14, 1950) is an American physician-scientist who discovered the genes associated with a number of diseases and led the Human Genome Project. He served as director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) ...
(founded 2007 – 16 August 2009; resigned to become 16th director of the
National Institutes of Health
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in 1887 and is part of the United States Department of Health and Human Service ...
)
*
Darrel R. Falk (16 August 2009 – January 2013)
*
Deborah Haarsma (January 2013 – March 2025)
*
Kristine Torjesen (March 2025 – present)
During the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...
, BioLogos sponsored livestream events featuring the NIH director and BioLogos founder Francis Collins.
Responses
A ''
Time
Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequ ...
'' article about the foundation reported different responses in 2009.
BioLogos has also received praise and positive responses. Supporters include ''
Washington Post
''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...
'' columnist
Kathleen Parker, who has argued that the foundation's goal of "helping fundamentalists evolve can only be good for civilization."
Reception of the "evolutionary creationism" message of BioLogos within the Christian community has been mixed. Young earth creationists identify BioLogos as one of the great compromisers of the Bible, accusing members of bowing to science over the clear Word of God. BioLogos counters that they affirm all the core tenants of the traditional Christian faith, and that their views on evolution are consistent with notable defenders of Christianity such as
Augustine
Augustine of Hippo ( , ; ; 13 November 354 – 28 August 430) was a theologian and philosopher of Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia, Roman North Africa. His writings deeply influenced the development of Western philosop ...
, an early church father, and
B. B. Warfield, a staunch 19th century promoter of
biblical inerrancy
Biblical inerrancy is the belief that the Bible, in its original form, is entirely free from error.
The belief in biblical inerrancy is of particular significance within parts of evangelicalism
Evangelicalism (), also called evangelic ...
.
[Mark Noll, B.B. Warfield, Biblical Inerrancy, and Evolution, BioLogos, August 22, 2011. https://biologos.org/articles/b-b-warfield-biblical-inerrancy-and-evolution (accessed Jul 13, 2024)]
References
Bibliography
* ''
The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief'', by Francis Collins
{{DEFAULTSORT:BioLogos Foundation
Christian organizations established in 2007
Non-profit organizations based in Washington, D.C.
Criticism of creationism
Christianity and science
Christianity and evolution
501(c)(3) organizations