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As the world mourns the
death of conservationist Steve Irwin, the Aussie legend has already
become the subject of urban legend.
The following email began
circulating the Internet within days of the Crocodile Hunter’s
untimely death, claiming that he had made a timely conversion to
Christianity.
Yes, we now have confirmation of Steve Irwin's decision for
Christ. I want to inform Creation Ministries International that Steve
Irwin became a born again Christian two and a half weeks ago at
King’s Church AOG in Buderim, Queensland
Australia, going forward publicly before the congregation to ask Christ
to become his Lord and Saviour. Many of us will
now spend eternity with him. I am sure Terri is comforted as a Christian
in the fact that she will be with Jesus and also Steve again for
eternity. Steve declared the day before he died that he was the happiest
he had ever been in his whole life.
Pastor R.R.
Did Steve Irwin make a
near-deathbed conversion? This email has all of the hallmarks of an urban
legend: a posthumous anecdote reported as fact after the ‘fact’.
Suspiciously distributed by email only, it presents second-hand information, the anonymous author was not an
eyewitness. Then there is the providential timing of the
‘conversion’, a premonitory act performed just weeks before
the fatal accident. It is implied that only a religious epiphany can
bring true happiness to life. A cautionary tale underlies the story, life
is short and unpredictable…convert now and you will be rewarded
with “eternity”.
Similar to a stereotype,
urban legends are not invariably fallacious. They can be true, distorted
or embellished but grounded in truth, or simply be false. An important
element to any urban legend is the potential for truth, but is this story
plausible?
Deathbed conversions have
been attributed to many famous people, and the
more atheistic the target, the better. Infamously, Charles Darwin is credited
with a dubious deathbed conversion. This is staunchly denied by his
family. There is a delightful irony to the possibility that The Atheist
might recant his entire life’s seminal work with a last-minute
conversion, just to ‘play it safe’ in an eternal gamble on
Pascal’s Wager.
It is a comforting reinforcement
for believers to believe that an infidel ‘saw the light’. It
is also a way to discredit. Albert Einstein was often misrepresented as
religious for his metaphorical use of ‘god’. Among the
eminent list of alleged deathbed conversions are the philosophers
Voltaire and Spinoza, and authors Percy Shelley and Lord Byron. However,
in an 1820 letter to his publisher John Murray, Byron wrote, “A
death-bed is a matter of nerves and constitution, not of religion.”
He further remarked that “Men died calmly before the Christian era,
and since, without Christianity.”
Irwin never publicly
claimed to be a Christian, an Atheist, Agnostic or Evolutionist. However,
as a conservationist with an applied approach to zoology, it is doubtful
that he was religious. After all, until June 2006 Australia Zoo had been
the home of Harriet, ‘Darwin’s
tortoise’, who died at 176 years of age. Was he not also a
blasphemer, who uttered “Crikey!” a
corruption of ‘Christ!’?
The online Christian community
reacted to the story with hopefulness, but skepticism. Creationist Carl
Wieland of Creation Ministries International (CMI) (www.creationontheweb.com) claims
that the author of the email (from the Noosa
Christian Outreach Centre rather than King’s Church Buderim) penned it in “good faith” and that
it was not intended to be circulated widely. In fact, CMI are directly responsible
for spreading the rumour. However, we still
don’t know the original source of the claim (yet another symptom of
an urban legend). Wieland takes this opportunity to imply that this may
yet be true, “It is, ultimately, a matter between Steve Irwin and
His Creator”. Translated from Creationese
into Skepticese, our only concrete evidence would
be confirmation from the Crocodile Hunter himself. To keep the fire
burning, Wieland claims that he was able to “substantiate”
that Irwin’s widow Terri is a “churchgoing Christian”.
How did the story
originate? We could posit that a member of the church initiated the
story, to promote the church, by attachment, to the Irwin name/fame. Perhaps
it was misinterpretation. In the end, the rumour
was discredited by the very church specified by “R.R” in the
original email. In an official response, the pastor of King’s
Church posted the following message to his website (www.stevepenny.org).
Steve
Penny wishes to advise that the story of Steve Irwin’s conversion
to Christianity in Kings Christian Church is unfounded. Further
investigation has failed to substantiate rumours
of his conversion in any church on the Sunshine Coast,
or through a Zoo or school chaplain.
What more proof do we need?
It seems that we can lay this legend to rest when even Pastor Penny has labelled this “the Steve Irwin Hoax”.
Stollznow, K. An Irwin Legend. Australasian Science.
Vol. 27, No. 10, p.46.
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