Dr. Marcus Ross Reflects on Career as Young Earth Creationist

Dr. Marcus Ross, Liberty’s director for the Center for Creations Studies and professor of geology, has come a long way since dinosaurs first caught his attention as a child.

Feb. 23 marked the first anniversary of the release of the documentary “Is Genesis History?” which includes segments from a number of creationist scientists giving basic evidence from their discipline for traditional Young Earth Creationism, Noah’s flood and more. In the documentary, Ross is featured as a paleontologist.

As a four-year-old, Ross first discovered dinosaurs listening to a read-along recording about prehistoric animals. Now, according to the “Is Genesis History?” website, Ross has his Bachelor of Science in Earth Science from Pennsylvania State University, Master of Science in Vertebrate Paleontology from the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology and holds a doctorate in Environmental Science, also known as Geosciences, from the University of Rhode Island.

Ross said throughout his time as a student in higher education, he was open about being a Young Earth Creationist.

“It was a risky sort of thing to do,” Ross said. “It caused some troubles over time, but it also worked up a lot more trust with people that I worked with, because they knew I wasn’t hiding that fact.”

He said he has faced his share of skepticism about being both a Young Earth Creationist and a scientist.

Now, Ross is an established voice in the creationist community.

Ross and Dr. Todd Wood, a Liberty graduate who spoke about biology in the film, along with film director Thomas Purifoy and Stuart Bennett, a professor from Liberty’s Zaki Gordon Cinematic Arts Center, led a panel discussing after the film Thursday, March 8.

Purifoy said that at its first release, the film earned $2.7 million. It was enough of a success that the distributor brought it back to theaters for its first anniversary.

This surprised Wood, who did not expect the level of success that the film saw because of his previous experiences with Young Earth Creationist films.

“I continue to be astonished at how well it has been received,” Wood said.

Wood, Purifoy and Ross all said the film was designed to be an overview of the Young Earth Creationist viewpoint.

Purifoy said the broad scope of the documentary sometimes gave the film a “drinking from a firehose” effect, throwing a lot of information at viewers at a rapid pace. Some viewers watched the film multiple times on Netflix so they could absorb most of the information.

Ross, one of three paleontologists in the film, discussed the fossil record. He touched heavily on fossils related to Noah’s flood, and the natural evil visible in the fossil record.

Ross said that the concept of origins is one of those areas where people struggle to know what to believe. According to him, the film helps people know for themselves and show others a Young Earth Creationist’s view.

“The film’s aim and goal was to show people what a consistent, and hopefully coherent, view of Young Earth Creationism is, not to be an anti-evolution film, but actually one that puts forward an understanding of creation,” Ross said.