I don’t think you’re giving the children enough credit. I think they can learn to think critically on their own when given the option and the information to do so. Regardless of what’s preached to them in Sunday school, they are likely to be exposed to other viewpoints in school, friends, literature, media, etc.

Instead of trying to silence people like your uncle, how about making sure that we do all we can to teach the kids “how” to think, rather than “what” to think or what not to think?

If we pay close attention, there are so many opportunities for each of us to make a small difference. Many of us have a surprisingly large circle of influence, if we just look around. Just as Richard suggested, I think a better strategy would be to come up with creative ways to take advantage of those opportunities to plant seeds in the minds of as many kids as possible to allow them to think for themselves.

Anyway, if you do want to enter a discussion with your family members on evolution, it might be interesting to ask them why the concept of evolution is problematic to their understanding of Christianity. It may be less rewarding to argue (with them) the merits of evolution itself.

You might also try to point out that once those children grow up and find out he lied to them, they will think the rest of Christianity is a lie, too. As Saint Augustine put it:

Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the cycles of the years and the seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he hold to as being certain from reason and experience. Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men. If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods and on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason?

If possible, do it in private, or in mail; turning your grandmother’s birthday party into a debate would be rather rude to her.

As someone commented, Uncle Blowhard is just plain full of beans, and who better than a biologist to (politely) point out that his view has a couple of minor logical problems.

I would advise resisting any and all attempts to link this to any familial suspicions of insufficient religious fervor. If the Vatican accepts evolution, there can’t be a real religious conflict. Religion has nothing to do with it.

For example, I was enrolled in a fundamentalist christian grade school, where we were taught that the canals on the surface of Mars were proof of the noahic flood. This was around 1980. “Cosmos” upended the misinformation of that entire church and the textbook publishers. Because the evidence of the ridiculousness of what they were teaching me was readily available, all of their work fell apart.

However I doubt you’ll get your uncle to understand anything about it, since from your description he sounds like a right self-important stupid git. Avoiding him would probably more prudent.

As a biochemist, I love the idea of diluting (;-)) your uncle’s poisoning of young minds through your undoubtedly superior capacity to educate them. It may be impossible to wedge in evolution into a closed evangelical community, but I bet you can find groups in your own community dedicated to education. Volunteer to help kids out in biology, or to speak to children about evolution. At least you can sleep knowing that for every young child tragically having their education cut short, you will be waking one up to the beauty of the natural world.

Also, the idea of ‘subversive’ gifts for the kids is good; and do try to have a good relatioship with them – the future atheists among them may need you