D.J. Grothe has posted a link on Facebook to an article titled Templeton prize is bad news for religion, not science. Money quote:

When I attended a journalism fellowship funded by the Templeton Foundation in 2005, I learned from Templeton-endorsed scientists and theologians that the way to establish a peaceful co-existence of science and religion was to make no religious claims at all.

They said that creationism is out, as is intelligent design. There can be no afterlife. Nor does anyone have an eternal soul. There was no virgin birth – that was most probably a story made up after Mary was raped by a Roman soldier. There was no physical resurrection of Jesus. None of the miracles actually happened. And prayers are not answered.

It’s surprising that Templeton would support people like that, given that it’s current head is someone generally identified as evangelical and its founder was, at least, not known for his left-wing theology. My impression is that the two ideas Jack Templeton would most like to promote with the foundation are, in order of priority, (1) that Dawkins is wrong to claim scientific support for atheism and (2) there are science-based arguments for theism less embarrassing than Intelligent Design (it’s pretty clear that Jack Templeton, unlike some evangelicals, realizes ID is a joke). In fact, I would expect that Templeton would want to support people who deny that science forces you to the conclusions allegedly accepted by Templeton-supported theologians above.

It would be interesting to know more about how those theologians got Templeton support, and whether Jack will be making any moves to prevent them from getting support in the future.