I’ll admit to being helped by the visual he used for timelines. What can I say—it’s just helpful!
I will also own up to being susceptible to confirmation bias in this case due to my belief in the Holy Scripture of the Catholic Canon of the Bible as the inspired, inerrant Word of God.
I love me some hardened skeptics, wizened old atheists, being dragged kicking and screaming into admitting that this or that thing, set forth in the Holy Bible, is true, or most likely so.
Can I explain away aspects of science that seem to indicate hundreds of thousands or millions of years or more of the earth spinning around the sun, thus presumably casting doubt on timeline set forth in the Book of Genesis? No. Am I moved by those aspects of science off of my belief regarding the inerrancy of scripture? No. Am I prepared to accept being condemned as a science denier between now and the time, if it ever does come before the General Judgment, when those aspects of science are eventually authoritatively explained away? Yes.
I will reply to this tomorrow, choosing tonight to answer your FRmail.
Those aspects of science will never be explained away, for they are demonstrably true. The error lies in a Genesis timeline presuming short "days". It does no such thing. ("Young-earth" creationists fear that an old-earth view necessarily allows evolution, although it does not.) (Moreover, the first two chapters of Genesis are but two of over twenty chapter-length or longer passages on creation in the Bible, all of which must be integrated consistently.)
The Hebrew word "yom" translated into English as "day" actually has four different literal definitions: a twenty-four hour day, all of the daylight hours, a twelve-hour period, and a long indefinite time period.
The first six "days" all have "evening and morning" bracketing them, but note carefully that the seventh day does not. Indeed, Hebrews 4 explains that God's rest during the seventh day continues even until now.
Not only is the seventh day already many thousands of years long, but also Adam's portion of the sixth day took many months or years. One does not grow lonely in a day.
Although the sun and earth are indeed 4.5 billion years old, and the universe 13.8 billion, what matters most is not when it was created but rather Who created it.