The information in the article is very interesting, totally changes how you think about viruses, but the writer's tone occasionally annoyed me. It's too sensationalist and is cramming in topical issues that don't really belong there. What on earth has this really got to do with creationism?

This discovery doesn't make any fundamental philosophical difference to how we think about life beginning.

We already thought life began with a mixture of random non-living organic chemicals, it's no big leap to suddenly say it began with a mixture of random viruses instead. As far as the average person is concerned, it's still pretty much the same concept of microscopic globules appearing followed by evolution into larger creatures.

As for theological implications, I don't think there's anything new here. If someone believes there's a supreme being, then they could just as easily claim that viruses were the being's tool for creating life as much any other method. So-called Literalists won't accept viruses as a creation mechanism, but then they never accepted evolution in the first place, so this will make no difference to their thinking either.

This discovery IS very interesting in terms of how we think about viruses, but it's not so interesting in terms of how we think about life. It's still not answering the question we started out with:

If viruses did kickstart the process that created all other organisms, how were the viruses created? In other words, how did this whole process of life begin?

(And the next most interesting question: what are the chances we could find this happening on other planets?)