Science and Religion

"For the most part, theologians still think and write almost as though Darwin, Einstein and Hubble never existed. Their attention is fixed on questions about the meaning of human existence, human history, social justice, hermeneutics, gender issues or the individual’s spiritual journey... except for a smattering of ecologically interested theologies, the natural world and its evolution remain distant from dominant theological interest." John F. Haught, Deeper than Darwin: The Prospect of Religion in the Age of Evolution

Here I fully support Haught in his assertions. He sums it up: "in the West, the findings of evolutionary biology and cosmology continue to lurk only at the fringes of contemporary theological awareness." I can only reply with a resounding "Yes!" Here he hits the nail directly on the head. It is as if there is a need to preoccupy oneself with distractions, to keep busy within one’s area of interest, without coming to terms with the profound implications of scientific discovery. Is it to some degree not a confession that God is dead, that “yes I understand my traditional understanding of God is rendered impotent or in need of drastic reformulation by these discoveries but, I will continue to work and write as if it were not.” -Theology- here becomes an approach, complete with normative ways of speaking and operating, always within a closed framework lending itself to more or less acceptable statements and interpretation by the theological community. Haught, as much as one might disagree with his concept of religiosity, is at least willing to take the implications of evolutionary science seriously and reformulate his understanding of God and ultimate reality. He endeavours to unify his knowledge, rather than compartmentalize it, proposing a synthesis that brings together truth findings from various disciplines.

Here is a place to start. I don't believe, however, it will be sufficient to the end. I say this because I earnestly believe that once the implications of modern science are understood, traditional conceptions of God will have to be completely reformulated, thereby altering those foundational understandings from which so much of the Church is built upon. For some this is to be avoided at all costs, even to the point of militant action. So be it. For some, force is an expediency, whether it is based on illusion or not.

What are the alternatives? I will briefly mention a few honest thinkers here:

1) Conway Morris: The existence of life as fundamentally mysterious.
He doesn't develop this in his Life’s Solution: Inevitable Humans in a Lonely Universe, but one possibility could be a "religion" centered on the category -Mystery-.

2) Edward O. Wilson: A new religion based on scientific knowledge.
"The true evolutionary epic, retold as poetry, is as intrinsically enabling as any religious epic." For him, the sense that “something is going on” outside of natural causes or explanations is nothing more than a reflection of a brain evolved to “believe in the gods”. Moral and religious sentiments are the product of evolution. Even the underlying structures of religious hierarchies are determined by this evolutionary process. Traditionally male dominated authority structures are mirrored nicely in animal hierarchies such as canine or simian groups. He has said that, “Religions reflect the human organisms that nourish them.” I see here a lot of potential and fidelity to the event of Truth in science.

3) John Haught: Religion that is cognisant of scientific findings, using evolution in particular as a model of not just biological development, but cosmological and universal as well.
This should not be confused with Wilson's proposal. This is not the founding of a completely new religion, but one that is a synthesis of science and theology, two areas of human knowledge which are fundamentally interested in -truth-. (I think a good argument could be made that what Haught proposes is indeed a new religion which is unacceptable to a majority of Christians/Muslims, but I see here a man who cannot ignore the truth of scientific discovery, while maintaining fidelity to his faith).