Believing with science

Last month we made a brief detour to reflect on the meaning of Christmas. Now we continue to trace some landmarks in the story of Christianity.

As I explained in an earlier column, the idea is to understand something of the history of the Church in order to build a better Church for tomorrow. In this column, our focus is on the impact of the scientific revolution which began about the same time as the Reformation.

If the Protestant revolution led to a loss of power for the Catholic Church, the scientific revolution presented a threat to the authority of all authentic Christian denominations.

It all began with the scientific discoveries of the Polish scholar, Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543). Prior to the discoveries of Copernicus, the Church had accepted the scientific worldview of the Greek philosopher Aristotle, which held that the earth was stationary and was the centre of the cosmos. This worldview could easily be reconciled with the Biblical view of humanity as a favoured species. Copernicus, a 16th century Catholic, found that the cosmic centre was not the earth, but the sun.

Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) was a lay Italian Catholic who, through his own observations and discoveries, confirmed that Copernicus had been right.

In 1615, Galileo announced his ideas on the relationship between science and theology, arguing that the two should be kept separate. He is quoted as having said that the purpose of the Scriptures was to teach us “how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go”. In other words, it was wrong to use Scripture to defend or negate the findings of science.

After something of a struggle with Church authorities, Galileo was eventually prohibited by the Catholic Church from promoting Copernicus’ ideas and was condemned to life imprisonment. This condemnation was revoked by Pope John Paul II in our time.

The British scientist, Isaac Newton (1642-1727) is regarded as one of the greatest scientists of all time. His ideas on motion and gravitation are thought to have formed the basis of modern science.

Newton was a Christian who is quoted to have said that from the outset he had hoped to provide a scientific proof for God’s existence. He held the view that science was the only means of arriving at a proper understanding of the sacred. I understand this to mean that science was a greater authority on God than the Scriptures.

While the findings of Galileo and other scientists were problematic for Church authorities, what was even more disturbing for all Christian denominations was the theory of evolution advanced by Charles Darwin in the 19th century.

In his books, The Origins of Species and The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex, Darwin argued that human beings descended from apes, and also propagated the theory of the survival of the fittest. These findings seemed to be a direct attack on the authority of the Bible. They were seen to deprive human beings of their special place in creation, to suggest that there was no special order in creation and to indicate that God was not a caring God if he could leave created beings to fight it out among themselves in the struggle for survival.

What lessons can we learn from this brief account? First, at this stage of human development, it is necessary to view theology and science as two different disciplines with different competences regarding salvation on the one hand, and the cosmos and the scientific history of humanity on the other. In other words, it is not proper for the Church to use its God-given authority on the Scriptures to pass judgement on scientific discoveries without using scientific methods to rebut these discoveries.

Similarly, it is presumptuous to suggest that one can use science to prove or disprove the existence of God. The problem of this position is that it can lead to a trap where atheist scientists can argue that they can prove beyond any doubt that God does not exist, thus reducing the existence of God to a laboratory test.

What I would suggest is that scientists and theologians should continue to work together as each discipline can add valuable insights to the other. Perhaps there will come a time when scientists will appreciate the insights of theology and vice versa.