The Climate Is Changing

When I put together a list of the most important topics in religion and science in my recent book, in the changing climate of what's being discussed (if you can excuse a pun), one topic certainly received the #1 vote by a wide variety of people: Global climate change. To some this may seem unusual in the science and religion dialogue. In fact, the younger the respondent, the more critical this topic becomes. The climate is indeed changing, and this topic is trending.

There are numerous ways to approach the topic, and in this brief post, I've decided look at the topic as a follower of Jesus within a multi-religious context. (In fact, I'm addressing the topic of religious views on sustainability at the upcoming Chico State conference in March.) And so I start by saying that, as a Christian, I'm engaged in this topic because of our calling in Christ. Psalm 24 reminds us that the earth is God's, which implies that we need to care for it, just as Genesis 1:26-28 complements this affirmation with God's command to steward the earth. Eugene Peterson paraphrases that latter passage so beautifully,

“God spoke: ‘Let us make human beings in our image, make them reflecting our nature./ So they can be responsible for the fish in the sea, the birds in the air, the cattle./ And, yes, Earth itself, and every animal that moves on the face of Earth.’” 

Genesis 1, The Message

#1 Climate Change
Throughout the year, I spend many hours and days at conferences and meetings in the field of science and religion, and I can affirm that what Philip Clayton has written is largely accurate that there is near

“... universal agreement among scientists that humans are causing the climate of our planet to change; and there are clear teachings within every major religious tradition, from indigenous lifeways to New Age spiritualities, that the earth is to be protected and valued.” Philip Clayton

Indeed human-caused, or anthropogenic, climate change represents a topic that increasingly comes to mind in science and religion discussions, and the consensus among scientists is overwhelmingly that climate change really exists and that we human beings have caused it. 

As a result, the often staid and reserved leader in science--and the largest scientific organization in the world--the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has moved beyond its usual roles into more public advocacy and communication. In 2018 it launched “How We Respond,” a communication initiative to highlight how communities are actively and effectively responding to climate change at local, state and regional levels, and to demonstrate the critical role of science and scientists in informing these activities.”  In addition, AAAS through their Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion (DoSER) put together a fascinating discussion on climate change with climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe and Episcopal Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori.

As I said, I'll keep this post multi-religious with more to come, but I do not that, as Christians, this broader base allows us to connect with non-Christians in order to make a difference. As I've mentioned, the three monotheistic religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam prioritize their call to stewardship. Eastern religions also have their own contributions. Buddhism, for example, emphasizes compassion and the interconnection of all life. Hindus and Jains describe a soul in all things, and the latter’s accent on ahimsa can contribute a deep reverence for all life. 

Is there a way that we might join with others and take up this call? I certainly hope so. More to come in future posts...

Some Thoughts on Genesis 1-2 and 21st Century Science

Excerpted. To read more, click here.

How then can we look at Genesis 1 and 2 as twenty-first century Christians who live in a highly scientifically saturated and technologically advanced world? (Incidentally, you'll find many more thoughtful answers to questions like this on the Scientists in Congregations website.)

Clearly, the primary concern of these texts is not contemporary scientific questions. Their main intention is to describe the creation of an ordered and habitable home for the people God creates. Thus, many contemporary readers find a constrictive literalism inadequate for understanding these texts. For example, seven twenty-four hour days of creation do not make sense in terms of contemporary cosmological theory. We probably never should have expected otherwise: In 1000 BC, no reader or hearer (since very few read at that time) could understand contemporary quantum cosmology or neo-Darwinian theory. 

Accordingly, theologians commonly speak of God’s accommodation: that the revelation of God accommodates itself to the understanding of human minds. John Calvin, writing at the time of major scientific changes in the sixteenth century, phrased it similarly, “Moses wrote in a popular style things which, without instruction, all ordinary persons endued with common sense are liable to understand.”

Do these texts fade behind the brilliance of scientific insight? Hardly. They still radiate great power and wisdom as foundational texts for the Christian church, as sparkling insights into ours and God’s nature. One might even view it as an act of providence that these biblical texts, written long before the emergence of modern science, resonate with certain contemporary scientific theories in the texts.

       
First of all, Genesis 1:3—“Let there be light!”—initiates a sequence of events with the sudden emergence of light, similar to the unparalleled outburst of energy in the Big Bang. Indeed light comes first, and reminds me of  the fundamental constant in Einstein’s special relativity theory, the velocity of light. (Einstein emphasized this absolute standard. Wanting to avoid any hint of relativism, he promoted the term, Invariententheorie, “invariance theory.” His attempt to name his theory failed, and “relativity” stuck.) In addition, light was created before our sun, which came billions of years after the initial singularity of the Big Bang.

        
Second, the order of water, vegetation, non-human animals, and then humankind in Genesis 1:6-31 has a broad agreement with the sequence of life’s emergence in evolutionary theory. In addition, the command “Let the earth put forth vegetation” speaks of an indirect creation by God. Science describes a universe of continuity, where God creates humankind indirectly through the processes of nature over time. Put in philosophical terms, God as the First Cause, uses secondary causes to achieve divine purposes. (By the way, if we get primary and secondary causation right, a great number of "conflicts" between faith and science evaporate.)

        
Third and in a similar vein, evolutionary theory does not necessarily change God’s creating us, but simply the means God uses. The declaration of Genesis 2:7, “then the Lord God formed adam from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life,” depicts with great consonance the creation of man and woman. Once again, extreme literalism will not do: dust does not contain enough carbon nor usually sufficient silicon. The Brown University biologist Ken Miller, who combines a commitment to evolutionary science with his Christian faith, argues against such literalism and for a sensible reading of the texts:

To any biochemist, even an evolutionary biochemist, the notion that human life was formed from the dust of the earth is not only poetic, but scientifically accurate to an astonishing degree. An extreme literalist—of the sort abjured by Augustine—might use Genesis 2:7 to argue that the elemental composition of the human body should match that of ordinary dust. A broader and more sensible reading would tell us simply that the materials of the human body were taken from the earth itself, which of course is true. To understand Genesis, to find the greater truth, I would argue, all one has to do is to apply the more sensible reading throughout.

A sensible or “natural” reading (to use Calvin’s term) is a good rule of thumb. In this case, it leads to striking parallels with contemporary science. 

Nevertheless, one must apply such interpretive parallels with a light touch. We will do well not to bet the farm on any particular scientific theory. As the Oxford philosopher, Janet Martin Soskice has concluded, Darwinian science did not disprove faith. It simply took on the Watchmaker God of the eighteenth century—which incidentally neither Calvin, Augustine, nor Jesus ever presented—and demonstrated its insufficiency as description of God’s character. Soskice writes that

because the theological apologetics of the eighteenth century had been so closely wedded to the science of their time, with its support for the arguments from design, the controversies over evolutionary theory came in the nineteenth century as a powerful blow. Religion’s dearest ally had turned on it. Science, which had been proving the truths of religion only a hundred years before, now proposed naturalistic explanations for the perfections and order of the natural world. The divine clockmaker was redundant.

And so Christians confess faith not in a Great Watchmaker, but in the Lord of grace who created the world out of sheer, superabundant love. The final book of the Bible, Revelation (4:11), expresses this so well:

You are worthy, our Lord and God,    to receive glory and honor and power,
for you created all things,    and by your will they were created    and have their being.

And this is the Creator, it appears, does not think it unworthy that we discover the divine nature, not only through revelation, but through the beauty and order of creation... and thus through science.