re: #231 Spenser (with an S)

I am so torn on this issue just due to the fact that I am a committed Christian who also knows that the universe is 14B years old. I hate to see my fellow believers being made fun of but I want to shake some of them who believe the nonsense. I would love to have you sit down with a guy I know. He’s got a Phd in biology from MIT and is a firm believer. He wrote a book on how science and faith can co-exist comfortably. His is not a squishy “I know there’s a god somewhere and I want to live a good life”, but a firm “Apostle’s Creed”-type of faith, too.

The trick is to keep slowly but gently repeating that there is not a contradiction between science and faith if you are rational about them both.

I am an observant Jew. I have studied at Yeshiva and I read the scriptures in the original. I have not yet found any large objection that seems to show a conflict, that can not be answered by a better application of scriptural knowledge or scientific knowledge.

The issue from the other end is that because of the religious right , there is a meme in this country that science and faith are an either/or proposition. Science always wins in matters of science, so someone who is not well versed in theology, will of necessity, if (s)he buys that meme, will decide that faith is stupid.

This is greatly exacerbated by the frothing of the religious right. It used to be that atheists were content to day they do not believe and they did not usually feel the need to “return fire” with the same vitriol that comes out of the preachers. After too many years of crazy, we now have people like Dawkins who are almost on a mission of their own to discredit faith.

Now as people of faith, the answer to dealing with both side of this, is again in the scripture… Lead a good life and study hard. You can actually defeat a logical positivist argument if you know how. Logical positivism is not the only consistent world view. You will not be able to prove and they will not be able to disprove and the final point to be sought is one of mutual respect. If they see that you are intelligent, know your stuff and not frothing - and further do have answers to their philosophical challenges, they may not believe what you do, but hopefully they can accept that you are not crazy.

On the other end though, as people of faith, we can not let the word get perverted by hatefulness and ignorance. If we kept our own house more clean - as in actually cared about things like humility, compassion, good, deeds and honesty at all times, then we would not have such a backlash against those who claim to speak for us, hitting us.