Tag Archives: god

What Should We Do?

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Submitted for publication

I start with the note that the following are my thoughts and my conclusions.  I will also note that I made no use of any AI technology in the creation of this manuscript.

I offered some thoughts on the use of AI technology in “The Questions We Ask AI – https://godandnature.asa3.org/mitchell-questions-for-ai.html.   

I am writing this from the perspective of a chemist and chemical educator.  Those who are in other sciences may have episodes in their lives which echo what I present in this manuscript.

I was also a lay speaker/minister in the United Methodist Church and while that was not part of my teaching, it was part of my thinking.

Why do we “do” science? 

Is it because we can create new things?

Is it because we see a problem and we want to know the answer. 

Or are there other reasons for doing science?

No matter why we “do” science, we must also understand that while science may provide us with an answer, it cannot always answer all the questions we may pose.  We must also understand that the answers we obtain are not always going to be the answers we sought.

And we must also consider that results of our work may lead to consequences that we may not have anticipated when we began our research.

Early in my own studies, I was given the idea that science was neutral.  You “did” science to answer a question or solve a problem.  But science, nor any other subject, can never be neutral, for we use the information we have gained for our own purposes, whatever it may be and whether for good or evil.

What would you do if you discovered something that could make you rich beyond your wildest dreams?  What if it didn’t make you as rich as you might have wanted but it made society better?

In the fourth Star Trek movie, “Voyage Home”, Scotty gives Dr. Nichols the necessary information for making “transparent aluminum” in exchange for some plexiglass panels so the Enterprise crew can make a holding tank for the whales they will transport back to their time to repopulate the species and save the Earth.

Dr. McCoy had promised Dr. Nichols would become rich beyond his wildest dreams if he accepted the information.  He also asked Scotty if, in doing this, they were not changing history’s timeline.  Scott asked, “How do we know that he didn’t develop the process”, thus preserving the timeline.

We are beginning to see such questions arise from the development of AI (artificial intelligence).  While the possibilities for good seem endless, there are too many examples to suggest this approach still has a lot of work before we can rely on it – link to my AI paper. 

When I was still teaching in the classroom, I would spend the first couple of days discussing “The Processes of Science” (The Processes of Science | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (wordpress.com)).  I did this because most of my students did not understand how science worked and knowing how science worked was essential for success in my courses and in their later coursework and after they got out of school.

One year, during this discussion, one student commented that science had eliminated God from the equation (not his exact words but close to the point).  As many before him, this student pointed out that humankind had long created gods (lower case) to explain natural phenomena and as science developed and began to offer physical explanations for natural phenomena, the need for a god disappeared.  There was only a need for God to explain the material that science could not explain.  The student made the argument that science would ultimately find an explanation for everything and thus God would be eliminated.

I responded by saying that science could not explain the presence of good and evil in the world.  Were good and evil measurable quantities?  Or were they somehow encoded in our DNA?

If good and evil were part of a person’s DNA, what was society going to do?  That is a question that has haunted society since the idea of good and evil were first defined.  And history has shown that bad things happen when society has tried to make evil to the property of being a human being.  As I pointed out to the student, that was a path that I was not willing to go down.

If good and evil are not measurable quantities or part of our DNA, what then are they?  More to the point, what are we to do?

This is not about the concept of free will.  I believe that the choices we make are of our own volition, and based on what we have been taught, knowingly or otherwise.  From my own life experience, I know that, knowingly or otherwise, good and evil can be taught (see https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2015/06/21/its-not-about-a-piece-of-cloth/).

What then should we do with the discoveries we make today or will make tomorrow? 

When Alfred Nobel saw the consequences of his inventing dynamite, he created the Nobel Prizes. 

Do we limit what we teach to limit evil? 

Or do we focus on the good and hide the evil?  And who decides what is good and what is evil? 

Do we do something for the good that it provides now and wait to see what happens later?

Do we limit our work today because others may use the results for their own malevolent purposes tomorrow? 

Do we limit our work today knowing that it will make reaching tomorrow harder to reach?

Should we create courses that study the mistakes of our past (Agent Orange and Times Beach, MO; Love Canal, thalidomide) so we do not repeat those mistakes in the future?

Do we see the present and seek options for the future?  (see https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2023/03/23/alternative-energy-resources-reading-assignment/ for some thoughts about alternative energy resources).

And while the combination of good and evil may be the result of the “Law of Unintended Consequences”, we must still answer the question, “What should we do?”

We created a class of chemicals now known as “forever chemicals” that had a unique set of properties.  Now we know that those same properties are leading to disturbing environmental questions.  Should there have been more study concerning those environmental questions been completed before releasing the compounds for public use?

Whatever we do, we must first ask what we, individually or collectively, should do?

It should be noted that I have never watched an episode of “Breaking Bad.”  This is because episodes in my life echo much of the plot.

When I began studying chemistry, one major chemical manufacturer’s advertising slogan was “Better living through chemistry.”  Because of many factors, this slogan was changed.

Early in my chemistry career, someone approached me at a party and asked me if I could make them some LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide).  I replied that I could, but it would cost that person $250,000 with ½ up front and ½ upon delivery.  This person was shocked that I would put such a price tag on a reasonably easy synthesis.  To which I replied, if I made this compound, it would probably mean the end of my career, and I wanted to make sure that I was covered. 

What I didn’t tell him was that I really didn’t have the skills, the equipment, or a place to do the work.  This person went looking for someone else to make his life better through chemistry.

A few years later, I was in graduate school.  One morning, there was a note in every graduate student’s mailbox telling them that effective that morning, any materials or chemicals that they might need for their research required a signed note from their research advisor.  It turned out that one of the graduate students had been making amphetamines in his research laboratory.  Since it looked like a typical project, no one questioned what he was doing.

This graduate student was so proud of his work that he bragged about it at a campus watering hole.  The weekend before the memo, the DEA and other law enforcement agencies raided the laboratory, seized his materials and equipment, and arrested him.  His life got worse through chemistry.

In 1986, NOVA broadcast an episode entitled “The Case of the Frozen Addict” (https://archive.org/details/TheCaseoftheFrozenAddict).  It described the health concerns of several addicts who had become “frozen” after taking what they thought was heroin.  It turned out that it was another compound, synthesized by a local chemist. 

This chemist had taken advantage of a loophole in the drug laws by synthesizing a molecule with the properties of heroin but with a different structure.  Unfortunately, the material that was sold on the street was contaminated and the containments caused neurological problems, resulting in the patients being in “frozen” or catatonic state.

The patients were “cured” by treating them as if they were stricken with Parkinson’s disease and several research areas developed from this discovery.  The chemist was arrested on a tax charge (failure to declare income) rather than any drug-related charge (the drug he synthesized was legal under the laws of the time).  While he denied making the drug, it was evident that he was suffering from the same effects from the containment in the product he made.

While an examination of the by-products provided an insight into the onset of Parkinson’s disease and offered a possible pathway for a cure, it also illustrated the problems involved with the synthesis of drugs.

In 1938, Lise Meitner and Otto Hahn published a paper that described nuclear fission and the subsequent release of energy.  At that time, most physicists felt that this would allow nations to develop a weapon of immense destructive power.  Would they have felt this way if the winds of war were not blowing and getting stronger every day? 

Many of those who worked on the development of the first atomic bombs did so because they saw it as a problem to be solved and were appalled at the degree of devastation it wrought and argued against the further development of such weapons.

Others wanted to develop the hydrogen bomb with its increased destructive power, arguing that knowing that the devastation that would come from its use would prevent its use.  We have come to know this as Mutually Assured Destruction, or MAD. 

Others sought to use the promise of unlimited energy in a more controlled manner and develop nuclear power as an energy source, saying that it was cheap and clean.

We have learned that even the peaceful use of nuclear power produces waste that would haunt society for untold generations.

Was the development of atomic weapons and atomic power truly worth the outcome? 

In 1909, Fritz Haber developed a method for converting atmospheric nitrogen into ammonia under high pressure and high temperature with a suitable catalyst.  Carl Bosch took the method Haber had developed and scaled it up to produce ammonia on an industrial basis.  Haber would be awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1918; Bosch would be awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1931.

The Haber-Bosch process (named after its inventors) requires high temperatures and high pressures. The cost of production is directly related to the price of fuel; as the cost of fuel rises, so does the cost of fertilizer.

And as we have become accustomed to using ammonia-based fertilizers, we have stripped our farmlands of natural sources of fertilizer. One reason for rotating crops is to allow land to recover from repeated usage.

That is why farmers plan soybeans.  Soybeans are one of the major agricultural crops of this country, not so much for what can be done with them (which is a lot) but for what they do when it is in the field. The soybean plant is one of the few plants that contain a bacterium that take nitrogen from the air and “turns” it into fertilizer.  However, we do not have a complete understanding of how this is done.

Are there other alternatives?  Do these alternatives come with hidden costs?

In 1914, Haber worked on the development of chemical weapons such as chlorine, phosgene, and mustard gas, believing that the development of such weapons could limit or reduce warfare.  And the legacy of the development of chemical weapons during World War I remains with us today.

Regarding war and peace, Haber once said,

“During peace time a scientist belongs to the World, but during war time he belongs to his country.”  This was an example of the ethical dilemmas facing chemists at that time. (Novak, Igor (2011). Science: a many-splendored thing. Singapore: World Scientific. pp.247–316. ISBN 9814304743. Retrieved 16 September 2014 – from Wikipedia)

Do the needs of the country outweigh the needs of society?

Does loyalty to one’s country outweigh loyalty to one’s conscience?

I began this manuscript with the note that I was writing from the standpoint of chemistry and chemical education and my own faith.  These are areas that deal with the future.  The challenge I present to you today is to see how you will prepare your students for the future to maximize the good and minimize the evil.

What Is Your Favorite Bible Verse?

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Submitted for publication

I start with the note that the following are my thoughts and my conclusions.  I will also note that I made no use of any AI technology in the creation of this manuscript. (I offered some thoughts on the use of AI technology in “The Questions We Ask AI – The Questions AI Answers”)

While I am presently working on some ideas related to science and faith topics and a need to address the future, I thought I would present something a little less serious but still of importance.

What is your favorite Bible verse?  Was it a verse you learned many years ago in Sunday School or Vacation Bible School?  Was it one that inspired you?  Perhaps it was one that comforted you?  Was it one that offered guidance when you were faced with a problem?

Now, I will be the first to admit that I am not a big fan of memorization.  I suppose this is because of the amount of chemical related information I must know.  I have memorized some of that information, but I also know how to find the information I need as well.

As you will see in the following paragraphs, many of my favorite verses come from encounters in life.

Many years ago, I was watching a football game involving the University of Tennessee Volunteers.  The Vols had lost six straight games, and the alumni and fans were not too happy.  During the game, one individual held up a placard that said, “Luke 23: 34”.  I have no idea how many people turned to their Bible that day but when they did, they read, “Forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

I began singing in the church choir when I was a sophomore in college and this would lead me to singing in an off campus “coffee house”.  It was there I learned “Turn, Turn, Turn”. 

It was when I was teaching in Missouri and helping build a computer network, that I discovered the relationship between the song and Ecclesiastes 3: 1- 10.  It would be much later that I learned that Pete Seeger wrote the music and adapted the verses of this unique passage from the Bible.

When I first heard the group Jefferson Airplane sing “Good Shepherd”, I heard the words “O Good Shepherd, feed my sheep.” I marveled at these words and how they seemed to echo words from the Gospel of John (John 21: 1 – 19). 

In looking at the history of the piece, I discovered that the rock and roll piece that I heard evolved from a mid-20th century blues-based folk song.  And that folk song had evolved from a 19th century Gospel hymn with roots in an early 1800s hymn written by John Adam Grande, a Methodist preacher from Tennessee (Some of this was first written in “For What It’s Worth”)

The lyrics for the rock and roll songs “Along the Watchtower”, written by Bob Dylan and “Crossroads” by Eric Clapton, Ginger Baker, and Jack Bruce (aka Cream) also have roots in Biblical phrases.

In one of Tom Clancy’s novels is a note that the motto for the Central Intelligence Agency comes from John 8: 32 – “Seek the truth and the truth shall set you free.” It is perhaps a fitting verse to know when one is involved in education.

We must be careful though when we speak of our favorite verses.  Many will quote “that money is the root of all evil.”  But the actual verse is “the love of money is the root of all evil (1 Timothy 2: 10)”.  Removing the first three words changes the meaning of that verse rather dramatically.

As I noted in “What Is in Your Heart?”, some will say that “God helps those who help themselves” is one of their favorites, not knowing that it is not found in the Bible but rather Ben Franklin’s “Poor Richard’s Almanac”.

Others will quote verses or parts of verses that justify hatred, exclusion or justification for their actions and behavior towards others.  But such verses reflect more the mindset of the speaker rather than the actual words of the Bible.

While many of the verses that I have come to consider my favorite ones have come from music and literature, there have been times when others have come to me because of time and place.

A few years ago, I traveled to the Detroit area for a job interview.  As I was driving across the plains of central Kentucky back to my home in Whitesburg, KY, I saw the Appalachian Mountains rising before me.  I was reminded of the worlds of Psalm 121: 1 – 2.

I look up to the mountains; does my strength come from the mountains?

No, my strength comes from God, who made heaven, and earth, and mountains.

Those words, with the mountains rising before me, led me to turn down the job offer in Detroit and continue with the job I had in Whitesburg.  Shortly after that I received the invitation to serve the small United Methodist Church in Neon, KY, and begin my service as a lay minister.

There are verses which bring us joy; there are verses which bring us comfort; there are verses of celebration, and there are verses that offer hope and guidance.

What are the verses that echo in your mind and heart?  What are the verses that give you joy, comfort, and wisdom?  I would invite you to spend a few moments and think about those verses, then put them down on paper and send them to the church to share in a future newsletter.

Will We Have a Future?

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This will appear in the June issue of the Fishkill UMC newsletter.

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What is your vision for the future?  Do you fear the future or look forward to what it may bring?

My great-great-grandfather John August Schuessler and his twin brother, Nicholas, came to America from Germany in 1840.  I do not have any information about why they came to America or why they moved from New Orleans, their point of entry, up the Mississippi River to St. Louis.  One can assume that they sought to escape the turmoil and war that dominated Europe at that time and seek freedom and a better life in America.

It is a story that most Americans understand.  Many, if not most, Americans have roots in Europe, Africa, Asia, Australia, or South America.  They all came to America because they wanted to escape the troubles of their homeland and seek the freedom and opportunities that America has always offered.

Some 13,000 years before John and Nicholas came to America, another of my ancestors (we have members of the Creek Nation in our heritage) stood with his family and friends on the west end of the land bridge connecting Asia to North America.  All they saw was a wall of ice with an opening that suggested a pathway beyond the ice.  They knew nothing about what lay beyond that imposing wall of ice and it was probably simple curiosity that drove them to see what might be at the end of the corridor.

And while we know that many individuals made the passage across the land bridge before the ice melted and the land bridge disappeared under the waters of the Bering Strait, just as many or perhaps even more turned away, preferring the life they were living over a life in an unknown country.

Today we stand on the edge of an unknown country called the future.  It is a land clouded in the mists of uncertainty and the unknown.  We cannot see what might lie on the other side.

There are some today who feel that the future will bring Armageddon and the destruction of the world.  They do not fear the future because they have “been saved” and will be lifted to Heaven before the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (conquest, war, famine, and death) reek havoc upon those who are left behind.

But conquest, war, famine, and death are part of the human condition, and we have the capability to prevent them.  (We may not be able to prevent death, but we can work to improve the health of people, and we can seek research to find the cures for many diseases.)

To say otherwise is to say that you have no desire for the future and are, perhaps, only interested in your self-preservation.

There are those today who fear the future because the future brings change.  They have no vision for the future, and as the writer of Proverbs wrote, “those without vision will perish.”  The Message offers “if the people cannot see what God is doing, they stumble over themselves.” (1)

Heraclitus wrote, “No man ever steps into the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he is not the same man.”  Those who fear the change the future brings feel they can stop the flow of the river.  But when you build a dam to stop the flow of the river, you must spend all your time and resources keeping the dam intact so that it will not break and flood the present, destroying all one tried to save. 

Our journey into the future requires that we have a set of skills that allow us to adapt to the changes that come with the future and faith that will carry us through.  My great-great-grandfather came to America with a set of skills that would allow him to create a new life in America and a strong faith in God (as evident by the number of Lutheran ministers among his descendants).

In 1962, Robert Kennedy said,

The future is not a gift: it is an achievement. Every generation helps make its own future. This is the essential challenge of the present. (2)

Albert Einstein once remarked,

“The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking.  It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.” (3)

We cannot create a vision for the future when people try to take away the tools that will allow us to feed the people, find cures for the diseases that threaten the health of the people of the world(all the people and not just a select few), and remove the causes that allow people to seek conquest and war as the solution to the problems of society.

We cannot create a vision for the future when we, our children, and future generations, do not have the ability to develop the skills that will allow us to solve the problems that will come tomorrow (we can solve today’s problems but even those skills are stripped away).

We cannot create a vision for the future when secular and sectarian fundamentalists demand a society based on a single thought and obedience to those who have that one “true thought”.  The vision for the future will come when there are many thoughts working together.

During his visit to South Africa in 1966, Senator Kennedy said,

The future does not belong to those who are content with today, apathetic toward common problems and their fellow man alike, timid and fearful in the face of new ideas and bold projects. Rather it will belong to those who can blend vision, reason and courage in a personal commitment [- – -]

Our future may lie beyond our vision, but it is not completely beyond our control. It is [ . . .] neither fate nor nature nor the irresistible tides of history, but the work of our own hands, matched to reason and principle, that will determine our destiny. There is pride in that, even arrogance, but there is also experience and truth. In any event, it is the only way we can live. (4)

Today we stand on the edge of an unknown country called the future. 

To borrow a thought from Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities, the future will either be the best of times or the worst of times.

The future will either be an age of wisdom or an age of foolishness.

The future will either be the epoch of belief or the epoch of incredulity.

It can be the season of light, or it will be a season of darkness.

It will either be the spring of hope or the winter of despair.

Everything lies before us but only if we step into the mists of uncertainty and the unknown.  To take those steps, we must develop the skills and abilities that will provide us with the abilities to solve the problems we encounter.

To take those steps, we must strengthen our faith so that we have the strength to move forward.

To take these steps, we must be a community of all people and not just a select few.

Notes

What Will You Do?

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This will appear in the upcoming issue of the Fishkill UMC newsletter.

In one of my first messages as a lay speaker, I stated that I saw Jesus as a revolutionary and a radical.  Paul Schuessler, my cousin and patriarch of the Schuessler family (my grandmother’s family) was visiting my church that Sunday.  Paul was also one of the many Lutheran ministers in the lineage of the Schuessler family.  Afterwards, Paul chided me for being so bold in my pronouncements about our Savior.  Yet, a year later, he would state that Jesus was a revolutionary and a radical.  When I asked him about this change, he just commented that such a change is possible with Christ.

As I have written before, I grew up in the South during the 50’s and 60’s so the schools that I went to were segregated.  Even in high school in Memphis, TN, from 1966 – 1968, I, along with my classmates, experienced the effects of segregation.  I doubt that my classmates truly understood that because it was the system they grew up in.  However, because of the moves my family had made, it was a bit easier for me to see and feel those effects.

And those effects, while not as obvious, were still present when I went to college.  In 1969, the Black Students Association of NE Missouri State College (now Truman State University) organized a sit-in of the administration building in protest to the lack of off-campus housing for black students.  Because I knew those who were involved in the protest, I was inside the administration building in support of their efforts.  It should be noted that I was the only white student inside the building.  The campus ministers, including the Wesley Foundation minister, were busy helping negotiate a safe conclusion to the standoff between the students inside the administration and the administration officials and police outside.  Most white students were on the outside but not in support of their fellow students. (note 1). 

I went into the administration building that evening because the people inside were my friends, and one needs to stand by their friends at times of need. 

Later that same spring, I would come to understand that my acceptance of Christ as my Savior allowed me to receive God’s grace. And this meant that my life could never be the same again. As Methodists, we understand that our lives can never quite reach the level of perfection of Christ; but that doesn’t mean that we stop trying.

I work for justice, freedom, and good not because it will get me into heaven but because it is what is expected of me because I am a citizen of the New Kingdom (Note 2).

What did you do when you sat in the synagogue and heard Jesus tell the people of Nazareth that he come to preach the Good News to the poor, to pardon the prisoners, give sight to the blind and set the burdened and battered free?

What did you do when Jesus fed the multitudes, not once but twice?

What did you do when the people sought out Jesus to heal them, their family, and their friends?  Did you help the four friends who found a way to lower their friend through the roof so that Jesus could help their friend walk again?

What did you do when the people gathered outside Jerusalem and pooled their resources so that all could share?

What did you do when Jesus turned no one away?  What did you do when Paul suggested that the message Christ gave was for all and not just a few?

What did you do when the early Methodists created the first credit union so that people could pay their bills instead of being thrown into debtors’ prison?

What did you do when the early Methodists created the first health care clinics to provide health care to the many people who did not have access to health care?

What did you do when the early Methodists created the first schools so that children could learn to read and write?

What did you do when the early Methodists opposed the sale and trafficking of human beings?

Because the early Methodists sought to change society and help those that society considered unworthy, they were considered threats to the organized/established church.  Our spiritual ancestors were considered outsiders and troublemakers because they sought to bring the message of the Gospel to the people!

Why was there no bloody revolution in England when there was one in France at the same time?  Some historians believe that because of the efforts of the Wesleyan Revival, England did not experience a bloody revolution like the French revolution of the same period (note 3).

Some years ago, I used the phrase “vision with action is merely a dream. Action without vision just passes the time. Vision with action can change the world” in a message.  (from “What’s The Next Step?”)

Now, as it happened, eight months later I was at that same church and I used a phrase that Willie Nelson said, “one person cannot change the world but one person with a message could.” As I recall, he pointed out that Jesus and the message he carried on the back roads of the Galilee was one prime example. (from “What Does Your Church Look Like?”)

Two thousand years ago, we were given a vision for the future.  Some two hundred and fifty years, a mission was begun to make that vision possible.

John Wesley first expressed the vision of the church and its need to minister to the community in this interchange with Joseph Butler, Bishop of Bristol:

Butler – “You have no business here. You are not commissioned to preach in this diocese. Therefore, I advise you to go hence.”

Wesley – “My lord, my business on earth is do what good I can. Wherever therefore I think I can do the most good, there must I stay so long as I think so. At present I think I can do the most good here. Therefore, here I stay.” (Frank Baker, “John Wesley and Bishop Butler: A Fragment of John Wesley’s Manuscript Journal)

And when the church becomes a part of the community, its impact is wide. Bishop Earl Hunt, who served as President of the United Methodist Council of Bishops spoke of the impact of the church in a community.

“. . . whenever the church of the Lord Jesus Christ is turned loose in a community to help human beings and meet their needs and lift up the name of Jesus Christ, that church becomes indispensable in the community.”  (Pages 173 – 174, New Life For Dying Churches! Rose Sims) (note 4)

We, the people of the United Methodist Church in the 21st century, see a world that is not unlike the world of Israel two thousand years ago or England some two hundred and fifty years ago. 

We see poverty and the widening gap between the classes; we are beginning to see health care denied because people cannot afford it; we are seeing the oppression of many simply because they seek freedom, or they are somehow different.

What will you do?  Will you stand aside?

Or will you remember what those who came before you did, and do the same?

Notes

Note 1        see Side By Side | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2010/01/05/side-by-side-2/) for information about this protest

Note 2       from “The Changing of Seasons” | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2010/10/24/the-changing-of-seasons/)

Note 3       Notes on the Methodist Revival and the non-English Revoltuion are in Generations | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2018/06/23/generations/)

Note 4       from The Family Business | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2011/05/27/the-family-business/)

A Path of Science and Faith

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This is my contribution to the 2024 Religion and Science weekend, sponsored by the Clergy Letter Project, and Boy Scout Sunday. It will also appear in the upcoming February issue of the Fishkill United Methodist Church newsletter.

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I had no idea when I began my journey with Christ back in 1965 where it would lead or what I would do.  It wasn’t until I drove across the plains of north Missouri back in the 1990s that I was reminded that I had entered a covenant with God and that I needed to fulfill my part of the covenant.  I then began exploring ways to become a lay speaker/servant and ultimately a lay minister (A Reminder | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (wordpress.com) – https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2018/02/09/a-reminder/).

Similarly, when I choose to become a chemistry major in 1966, I had no idea what I would do with the degree.  To be honest, on the day I graduated from Truman State University, I thought that I would be going to graduate school at the University of Memphis.  But I received a phone call from a local school district shortly after graduation and, a few hours later, sign a provisional contract to teach chemistry and physical science.  This diversion from graduate school to teaching would provide the impetus for my later graduate studies and the completion of my doctoral studies at the University of Iowa.

In one of my classes at Iowa, we discussed the issues of creationism and intelligent design and the impact these issues would have on science education.  This was not the first time I encountered these issues.   

In 1980, the Missouri state legislature was preparing to pass a bill that would have told biology teachers how to teach biology, by including creationism in the discussion of evolution.  I suppose I could have ignored this because I only taught chemistry, but one must be careful when individuals who do not have any knowledge of the processes of science (“The Processes of Science”) try to tell science teachers what to teach and how to teach it.  I was prepared to resign if the law passed and was surprised to find that my department chairman, a devout Southern Baptist layman and biologist, was also going to resign (No one told me: Thoughts on the relationship of science and faith | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (wordpress.com) – https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2021/07/23/no-one-told-me/). 

I don’t believe that I have ever had a conflict with my faith and my science background.  I accepted the idea that God created the earth and the heavens, but I never accepted the idea that it was done in six days.  And the more I studied things, the more I began to see the hand of God present in creation.

And as my studies and work in the areas of faith and science began to converge (“The Confluence Between Religion and Science” | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (wordpress.com) – https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2019/02/06/the-confluence-between-religion-and-science/) I began to discover two things.

First, those who argue for a science only or faith only approach to life do so only for their own power.  Each group seeks to impose its view on the people as the only acceptable view.

The second thing I discovered was that many of the individuals that I studied in chemistry and physics were men of God as well as men of science (A Dialogue of Science and Faith | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (wordpress.com) – https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2009/12/31/a-dialogue-of-science-and-faith/).

It is entirely possible that I could or would have come to Christ without having been a Boy Scout but that is clearly a question for another time and place. Besides finding a path to God through the God and Country award, I also began to develop an appreciation for the world around us. I cannot call myself an environmentalist but clearly, having seen the beauty of the Rocky Mountains when camping with my troop and seeing the physical wonders of this country and then seeing the awesome view of galaxies far away, I know that there is a Creator out there. And if there is not a Creator, then how was this all done?  (“Removing the Veil” | Thoughts From The Heart On The Left (wordpress.com) – https://heartontheleft.wordpress.com/2013/02/11/removing-the-veil/)

I did not need to know that Boyle and Priestley were men of God to understand their work and what it meant to me as a chemist.  But knowing that their work helped them better understand how God works is also true for me.

Can I use the skills that God gave me (allowing me to use other words from Genesis that state that you and I were created in His image) and begin to work out the mysteries of the universe, from the moment of the Big Bang to the present day and perhaps far into the future?

The author and activist Stephen Mattson wrote.

Some people mistakenly believe that trusting in God requires them to distrust science, history, art, philosophy, and other forms of education, information, and truth.

But intelligence is a friend of faith, and ignorance is its enemy.  God loves knowledge and truth, and any faith that objects to either is terribly misguided.

Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., wrote,

Science investigates; religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge that is power; religion gives man wisdom that is control. Science deals mainly with facts; religion deals mainly with values. The two are not rivals. They are complementary.

In a world that is fast dividing, it is the joint study of faith and science that will be one means of bringing people together.  For as science brings us knowledge of the physical world, faith brings us an understanding of the spiritual world and together we can bring the world together.