I’m fascinated by the whole “God does [does not] exist debate” raging between militant atheists like the Dawkins cabal, and the shrill screamings of Fundamentalist-Creationists. So like a crow drawn to shiny things, I’m drawn to read essays and articles about this debate – and usually fall over laughing. Ocasionally, however, there is a refreshing breeze in the thick miasma of hystrionic shrieking and name-calling. Here’s one I found this morning from HE Baber at Guardian CIF Belief:

Does God exist? I don’t know and neither does anyone else. But Science has not, will not, and cannot disprove the existence of God. Scientific hypotheses can only defeat other scientific hypotheses. Theological claims, however, are not scientific hypotheses and do not purport to explain natural phenomena.

I’ve been thinking quite a bit about this debate lately – largely because of the many articles, essays, exhibits, and documentaries now swirling about celebrating the 200th anniversary of Darwin. How does this science and religion debate fit within our OC/IC context?

One thing that stands out, and proud, for me is a central pillar of our tradition: free enquiry and good scholarship. A surprise to some given our history over the the past 85 years but it is indeed the case that our OC/IC tradition emerged largely due to the defence of free enquiry and scholarship.

I would even go so far as to suggest that it is a religious duty to engage in, or support scholarship within our OC/IC community, and wherever else it might be found. Thus, since evolution is the best factual description of the mechanics of the natural world we’ve yet found – it is our religious duty to accept it, defend it, and indeed celebrate our curiosity, our desire to understand the world we live in.

We are “signatories” to the Clergy Letter Project – an effort started by Michael Zimmerman of Butler University to give voice to believers (not just Christians) who think that the war over evolution and faith is misguided to say the least. I should add that Michael would like to see more OC/IC representatives on the letter. You can find out more about it, and how you can participate at the above link.

This year is the 200th anniversary of Darwin’s birth, and the 150th anniversary of the publication of his Origin of Species, and has been marked by congregations of various denominations as Evolution Weekend for a number of years now.

As part of our participation – and our effort to create resources for OC/IC communities interested in this topic we’ve collected a few useful links that might help your community or mission to explore/discuss “science and religion”.

From NPR

From Religion & Ethics News Weekly

From Speaking of Faith

From Pew Forum

From the Washington Post

Over the past few months I’ve been mulling over the question: “Why believe”. Increasingly I like my partner’s answer to the question: because Christ’s teaching is compelling. That it is. But I am not entirely satisfied with this answer alone. So I’ve been very interested in the increasingly vocal debate – here in the UK at least – over the past year between the theist and atheist camps.

What has caught my attention of late is the battle over science. Regular readers will know that my community here in London participated in this year’s Clergy Letter Project (we’re still working on our video series which seems to be expanding in scope at a frightening pace!). This morning I am reading Julian Baggini’s A Short Introduction to Atheism (OUP, ISBN 019 280 424 3) and it struck me that one element of the debate is the contention that at least one of the primary purposes of religion is to explain the world around us.

I don’t know about you, but I have a problem with this. In my experience of my faith I have never found myself turning to the Bible, or our tradition to explain the natural world. And here we enter the realm of the relationship between science and religion. Science is the pursuit of such explanations – the results are observable facts about our world and environment. I accept these findings as fact. What impact does this have on my faith?

In the run up to the weekend of the Clergy Letter Project I listened to a pod-cast of the National Academy of Science and in it, one of the speakers made a wonderful statement, something along the lines of: I do not believe in science, rather I accept it as fact. I found this a wonderful statement and have been mulling over it ever since.

Regular visitors will know that my little fellowship here in London is participating in this year’s Clergy Letter Project. Now in its third year, the project aims to explore the interrelationship between science and religion – as well as countering the growing fundamentalist mis-representation of our faith.

What we are aiming to do is to create a series of small vids talking about some of the issues involved. We’ve got a theologian (yours truly) and a geneticist (a fellow OC/IC believer) participating. I’m hoping that in the run up to Feb 8-10 we might have some interesting exchanges here on the blog that will feed the creative process and help shape the videos.

What are your thoughts on the realationship between science and religion? How have recent debates (fuelled by figures such as Dawkins) informed or shaped your thinking? What do you see as the contribution we OC/IC folk can make to this conversation?