Science and the Sacred

Science and the Sacred

Let’s Come at this From a Different Angle

posted by Pete Enns


Every Friday, “Science and the Sacred” features an essay
scholar and author of several books and commentaries, including the
views of Scripture. This is the fourth of his multi-part series on an incarnational model of Scripture.


That is all fine and well, but let’s come at this from a different angle.





The book of Revelation is an apocalyptic book, which means it is a figurative, symbolic description of what the “end” will look like. Much of Revelation is concerned with showing God’s ultimate rule over history, and how he is bringing that history to its consummation in Christ.




Although it has occasionally been tried, a “literal” (meaning time-space, historical) reading of Revelation does not work at all. The message behind Revelation is something God will do in history, but the description of those events are figurative. This is especially clear beginning in Chapter 21, where we read of a “New Jerusalem” descending from the sky. Its description is a symbolic amalgamation of Jerusalem, temple, and Garden of Eden imagery. It is not a literal city crashing down on the Earth, but a theologically potent, concrete, ancient description of what God will eventually do in time and space.

The use of such imagery was a powerful communicator of theological truth to ancient peoples–and it should be to us, as well. And here is my point to ponder: the symbolic, non-literal nature of the renewed Garden in Revelation 22 should suggest to us, quite strongly in fact, that the Garden of Genesis 2-4 likewise, although communicating theological truth, is also symbolic and non-literal. Both are “true,” deeply so, but neither are literal, historical, or physical.

Discuss amongst yourselves, but try to keep it nice.


The Drama of Life


Often in discussions of science and religion, creation is viewed in terms of design. Some view the complex design on the natural world as proof of an intelligent creator. Others, however, claim that flaws in nature show that a divine creator does not exist, or else made a number of mistakes.

In his article “Darwin, God, and the drama of life”, theologian John Haught argues that religious thought can more significantly interact with evolution and the natural world if it views them in terms of a narrative rather than in terms of a design. The most important issue in discussions of science and religion, according to Haught, is not whether design points to deity but whether the drama of life is the carrier of theological meaning.
From a design point of view, evolution can appear to be a random process, staggering about without meaning. But in dramatic terms, it is clear that the story of life is in not yet over.

As Haught writes:

A theological reading of evolution, I am suggesting, looks for an alternative to the rigor mortis of perfect design, and this is why Darwin’s ragged portrait of life is not so distressing after all. Theologically understood, biological evolution is part of an immense cosmic journey into the incomprehensible mystery of God. Any possible meaning it has will reside at a level of narrative depth unfathomable by the mathematical nets of physical science, by armchair observation, or by minds fixated on design.

Haught’s full article can be found in the “On Faith” section of The Washington Post.


Are Creationism and Intelligent Design Movements?

creationists.jpgDespite the existence of organizations like Answers in Genesis and The Discovery Institute, should creationism or intelligent design be called unified movements? In their study Doubting Darwin: Creationism and Evolution Scepticism, public theology Theos sought to test this assumption. Their conclusion, based on interviews with 50 prominent anti-evolutionists, found that rather than a unified group with a coherent set of aims and goals, most critics of evolution differ sharply in many aspects.

According to the report:


Respondents also differed in their reasons for disagreeing with evolution, challenging the theory on theological, sociological, and scientific grounds.

However, the study did find that figures like Richard Dawkins have a galvanizing effect on evolution criticism and brought more religious believers under the banner of evolution scepticism. Respondents also felt that creationist and ID arguments were unfairly biased against and not given equal consideration, leading to a sense of being on the defensive and under attack by the scientific community, rather than a sense of contributing to science.

The full report can be found here.

Editor’s Note:

Due to concerns about unhelpful comments on the Science and the Sacred
blog, we have decided to block posts that do not engage the topics in a
meaningful way. We welcome both critical and supportive voices, but
request that all posts offer something relevant to the posted topic,
and not simply be inflammatory accusations or lengthy, unrelated
monologues. Our goal in moderation is to assure discussions stay civil, open, and balanced. Lengthy posts are fine, so long as they are courteous and add to the discussion rather than usurp it.


Layers of a Bubble

bubble.jpgAs I drank my coffee and munched on my toast I felt a little lonely as I adjusted to this new person sitting across from me. She was bitter. The Church, she felt, had lied to her. Having purposely distorted the real world, it had kept her enclosed in the bubble. Upon emergence, she looked back and saw the layers around it, not as a protective shield, but as impenetrable barriers which would forever prevent her re-entry. She would never go back. She had lived in a fairy-tale world. I was no longer her mentor. I was a perpetrator of that which she now regarded as an ephemeral event–a dream in her past.

Darrel Falk begins his paper “Barriers to Accepting the Possibility of Creation by Means of an Evolutionary
Process: III. Concerns of the Typical Agnostic Scientist” (the fourth posted white paper from our November workshop) by describing a breakfast conversation he had with a former student who had abandoned her faith after going to graduate school. As the paragraph above shows, the student felt that the bubble created by some Christians to supposedly “protect” themselves from the world outside had become a barrier to her instead, making it impossible for her to ever return to the faith of her youth.

Lamentably, as Falk notes, the layers of this bubble come not from the Bible itself, but are artificially propped up by our own Christian culture. His paper looks at five of these artificially constructed layers, which unnecessarily serve to block the entry — or reentry — of agnostic scientists into the realm of evangelicalism.

According to Falk, the five layers of this bubble are:

  1. The story of Adam and Eve must be viewed as history
  2. A God who is love would not create through a process that includes suffering and death
  3. Science explains it all–there is no need for God in the history of life
  4. Augustine’s Warning (against using scripture in matters in which a speaker knows relatively little)
  5. As it relates to science and faith, Christians are perceived as people who distort facts and lack integrity

The full paper discusses these layers in further detail, explaining how they come from human rather than scriptural construction. Ultimately, as Falk concludes, it is the task of the church to remove those layers that will continue to have devastating consequences on human life unless steps are taken to remove them now. Until then, many more may find that the bubble which once protected their faith now makes it impossible for them to return to it.

Falk’s essay, along with several other white papers from our November workshop, can be found in our Scholarly Essays section.


Previous Posts

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Shiny Scales, Silvery Skins, and Evolution


A Stellar Advent Calendar


Belief, Guidance, and Evolution


Let's Come at this From a Different Angle


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