FIREWALLS BETWEEN SCIENCE AND RELIGION AND BETWEEN RELIGION AND THEOLOGY

Donald A. Windsor

Scientists can believe in God.  However, they cannot incorporate God into their scientific explanations.  A firewall must separate those two domains.  Jesus emphasized this separation in his admonition "Render onto Caesar what is Caesar's and onto God what is God's" (Mark 12:17).

But suppose that, as a thought-experiment, scientists were able to peek around the firewall and look at nature from the aspect of God.  What would they see?  They would observe much clearer patterns, because God would not need probability.  Probability is defined as one option divided by all the applicable options.  Probability is an expression of a lack of knowledge, for if we knew which option would occur, it would have a probability of 1.  Every event that has ever occurred had a probability of 1. 

God probably sees the past, present, and future all at once.  Our present is just the interface between the past and the future.  We are swept along by the unstoppable flow of time.  Does time exist for God?

For that matter, does God exist?  Do we define God?  Did humanity create and perpetuate the concept of God simply because we have no choice?  God is the logical framework that we need to complement our paradigms of time and of existence itself.  We recognize time, so we tend to wonder what no time, or eternity, would be.  We exist, so we wonder about nonexistence.  Anything that we wonder about, that we cannot figure out, we attribute to God.  We are visible; God is invisible.  We are mortal; God is immortal.  We have huge gaps in our knowledge; God is all knowing.  We make mistakes: God is infallible.  And on it goes.  God is everything that we are not.

The firewall separating science and religion is often under attack.  Much, if not most, of humanity does not recognize this firewall, usually because they do not understand science.  Moreover, they do not understand religion.  Most people see God through their religion and probably cannot comprehend how God could be separated from religion, particularly their religion.

Which is why we need another firewall, one separating religion from theology.

Theology is the study of God.  Religion is a prescribed set of beliefs and rituals peculiar to a group of people.  Religion is a tribal identifier, much like a uniform, which separates us from them.  In fact, some religions do have dress codes.  Religion divides people and is a rallying point of wars.  Iraq is a poignant example, where Shi'a and Sunni Muslims perpetually kill each other.  History is full of such conflicts throughout the world.  Even when wars may not be caused by religious differences, these differences are exploited by their holy leaders to inspire the combatants. 

Religion seems to have been invented by kings to convince their subjects to endure extreme hardships, and even death, in support of sovereign (= divine) causes.  Kings proclaimed themselves to be God's rulers on Earth.

Theology is the study of God and should not be contaminated by religion.  Theology should be a branch of philosophy and should enjoy the same interrelationship to science that philosophy does.  No firewall is needed.  The distance between theology and science is maintained because theological experimentation is difficult, perhaps impossible.  The effects of prayer on event outcomes, such as healing or survival, are interesting, because they ask God to change what seems to be the inevitable future.  Nevertheless, they are also puzzling and inconclusive.

I have tried many theological experiments and they all leave me unsatisfied, but not so unsatisfied that I could conclude that they produced negative results.  My problem is my own deeply entrenched bias.  I want the God that I learned about in Catholic schools.  However, I fear that such a God probably does not exist.  "Probably" indicates my lack of knowledge.  Consequently, I seek reassurance that my God is still there. 

My religion is Catholic, but some of the rules of the Catholic Church seem to be nothing more than tribalistic stances.  Opposing birth control, abortion, and same-sex marriages has no basis in Christianity.  Jesus never mentioned these subjects.  Celibate male priests is another position that the Church simply cannot rationally defend, yet it persists in enforcing.

All of which leaves me as a lonely infidel clutching an elusive figment of a hoped-for God.

Erecting firewalls between science and religion and between religion and theology helps me cope with life.  Evidently, I am not fond of religion.  But I am a scientist and remain fascinated by theology.

Amen
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THE ANNUAL HANGING OF THE PITCHFORKS

Donald A. Windsor

When an irate mob storms the castle, they are equipped with pitchforks and torches.  Or so some legends seem to portray it.  The pitchforks in my drawing are not noticeable, nor is there any hint that an annual event is occurring.  Why would an angry horde want to hang their pitchforks anyway?  Let alone on an annual basis?

The metaphor in this drawing is that assigning a periodicity (annual) to an event that virtually nobody has ever witnessed (hanging of pitchforks) is a brazen act of audacious incongruity.  The cognitive dissonance between what the title says and what the drawing depicts segues into the metaphor in an abrupt, jocular moment of temporary befuddlement.