TWO SIDES OF A COIN?

 Religion starts wars.

Science feeds people.

Actually I understand the mindset. If someone inside or outside the belief system is not well educated this can seem, sadly, very true. But since this is a blog for happy Catholics, let us take the opposite in order to understand why someone would believe the statements above.

There is no proof that smoking is bad for you. Margarine is much better for you than butter. You need 8 glasses of water, two glasses of milk, and glass each of orange juice, coffee, and wine each day. Leaches are good for what ails you. The world will run out of food by the year 2000. Y2K.

People who eschew faith for science because it is fact based and provable (unlike religion) have to face such little scandals. (I am positive we are blindly in the middle of any number of them at this current moment only to be revealed at a later, more enlightened – or less enlightened – date.) Many excuses may be made – very legitimate excuses. Faulty science may be at fault. People manipulating data in order to promote some agenda may be at fault. Societal prejudice may be at fault. Any number of things may mar the glory of true science.

These are not little matters. They sway national and international policies. They dictate how we treat our bodies and the bodies of those in our care. They determine how we interact with the environment and so forth. When science is wrong it does an incredible amount of damage. This causes many to read the latest breakthroughs in science in the newspaper with a role of the eyes and wait and see mentality. There is a reason that there is a global warming debate. If science was always correct (as it gets to the masses anyway) everybody would have just gone, “O dear! Let’s do something about this!”

The counter is that science is often manipulated or performed by poorly trained or influenced persons claiming to be scientists. This is true. Science at its best is a great gift to man. When done properly it does magnificent things for us. But the persons reading about the latest breakthrough over his breakfast cereal has no way of determining if coffee is actually good for you now.

Now imagine what a science minded person has to face when confronted with Christianity. How do I know what constitutes true faith and what is practiced by poorly educated preachers? How can I put my faith in Christianity when hear one moment that homosexual activity can either cast you into hell or make you a bishop? You worry about that stuff I am going to go try to find ways to feed more people.

It is good to be aware of this conundrum. It is difficult to overcome. We believe that it is not science versus religion – an and/or proposition. They need to be united as two pillars. When they go their separate ways something is wrong either in one of the camps. They should work together to inform us how to be better human beings, how to live in our world, how to understand our creator.