On science, faith and miracles - a response to Simple Simon

I received a lovely, thoughtful response to my second post. Many thanks to that first visitor! They identify themselves only as Simple Simon. Here is what they said:

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At 12:33 PM, Simple Simon said...
"I don't want to call into question the entire premise of your forum here, but where do you go in your specific pursuit if your faith leads you to the conclusion that, with the appropriate faith, you can suspend the laws of nature and science -- (to quote Christ) with faith the size of a mustard seed you can ask a mountain to get up and move and it will obey you?

If a law of science that is discovered or proven in 2004 confirms the faith held by people for 2,000 years, and then a prophet or other messenger of God asks God to suspend that scientific law for some purpose (say conversion) and God grants the prayer, then what is the ultimate value of the particular scientific law in your ultimate pursuit?

Have you considered whether it is an unproven scientific fact that all laws of science can be suspended with the appropriate faith?"

/Simple Simon

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And here is my response...

Dear Simple Simon:
I suspect that many who might visit here would call into question the entire premise of this weblog. That's okay.

I do not have a simple (if you'll excuse the expression) answer to your query. But what I'll try to do here is to craft an answer consistent with my theory that science and religion can be reconciled.

I don't purport to be able to translate Christ, but it has often occurred to me that much of what He said two thousand years ago has a scientific foundation that is demonstrable today.

Take, for example, His statement that "the sins of the fathers will be visited upon the sons until the fifth generation." This statement disturbed me profoundly as a child. I could not understand why God would punish children for things their parents or grandparents did.

Later, when I was studying psychology in college, I came across the established research showing that children who are abused are much more likely to become abusers themselves. Just to use one example.

What if Christ was not making a statement about God's punishment, therefore, as much as he was telling us about human nature? It would seem to be an admonition to (amongst other things) raise our children properly, to avoid the emotional damage and psychological disease that could take generations to eradicate. According to my theory, Christ would not have told the people of that era anything about human psychology, or the "hard-wiring" of the neural network in a child's brain, or behavioral patterning - this would have made no sense to them.. What he COULD do, however, was to put it in terms that they could understand - sin. His phraseology is significant, to that end. He says, "the sins of the fathers will be visited upon the sons." It is a statement in passive voice. He speaks of an effect.

Christ does this in other places as well. Recall the story where the crowd brings a crippled man to Christ. (I am going to have to paraphrase here…) He says to the man, “Rise – your sins are forgiven.” The crowd begins to mutter in astonishment, and Christ hears them saying things like, “Who is this man, that he thinks he can forgive sins?” And Christ says to the crowd and to the man, “Which is easier, to say ‘your sins are forgiven’ or ‘take up your bed and walk’? But, so you will understand that I have the power to forgive sins, Rise – take up your bed and walk – your sins are forgiven.” And of course, the man does in fact pick up his mat and leave the crowd on his own two legs.

Thus does Christ show us the connection between the spiritual and the physical. The people gathered there cannot understand how a “sin” – which is unseen – can be forgiven. They can, however, see the “miracle” of a man physically cured of a visible disability. By showing them things they can see, Christ wants to get them to believe in the things they cannot see.

So, let us turn to your quote about having faith the size of a mustard seed, and moving mountains with it. Is Christ speaking literally? Is He speaking metaphorically? Is He using terms or expressions that make sense in the context of the culture in which He appeared, but which we might understand differently?

My short answer to your question would be that if "faith" can "suspend" natural laws (or science, as we know it), then there is some scientifically demonstrable scientific law behind that suspension that we do not yet understand.

Some of Christ’s other comments are instructional in this regard. He says in one place, “All things will be revealed,” and in another, “Be not afraid.” And how many times does He say, “Love one another”?

We must put ourselves in the position that Christ’s contemporaries were in. Would they have thought it was possible for hundreds of thousands of pounds of steel and fuel to fly? What would they have thought if they had seen a commercial airliner? And if a “prophet” in their day were to have said to them, “Believe! If you only have faith the size of a mustard seed, you shall one day be able to fly like birds” would this not have sounded like an absurdity? Would people not have fallen into two groups – those who thought this “prophet” was mad, and those who thought that flying was physically impossible, but with enough “faith,” they could do it anyway?

But both groups would have been wrong. Flying isn’t physically impossible. Two thousand years later we see it every day, and do not much marvel at it, because we understand aerodynamics. How many other commonplace things in our culture would the people of Christ’s time have thought were suspensions of “natural law”? Laser surgery? Space flight? Antibiotics? Robotic machinery? Roller-ball pens?

Never did Christ say that our faith was to be separated from our study. Did he ever tell the scholars in the temples not to study? Or the doctors to stop trying to heal their sick patients?

To come back to the present day, then, is it not plausible that there are phenomena today that we do not understand, only because we still do not have the technology to see, identify, measure them? I would draw your attention to recent studies that have been discussed extensively in the medical community, looking at the effect of prayer on healing. These studies compared the healing and cure rates of patients who were not being prayed for by others, with rates for patients who WERE being prayed for. The study's results were interesting in at least two respects:

First, the patients who were being prayed for healed faster or were cured at a higher rate than those who were not being prayed for. And secondly, this was true even when the patients DID NOT KNOW they were being prayed for, and when those praying for them were at a great distance (physically) from them.

We have just begun to scratch the surface of things like nanotechnology and the study of different types of energies. What will the future bring in these sciences? Isn’t it possible that the things we call “miracles” today – inexplicable things like spiritual healing, or extra-sensory perception are just types of energy, the properties and functions of which we do not understand?

I want to be clear about what I am not saying. I am not saying that if something is explicable, then there is no God, or that Jesus Christ was just a really nice man. To me it is not inconsistent to believe that God would take human form to show us who He is, who we are, what we are capable of, meant for, and that death is not the end.

Would I be skeptical of anyone who claimed to be a messenger of God, and who wanted to show it with “signs?” Yes. Would I pay attention to what he or she said and did? Of course. “By their deeds ye shall know them.” My standard operating line in this regard is that God gave me a brain and He expects me to use it. You must use your brain and your heart. Faith and reason. Fides et ratio.

A thousand years from now, we may be able to heal with a touch, as Christ did. We may be able to move large objects with our mere thought. If we believe. If we are not afraid. If we love one another. And if we don’t destroy each other first. Particularly in the name of our religions – a fate looming before us these days. But that is a blog for another day.

And that’s My Take On Things.

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On a completely different note, I have much to say about recent events. I hope to start blogging about those this weekend.

More later!
/Prairy P.