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Do You Have To Deny Science To Be A Christian?

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  • Do You Have To Deny Science To Be A Christian?

    Can you believe in both?

    Link

    -------

    Is it necessary to ignore science to be a Christian? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

    Let’s start with saying what this post is not. This is not an argument that Christianity is true. I am not going to attempt to show you in this post that God exists or that Jesus rose from the dead. What it is going to be is arguing against an argument of ignorant internet atheists. I would hope a thinking atheist would read this and say “I don’t agree with your Christianity, but I can agree with this post.”

    Yesterday, I again encountered the claim that to be a Christian, you have to ignore science. We know today that people don’t fly and that virgins don’t give birth (Incidentally, I do affirm the virgin birth) or that people don’t come back to life after three days. We know this because we live in an age of science.

    When I encounter this, I always ask the same question. When was it that science made these discoveries? When did we discover that sex makes babies or that dead people stay dead? You won’t find an answer to that because no scientist discovered that. There is no need for a scientist to write a paper something along the lines of “A Conclusive Finding That Dead People Stay Dead.”

    The ancients certainly did not have the scientific knowledge that we had today, but that doesn’t mean they were idiots. They knew that it takes sex to make a baby. (Even if we point to in vitro fertilization, we still have sperm going into the egg to fertilize it.) They knew that when Uncle Joe died, he was going to stay dead. They didn’t prop him up in the living room to see what would happen. They buried him. They knew that if you want to travel on the water, you need to build a boat. They knew that if you plant certain seeds, food develops.

    So let’s suppose you have someone who believes Jesus rose from the dead, like any Christian does. Are they actively denying science? No. They are saying that they know that all things considered, dead people stay dead, but that it is possible for a God, if He exists, to raise someone like Jesus from the dead.

    Does that equal a denial of science? Not a bit. For people like myself, science is telling you what will happen in the materialistic universe assuming there is no outside interference. If a ball is falling, if nothing happens, it will continue to fall. If I catch it, I can stop the fall in mid-drop and assuming it can be held in my hand and is not too heavy, it will not continue to fall. A falling bowling ball from a great enough height, for instance, could crush my hand. It could be even a falling baseball dropped from the top of the Empire State Building or thrown off an airplane could have deadly velocity at the ground level.

    It could hypothetically be the case that miracles are impossible, but that is not determined by science. That is a question of metaphysics and philosophy. You can study all the science you want and if that’s all you study, you will never answer the question. Science can give evidence, but it itself cannot prove or disprove the existing of God.

    As a believer in miracles, it is not because I am anti-science. It is because I believe there is evidence for these miracles. In the cases where the miracles happened, if they had not happened, all would have happened the way that science predicts that it would happen.

    I also think that people who argue against certain ideas in science are not wanting to intentionally deny science. Readers of my blog know that I don’t argue yea or nay on evolution, for example. I do know plenty of Christians who are skeptical of evolution. Their arguments they seek to put forward are normally scientific ones. They have some scientific problems with the idea. You could say all you want their theology is driving their science, but that doesn’t change the data.

    Are their arguments right? Not for me to say. That’s for the scientists to say. However, if these are genuinely scientific objections, they are not saying “I know the science shows that evolution is true, but I want to argue against it anyway.” They are saying “If you really studied the science, you would see that evolution is not true.” Again, I’m not saying who is and isn’t right in this, but simply the attitude. I leave it to the scientists to debate that

    So no to the atheist out there who thinks being a Christian is anti-science. All it means is we believe in a God who does do miracles from time to time. If no miracles take place, then we have no problem that what is predicted scientifically will happen. Again, this does not mean that miracles are necessarily actual. It could be that miracles are possible, but they have never happened. The person making the kind of argument I am going against today would have to show that miracles are impossible and not just that they have never happened. You could try to argue that philosophically, but you won’t argue that scientifically.

    Give ancient people some credit. They were not as stupid as we think they were.

    In Christ,
    Nick Peters
    (And I affirm the virgin birth)

  • #2
    No you don't have to deny science to be a Christian.

    And no I don't "believe in" science either.

    I'm always still in trouble again

    "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
    "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
    "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

    Comment


    • #3
      what we call modern science originally developed by Christians who figured that God's creation was rational and therefore we could use rational empirical methods to discover more about it.

      https://www.crossway.org/articles/ho...odern-science/
      https://www.abc.net.au/religion/chri...ience/10100570

      Comment


      • #4
        I don't know if it's just the circles I run or don't run in, but in the last 10 years, I haven't heard nearly as much from Christian quarters about denial of evolution being absolutely necessary.
        "I am not angered that the Moral Majority boys campaign against abortion. I am angry when the same men who say, "Save OUR children" bellow "Build more and bigger bombers." That's right! Blast the children in other nations into eternity, or limbless misery as they lay crippled from "OUR" bombers! This does not jell." - Leonard Ravenhill

        Comment


        • #5
          Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post
          I don't know if it's just the circles I run or don't run in, but in the last 10 years, I haven't heard nearly as much from Christian quarters about denial of evolution being absolutely necessary.
          IIRC, it was a survey by the Barna Group that showed it was a fading issue -- especially among younger people.

          I'm always still in trouble again

          "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
          "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
          "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

          Comment


          • #6
            Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
            IIRC, it was a survey by the Barna Group that showed it was a fading issue -- especially among younger people.
            I'm curious why, but it's certainly good not to get bogged down there when the issue of homosexuality is a five alarm fire at this point in time, and almost certainly the primary reason young people give for rejecting Christianity nowadays.
            "I am not angered that the Moral Majority boys campaign against abortion. I am angry when the same men who say, "Save OUR children" bellow "Build more and bigger bombers." That's right! Blast the children in other nations into eternity, or limbless misery as they lay crippled from "OUR" bombers! This does not jell." - Leonard Ravenhill

            Comment


            • #7
              Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post

              I'm curious why, but it's certainly good not to get bogged down there when the issue of homosexuality is a five alarm fire at this point in time, and almost certainly the primary reason young people give for rejecting Christianity nowadays.
              There was a Barma survey that indicated that the two primary reasons young people were abandoning the church was due to opposition to homosexuality along with science, the latter of which was largely equated with being anti-evolution.

              I'm always still in trouble again

              "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
              "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
              "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

              Comment


              • #8
                Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
                There was a Barma survey that indicated that the two primary reasons young people were abandoning the church was due to opposition to homosexuality along with science, the latter of which was largely equated with being anti-evolution.
                Not that I want to rouse the elephant in the room yet again, but was this survey taken pre-pandemic?
                "I am not angered that the Moral Majority boys campaign against abortion. I am angry when the same men who say, "Save OUR children" bellow "Build more and bigger bombers." That's right! Blast the children in other nations into eternity, or limbless misery as they lay crippled from "OUR" bombers! This does not jell." - Leonard Ravenhill

                Comment


                • #9
                  Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post

                  Not that I want to rouse the elephant in the room yet again, but was this survey taken pre-pandemic?
                  Yes.

                  Since I posted about it on another website and I haven't been back since 2016... I'd say the study was probably from 2014-15.

                  I'm always still in trouble again

                  "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
                  "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
                  "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    My wife is a YEC. She's the type that will cover her ears and start humming to avoid hearing any arguments against it, so I just let her be. If she takes comfort in those beliefs, I don't see any harm in it.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      No, and in fact it is scientists that interpret science not science itself, in addition it is interpreted through one's presuppositions and worldview.

                      Comment

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