We Unitarian Universalists claim Charles Darwin as our own, but it is only by association. His mother, Sarah Wedgwood, of the pottery family, and his first cousin Emma Wedgwood, who became his wife, were Unitarians. In fact, Charles questioned the beliefs about God from his boyhood until his death in 1882.
Charles' father was a physician: Robert Darwin was a benevolent man yet somewhat remote. However, he made it a daily practice to expound to his ten children on the importance of good behavior. In 1809 Charles was born into aristocracy with the wealth of the Wedgwood's and the Darwin's. When his mother died in 1817, after suffering a year of a wasting illness, Charles was only eight years old. Dr. Darwin did not allow his children to show emotion at their mother's bedside. They were oppressed from expressing their grief. Charles channeled his grief into insect collecting at their rural estate. He was very sensitive to every living creature.
Dr. Darwin tried unsuccessfully to guide his son to an acceptable aristocrat's career. Charles had a short stint in medical school, then an aimless, carousing time at Cambridge University studying Anglican divinities. Nothing of the traditional theology made any sense to him, until he found himself on the frigate HMS Beagle.
The story of how Darwin came to be a naturalist on the Beagle is a fascinating one, and I encourage you to read about it from the many sources.
Aboard the Beagle during those five years, Darwin collected and made copious notes on observations such as four finches with slightly different beaks, which suggested that the birds inbred on their own islands. He began to question Christianity's literal belief in the creation of living beings as they exist in their present form. On the island of San Salvador he noticed the strata of seashells high in the cliffs. Were they there because the sea rose and then sank, depositing the shells, or did the cliffs rise above the ocean's level? This and other questions began to stir within him about discrepancies in species from one habitat to another as he noted so well in the Galapagos Islands.
When finally back in England, and although accepted by the scientific community, he developed headaches and stomach problems. He had panic attacks and frequent anxiety. We surmise today that those problems were of a psychosomatic origin. He wanted to publish his "transmutation" theory, but the risk of being called a heretic and the humiliation for his beloved wife Emma and their children was too much to bear. He kept his dark secret to himself, and therefore his illness, for 20 years—until he was forced to publish ahead of another scientist or lose his chances forever to establish his theory of evolution. In 1859, the furor over the publication of his book, Origin of the Species, did damn him to hell. The Anglican Church and people other than the scientists disavowed his work. To say the least, he was miserable.
One tragic and extremely important incident occurred to further influence Darwin's path away from Christianity. Their daughter Anne Elizabeth became ill at age nine and wasted away as did her grandmother. When she died at age 10, Charles could no longer believe that God was merciful to let a happy, loving, spirited child like Anne die.
From the beginning of their marriage in 1839, Emma was sorrowful about his lack of her concept of spirituality. She was a wonderful, caring wife in all ways. As he lay dying, she cradled him in her arms. She thought they might not be together in the hereafter because he would not profess a belief in God in this life. He hoped that somehow they would remain together, and it is quoted that he said he knew that they would not.
His death occurred 23 years after Origin of the Species was published. Eleven years before his death, his second book, The Descent of Man, was published. The irony of it all? In those intervening 12 years, times had changed! Free-thinking and science had been accepted in England. He finally received recognition for all of his work and the stomach problems and anxieties ended. Those last eleven years were some of his best.
A final irony: Charles Darwin was buried in Westminster Abbey next to Sir Isaac Newton! At his funeral service a special hymn was commissioned based on the Book of Proverbs from the Christian Bible's Old Testament. I quote: "Happy is the man that findeth wisdom and giveth understanding."
So may it be.
According to researchers from the Oxford Hair Foundation, my brand of species is in danger of extinction. It is projected that by 2100, there may be no more natural redheads. You see it takes two recessive genes to get this magnificent hair, and because of our mobile society, folk with red hair in their gene pool are not hooking up enough. In fact, at this time, less than 4% of the world's population has natural red hair. You see before you a member of an endangered species.
Of course, my husband Nick immediately commented: "Perhaps we can now get money from the government to keep you alive?"
This is natural selection. Does it mean that God rejects my kind whose fate is to die out? Does it mean that red hair, is not an intelligent design?—don't answer that!
No,it is simply, non-judgementally, the way of things, a trend that we can pay attention to or not.
When Darwin came up with the concept of survival of the fittest, some people took the theory beyond physical heredity and applied it, in pseudo scientific ways to the social sciences. Theories of "Social Darwinism" arose and with it, judgment of weakness and strength, developed into worthiness of being, and some created "scientific theories" to promote eugenics, forced sterilization, state sponsored discriminations and genocide.
Joseph Arthur Comte de Gorbineau was an early proponent of this kind of thinking, designating the white race, specifically Aryan, as the master race. He advanced the idea that most of the chaos of the world was due to the mixing of races. Many varied theories followed suit for decades, as people offered "proof" of observation to claim one race or ethnicity as superior to the other.
Economists also saw "survival of the fittest" as justification for unchecked capitalism. People were poor, some reasoned because they were weak or lazy. They deserved their lot in life. Those who were rich and privileged deserved all they could get.
Darwin was not among those who believed this. He promoted the idea that there is also social evolution which is manifest in developing social instincts to create community, that moral sentiment was strengthened through the understanding of the need for community.
It was religion, however, primarily Christianity, that brought a counterpoint to the faulty reasoning of societal inequality. The ethical grounding of compassion, humility and charity countered the arrogance of circumstance. Religious arguments brought forth the concept of equal worth in the eyes of God and the calling to love one's neighbor as oneself. It was during this time, as well, that Universalists and Unitarians were promoting a social gospel of justice and social responsibility.
In the pursuit of knowledge, some religious thought helped searchers see, that one must see the larger picture, beyond our limited, formulaic reasoning.
Faith and fact are not that far removed from each other if they are true representations of what is real. I get the feeling that people feel comfort in facts that everyone agrees to. Simple things like the following: if you keep your car in good shape and the battery charged, when you turn the key, the engine will start. Most people consider that fact. I, however, do not. That supposition depends on many underlying things in which I hold a deep faith.
I hold a deep faith in the physics that underlies the facts. For example, I hold great faith that the laws of attraction between electric charges remain constant with time; that the charge of particles is constant; that the force coupling constant is constant; and that the force between every two charges in the universe is inversely proportional to the square of the distance between the charges—and by square I do not mean not 2.00...1 or 1.9999999999, but 2 exactly. Because if it is not, then things do not work.
Nerve synapses in your body would not work (so you would not be able to see and feel); the cells in your body would not respond to osmotic pressure the way they need to for life processes to proceed. You would not be able to digest food
What I am saying represents just the tip of my faith, and has given rise, over many centuries, to the process behind the scientific method, from which most of the facts that we have come to believe arise. The scientific method follows a very strict process:
The main point above is that all scientific hypotheses must present falsifiable predictions. If there are no predictions presented that can be shown to be wrong under certain conditions, then what is being purported is not science, but is more in the line of unfounded faith. This does not mean that science cannot confirm previous beliefs and edge them into the arena of fact, but when science does, I find, that it always opens new areas for expanding my faith and for deepening my trust in what I am privileged to believe.
These are the reasons that a study such as Intelligent Design is not science. ID does not offer falsifiable predictions. This is why evolution is science. This is why we can be almost certain of the facts that come out of the theory of evolution.
However, beside these things in which I hold faith, I have an even greater faith. I believe that what we perceive actually presents our conscious brain with a true representation of reality. I have great faith that when I feel something very cold and frosty, that it is, in fact cold and frosty. I believe that when I see yellow, that I am seeing the same part of the spectrum that most other people see when they see yellow. I believe that our human perception has a great tendency to view and interpret objective reality correctly. Einstein once said, "One of the most amazing things about the universe is that it is comprehendible."
Faith and Fact, a mixture that swings back and forth in a sweet balance that can nurture each other: faith finding fact and fact finding an even deeper basis for faith.
It has been said that pagan homes are toasty warm in winter, owing to the fact that the books lining all the walls insulate so well. We love to read and learn.
I am a pagan. I believe that burying the statuette of a catholic saint sped the sale of my first house, and that that ritually blessing our new home cleansed it of disruptive energies. I believe that a ritual performed by our women's group improved church finances. I believe in divination. I believe that a bowl of soup prepared with the intention of healing you will do so more effectively than a bowl of soup prepared without that intention.
I also believe in accountability, most especially with regard to public realms and policies, like schools and laws. I rely, as do you, on the mechanisms of accountability afforded by scientific practice. I loved Biology classes in school, where I was delighted to learn about the theory of Evolution by means of Natural Selection. What a satisfying, logical explanation for the diversity of life on earth! Studying it makes me happy.
Creationists point to disagreement among scientists about evolution: punctuated equilibrium? gradual change? But procedural rules of the practice of science are standardized. Its declarative knowledge is constantly updated in light of new information. You won't find an authentic scientist who would tell you that he had a special, inviolate book written and translated hundreds of years ago which directs all of his thinking.
A baby, unhurt, was found in a muddy field after the recent spate of southern tornadoes, which killed his mother. This baby's survival has been repeatedly called a miracle. The gift of this baby's life is unfathomably grand. But why declare that his survival was not simply because his flexible young body is small, offering little surface area for collision by deadly flying debris? Which would we expect to survive unscathed in a whirlwind: a mouse or a cow?
Public policy must be guided by the accountability of scientific knowledge, not by any religious opinions.
How then can I be a pagan? First of all, I would never try to spread my views or to promote them as the way that's right for anyone else. On a strictly personal level, I don't need them to be subjected to scientific scrutiny. But I can hold the way of science in this one head alongside my spiritual practices because I believe that there is nothing that is separate from the unity of being. I don't like to use the word god, particularly not with a capital G, because it implies that there is some godness that is not us but that we must strive in some way to attain, some original sin that must be overcome. I reject that. I think we are all god, all goddess, all unified field of life. Maybe this is what that bible means when it says we are made in god's image. Why wouldn't the essence of the universe be embedded in star patterns, or in the leaves left behind in a cup of tea? I remember an interview with a gifted high schooler who was asked why he had chosen to study astrophysics: "I want to know the thoughts of God, and I think that he would likely use physics as a language to reveal them to us." Indeed. As well, perhaps, as baby talk. Or music. Or the cycle of the seasons. The ultimate unity of all, I think, permeates everything.
If a women's chant turns a financial tide, I don't suggest it is because we say this or that set of words, or burn a certain candle. I believe it is by some means as yet unexplained. Whether it is a thirteenth dimension of a pulse of energy known as a "string" by theoretical physicists, or a pulse of energy generated in the gray matter of the ritual participants, I believe that we will be able to explain mysteries like the greater healing powers of grandma Jo Ann's over Campbell's chicken soup. I think we are like people in the past, in awe of lightning, before there was understanding of electricity.
So please, if you have a sore throat and a fever, get a strep test. You might need an antibiotic. Feel free to enhance your treatment holistically.
And if the children ask you how things work and you are in church, speculate away. But if you are in a science classroom in a public school, you must stick to science.
And if politicians consider legislation affecting the earth or the health of the beings on it, they must be guided by science.
And for those working at the frontier of knowledge, where speculation and science intersect: hurry up, will you? I just can't wait to learn more!
In 1946, rocket borne cameras, launched from the White Sands missile range in New Mexico, took the first pictures of earth from space. The black and white photos were taken 65 miles above the earth's surface.
Though the possibility of pictures of earth from space were first thought of as aids to mapping terrain and creating spy systems, the enormity of the perspective took hold of the mystical hearts of many.
Now, after World War II, several movements of thought were occurring. We had just witnessed the fact that our technological ability to split the atom could render a destructive force that, used unwisely, could destroy the world. We were soon to enter into a time of fear with the "red scare," demonizing Russia and any trace of communism. Creating the belief in "godless" people, out to take away our way of life. We entered into a time of mutual threat on a global scale and hunkered down into a cold war that created suspicion, alienation and paranoia.
Some of Western Religious thought concurred with the fear of the threat of those who did not believe in Judeo-Christian dogma.
But as pictures of the earth became more abundant through the years, taken from further and further into space, the undeniable fact that we are sharing this one world, beautiful beyond our human squabbles and sentiments, touched the hearts of many. It was simply clear that not only are we all in this life together, we are so much less important than we think.
In the pursuit of truth, these scientific discoveries helped searchers see, that one must see the larger picture, beyond our limited, dogmatic reasoning.
The path to our current understanding of evolution as an intrinsic, fundamental property of our universe has been a quite bumpy one. This morning I'd like to share some of the interesting bumps on this evolutionary road by describing two flubs or mistakes in science and then a little about a paradox concerning evolution and religion. And I'll end by offering a bit of opinion on how science and religion relate. So let's start.
Lord Kelvin was a distinguished nineteenth century physicist and a devout Christian, who once said:
"Do not be afraid of being free thinkers! If you think strongly enough you will be forced by science to the belief in God, which is the foundation of all religion. You will find science not antagonistic but helpful to religion."
And Kelvin did try to use his science in the service of religion. Kelvin's work on the principles of thermodynamics led him into calculations of the age of the earth, which he found to be on the order of 20 to 40 million years. Kelvin had a compelling argument against Darwinism; he argued publicly that his calculations showed that the earth had been in existence too short a period of time to allow the evolution of complex organisms. But Kelvin was warned by a colleague that his calculation was incomplete and that the earth might be much older than his estimates. Kelvin, we now know, was wrong about the age of the earth. Using modern methods, the age of the earth is known to be some 4.5 billion years old, about 150 times larger than Kelvin's estimate. That's the first flub.
When Albert Einstein used his theory of general relativity to work out the large scale structure of our universe, the cosmology that emerged was shocking: the universe was expanding or evolving over time. Einstein had expected a static universe and disliked his results. So, he did something quite extraordinary—even weird, if you want. He added a cosmological term to his equations to produce a static universe. American astronomers then produced strong evidence that our universe is expanding just as Einstein's original equations had predicted. Einstein and his wife Elsa actually traveled from Germany to visit with the astronomers in California. When Elsa was told by the observatory staff that the huge telescopes and other equipment were used to find the scope and shape of the universe, she is said to have responded, "Well, my husband does that on the back of an old envelope." True, but even a great theoretical physicist like Einstein sometimes gets it wrong, and it's the observations that correct these misconceptions. Einstein retracted his cosmological term and later told a fellow physicist that it was the biggest blunder of his life. That's the second flub.
Lord Kelvin and Albert Einstein were both distinguished physicists, both opposed evolution with scientific arguments, and when the evidence came in, both were proved wrong. For nearly a century there was vigorous opposition to at least some aspects of evolution among scientists. Today the evidence in favor of evolution is overwhelming to scientists, but not to the general public in America. The National Science Board recently surveyed the public's knowledge of science and found that the U.S. scored significantly lower than almost all other countries on questions about evolution and the Big Bang. The Board concluded that U.S. underperformance on these questions was most probably due to religious beliefs. Science and religion in America apparently don't get along so well. A recent survey of eminent evolutionary scientists found that nearly three-fourths of them "view religion as a sociobiological feature of human culture, a part of human evolution, not as a contradiction to evolution." Evolution reviled by many on a religious basis is held by evolutionary scientists to be the source of human religiosity. There's our paradox to go with the two flubs.
So now, what about the relationship between science and religion? On the little bookshelf above my desk is my copy of Darwin's Origin standing next to my family bible. When I look at those two books standing side-by-side, the words of Albert Einstein often come to mind:
"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind."
Science and religion need each other—an astounding thought and a stumbling block for many in this day and age. Science is founded on a faith that there is an order in nature, which scientific methodology can reveal; and the human religious impulse sets goals such as truth and understanding for science. Religion defeats its own goals when it turns a blind eye to science. The human predisposition to religion is biological, but the expression of religion is cultural. In this there is great hope for accommodation between science and religion.
The book of Proverbs tells us, "Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom; and with all thy getting get understanding." Understanding the reality that surrounds us is one way of grasping for an understanding of the ultimate reality that our human evolution has inclined us to. Truth is one, not divided; and ultimately categories such as science and religion cannot be sustained. Someday the book of science and the book of religion must merge into one book of true knowledge. Attaining this goal will be an arduous and exciting religious journey, a journey of the human spirit over very rough terrain. Having nearly reached the biblical three score and ten, I'll miss this journey's end. Still old men dream dreams and hope that from generation to generation the young will have the vision to make this so.
Copyright © 2008 Lisa Ward, JoAnn Macdonald, Rob Lieb, Kathleen Mader, Merrill Milham. All Rights Reserved.