Science should go with faith
The Bible is always a source of truths—of faith and morals—meant to guide us for all times and all the way to heaven. It can contain prophetic words that predict and describe how things can to be in the future.
All this, if it is handled properly. Our problem is that many times it has been mishandled, and thus we have the understandable human reaction of some people who have come to disregard and discredit the Bible in their thinking and considerations. But that’s another story. We’ll go into that some other time.
For now, let’s focus on how it guides us and gives us glimpses of how things can be as we run along in time. Some words of St. Paul can come to mind. In his second letter to Timothy, there are some lines which I think are relevant to what we are witnessing these days.
“Know this also, that in the last days shall come dangerous times,” St. Paul starts. “Men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, proud, blasphemers, wicked, without affection, without peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, without kindness…” (3,1-3)
Every time I read these words and look at least at what we see in the media that mirror the temper of our times, I can’t help but notice the connection between the warning and the reality around us. I can only gasp, “How true!”
Many people don’t pray anymore. They have made God a thing of the past, or at best, considered merely as a museum piece or an ornament. They now proudly talk about how the present is now a post-religion era.
Obviously, with this mindset detached from God, the source and measure of truth, we should not be surprised when we can witness a lot of delusions and sophisms or circular, closed-circuit reasoning.
But there’s one point farther down that has caught my attention these days. It’s when St. Paul says that these proud people who can be “traitors, stubborn, puffed up and lovers of pleasures more than of God” are “ever learning yet never attaining to the knowledge of the truth.” (3,7)
Yes, we are now swimming in a large ocean of data and information, we are now inventing new things at a rate that has gone ballistic, thanks to our new technologies, and yet we can ask whether we are getting any nearer to God, to truth, to goodness, to loving each other better, etc.
What’s more obvious is that we are getting more controversies, more animosities. Many people are getting more self-absorbed in their own world, practically stonewalling themselves from others.
Other worse things come. Relations among people get corrupted by all forms of greed, and then deceit and hypocrisy. Gossips, lies, detractions, calumnies develop and thicken. Hatred grows and when unchecked it can lead to murders and even to terrorism.
As St. Paul says: “Evil men and seducers shall grow worse and worse—erring and driving others into error.” (3,13) Nowadays, global networking is not only to advertise products, but also to promote evil and error.
The media have to be warned about this. They can easily be used and prostituted by some subtle forces masquerading as forces of progress. We cannot anymore deny that there had been instances when this anomaly has been committed.
Still St. Paul warns us of another terrible scenario. In that same letter, he says that “there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears, and will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables.” (4,3-4)
When I think of what is now known as Climategate, the unraveling scandal of a science-based superstition spinning around global warming and climate change hysteria, these Pauline words make a bull’s-eye hit.
Cutting-edge sciences are now made into tools of post-religion ideologies to weave a vast complex of fables generously spiced with plot points to entertain people.
What to do? Go back to God, of course. Revitalize religion. Strengthen the faith. Thus, St. Paul says: “Preach the word, be instant in season, out of season, reprove, entreat, rebuke in all patience and doctrine.” (4,2)
Reason and science cannot go alone without faith, without God. They’d be flying in dangerous circles.
(Fr. Cimagala is the Chaplain of Center for Industrial Technology and Enterprise (CITE), Talamban, Cebu City. Email: roycimagala@gmail.com)
