The lowest of the low?

Can you look at the beauty of these and the detail and color that was put into each little sea slug, and tell me God doesn't take the same love and interest in us? Forget the lilies of the field, look to these lowly creatures at the bottom of the sea.






Complete photo series here.

When Will Scientists Solve the Real Mysteries?

As amazing and fascinating as I think it is that doctors have brought a rat heart "back to life," and as thrilled as I am for what this could mean for the development of heart transplants, I feel like many more lives could be saved, and many women could maintain their sanity, and many children would not have to grow up alone because their mothers are in prison if only they could solve this one neurological disorder...

The God and Science Discussions pt 3

So...finally we are coming around to the meat of the question. Creation. Well, first I think we need to brush up on the creation stories. First, the 7 day creation story. And second, the Adam's rib creation story. ok, did you read them? Cuz' it will sure help with this conversation if you did.

Having read the stories you will notice that they are two distinct stories. The first one has God creating the heavens, earth, plants, creatures etc, and then he creates man and woman together from the clay of the earth. His piece de resistance (sorry I don't know where my accent marks are). In the second story, God creates the earth and heavens and then Adam. But "it is not good for man to be alone." so, he creates all the creatures of the earth and brings them to him but alas, none of them fit the bill. Then, God creates woman from the flesh of Adam.

So, my question to Creationists has always been, "Which story?" Which one is the story of creation? The second story makes no reference to time at all. The first assumes God's days are our 24 hour days. Who knows how long a day of God's is? It could be a million years! In many ways the story of evolution follows the first creation story. But (science nerd alert!) did anyone notice that God created the plants on the third day, but not the sun until the fourth day? seems a little backwards to me.

Yes, I believe that the earth is millions of years old. Yes, I believe that life forms evolved and changed and adapted throughout this time. Do I believe that there is some magic line connecting man to chimpanzees? I don't know. maybe. But, the evidence is just not all there, yet. It is still a theory. A compelling theory. A theory that is constantly evolving and adapting itself as new discoveries are made. And anyone who says there is ample evidence to declare this linear idea of evolution a certainty, is not...well, is not a scientist. Do I understand when God "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being?" (holy cow I love that image!) No, I don't have any clear idea of when God set us apart. But, I do believe that he did. That we are all a part of his image. Just as I can't tell you at what point the soul enters the human, but I know that is does.

If there is one thing I have figured out about God, it's that he is bigger than that. whatever that is. He is bigger. And just as I don't understand what he is doing with my pesky little life sometimes, I can't begin to wrap my brain around The Creation. and that is exactly why I love these stories so much. They attempt to make it understandable for me. and even if they fall way short (uh. Cain and Abel. Abel is killed. that leaves one male offspring to reproduce with who?), they are still the story of my creation.

As for Noah...there is plenty of evidence that a great flood actually occurred. And we can't expect the people of Noah's time to understand the vastness of this earth (heck! it was 1492 before we knew it was round!) So, to them the entire world did flood. I believe Noah could have built an ark big enough to house the animals of his "world." I do not believe there were dinosaurs on the ark, obviously.

And what if Noah didn't exist? or Adam and Eve? Does that shake something essential in my faith? absolutely not. Does that make the stories less true? no way. I am Noah. I am Dinah. I am Ezekiel. I am Miriam.

The God and Science Discussions pt 2

Please let us remember the rules...

The second part to answering the question

At your convenience, could you explain how a woman who believes in God and his Word does not believe that He created mankind?

gets a little stickier. It also has me venturing into the before mentioned realm of theology. And as I stated before, I am most assuredly not a theologian. But, here is my stab at my personal view of biblical interpretation.

*deep breath*

I believe that every word of the bible is true. That does not mean, however, that I believe every word of the bible to be fact. I believe the bible is the living word of God. But, I also believe that the perfect word had to go through the filter of a flawed human being. I am Catholic and if their is one thing that the Vatican takes seriously it is exegesis. I learned my faith and my view of biblical interpretation from my Catholic upbringing. So, for full disclosure here is what a once Cardinal Ratzinger (aka Pope Benedict XVI) said about exegesis.

The eternal Word became incarnate at a precise period of history, within a clearly defined cultural and social environment. Anyone who desires to understand the word of God should humbly seek it out there where it has made itself visible and accept to this end the necessary help of human knowledge. Addressing men and women, from the beginnings of the Old Testament onward, God made use of all the possibilities of human language, while at the same time accepting that his word be subject to the constraints caused by the limitations of this language. Proper respect for inspired Scripture requires undertaking all the labors necessary to gain a thorough grasp of its meaning.

and then

Consequently Catholic exegesis freely makes use of the scientific methods and approaches which allow a better grasp of the meaning of texts in their linguistic, literary, socio-cultural, religious and historical contexts, while explaining them as well through studying their sources and attending to the personality of each author.

So, this is where I'm coming from. In reading the bible literally, I believe there is a danger of keeping the word in the past. of it becoming too much of a historical document. Are there important historical events recorded in the bible? oh yeah. And do all people who read the bible literally read it as a strictly historical document? of course not. But, I have seen this danger.

The beauty for me of the bible is the universality of the people in it. I have screamed (or whined depending on the circumstance) at the front of the cave "I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. I have moved here to the middle of nowhere to minister to this congregation, I have no access to infertility support, the church has rejected your call to service, my husband is doing mission work in Guatemala for 3 weeks and I am here scrubbing the blood of my lost baby out of the grout of my bathroom tile!"

When reading the story of Adam and Eve, it becomes a factual biography as it were, of two people who lived a long time ago instead of a story of me. The story of me and my life. God has created for me a perfect paradise and if I stay in him and live as he has guided me, following his will, then I can stay here and live my life joyfully. But, no. I'm scrambling up that tree over and over because I want to know what God knows. I want to make sure that I agree with what he has planned. I want it to be about my will. So, I eat the fruit. And I look at what God has seen as perfectly wonderful and I disagree. God never told Adam and Eve to clothe themselves. He didn't see it as a problem that they were naked. They decided that. They decided that what God created wasn't right. I try to change and control things and soon I'm in exile wondering how God could have done this to me. But the reality is that I, like Adam and Eve, created this all by myself. I'm the one who wasn't satisfied in the Garden of Eden. I am Sarah. I am Peter. I am Mary Magdalen. I am David. Their stories are my stories. And God reaches out to me over and over again, the way he did to them.

But, for me it is important to read the bible keeping in mind the historical context, the literary devices, the audience the books were written for. I don't have to be purified after my period, I don't think pork is unclean, I don't send my mildewy clothes to the priest for 7 days to see if they need to be burned. There is plenty of stuff that doesn't apply to our society today. I do not believe that Noah lived to be 950 years in terms of our 365 day years. And I do not believe that God ever ordained the killing of innocents in his name. So, where does that leave me? Does that make the bible irrelevant for me? Absolutely not. God is in the bible as he has been throughout history and is with us today. The story of God's love for his creation and his constant reaching out to it over and over is central to my understanding of God, myself and my faith.

The God and Science Discussions pt1

Impressive title, no?

ok. Some ground rules.

1. Notice at the top of my sidebar there is a Kind Blog icon. If you are not up to speed on this click on it and read it. I apply this to my comments as well.
2. I will delete comments. I will never censor a person's opinion but I will censor the way you decide to express it. If I delete your comment I will email you explaining why and invite you to express your opinion again in a more respectful way.
3. If you read an offensive or rude comment please do not respond to it. I will be checking my comments frequently and the comment will be removed. I expect all discussion to be respectful and not to give time or energy to people who are too lazy to express themselves well.
4. These are open discussions. Meaning open to anyone of any faith or non-faith to talk openly with the intent of a good conversation and a hope of understanding each other better. Respectfully worded questions are encouraged and anyone is free to answer them.
   
5. This is not a debate. It is a discussion. There are plenty of places to debate this stuff. If you feel the need to prove your point the correct one, I can point you to those websites. This is not one of those websites.
6. If you don't like these rules. That's fine. You can go say mean things about me on your own blog.

I grew up going to church every Sunday. We said grace before every meal, made all of our sacraments, went to religious school from grades 1-12. My Faith Community is one of those quiet, personal communities. Faith was private and not discussed much. But, still you knew it was there. The rituals and rites never felt empty.

My father is a bio-chemist/bio-geneticist/something new that I can't remember. He is well respected in his field and has been a part of some discoveries and developments that touch every one of our lives on a daily basis. He has always loved the hands on aspect of his work and never cared for the academia or the frankly corporate side of the science world. He never felt the need to go beyond his B.S. in biology.

My mother is a teacher. She was head of the Science Department at my rigorous college-prep high school. She has her M.A.T. in Physics. Her students always loved her fun, passionate classes and her love of the subject.

As a child, I was brought out to explore my world through hiking, canoing, and camping. There was never any piece of nature that was too small to explain and point out, from different types of rocks, to sediment patterns, from nesting habits, to the parts of a flower. Nothing was ever judged disgusting or frightening. We caught snakes and held spiders. We'd spread out our blankets in the middle of the night to watch meteor showers or got out the telescope to see astrological special events like Haley's Comet. (We still email each other when we see that something is coming around.) Questions were always answered. Never shushed or belittled.

We regularly went to museums and watched episode after episode of Nova and other documentaries. Our development was filled with our world and my parents instilled a strong sense of respect and guardianship. We were taught to never disturb a habitat, always view ourselves as a guest, and never, ever anthropomorphize.

Although they never came out and said it, it was given that we were thanking God for his creation by taking the time to appreciate it. It never occurred to me that our exploration was somehow explaining away God. Of course the night sky was full of God's majesty as was the tiny colorations of the Libellulidae family of dragonfly . I was honestly shocked when I got to college and realized there was some weird culture war between science and religion. It just didn't make sense to me. It still doesn't. I still don't really understand the animosity.

I understand the twitching and itching over biomedical ethics. I do get that. Trust me. I had plenty of reservations when we did IVF. We ended up with 19 frozen embryos. We had promised each other and God we would give life a chance to however many embryos we created. Well, 21 kids?! And the connection to these embryos is inexplicable. One of the hallmarks of an IVF baby book is a picture of Junior as a 3+ cell embryo. And when they are transferred you start loving and hoping and wishing everything you've got on the wee little fellers. You give them nicknames and cheer them on. Then you look at the resulting children and their faces flash before your eyes when you think of those embryos. (Well, I know not everybody's, but for lots of us.) I was so attached to mine that when I got the call from the lab that the batch they were thawing was arresting, I demanded they transfer them immediately because it broke my heart and I wanted them to be snug and warm and...with me.

So when the time came to make our decision, we sat down and talked to a priest friend who specializes in medical ethics. After discussions with him we decided that 6 embryos we had that were already in the 6+ cell stage had to be given a chance. But, we didn't have to worry about the 13 that were still in the 2pn stage. The nuclei, and therefor the DNA, had never merged so the identity of the potential person never formed. Splitting hairs? You betcha. (It turns out to not have mattered because none of the embryos every resulted in another child.)

But, to think that science cut out God was never even something I considered. I mean, God is so much bigger. Science, for me, was looking at the glory and love of God through the world he gave me to live in and explore.

By the time I was a senior in high school, my dad had stopped going to church with us. I didn't know why and since I had the teenage radar of hypocrisy finely tuned, I asked him. His answer was a long time ago, but I understood it as this. "I don't find God at church. I spend more time in awe of God and his creation when I'm in the lab than I do for 1 hour on a Sunday." He said every time he broke down a protein or examined a genetic code he couldn't believe the precision and beauty of the way it was all put together down to the minutest level. Sure you can look at a landscape of the Rocky Mountains and say it beautiful. But it is layer after layer after layer of perfect symbiosis and intricate detail right down to the microorganisms breaking down the leaves of the forest. And I believe that though he wouldn't phrase it this way, he worships God everyday at his work.