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 | By Fr. Bill Ashbaugh

Balance is a Word That is Very Important for Our Spiritual Health

It is related to peace. When our lives are out of balance, we generally experience a lack of peace. Faith and science are two different realities that, for some reason or another, often get put on opposite sides of the scale. For our spiritual health, I would suggest that we examine how we balance scientific knowledge with the knowledge that comes from the gift of faith. Some Christian fundamentalists seem to lose their spiritual balance by reacting too much against science. Others look upon the Bible as an ancient science book. It is not. The Bible tells us why things are. It reveals God and God`s plan for us and the whole universe.

 

"All creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God." (Romans 8:19)

The Bible does not answer many questions about how God created. It simply says that God created all things through His Word! That Word became flesh and pitched His tent among us. The Bible tells us that the one who is responsible for creating all things loved us so much to become flesh and blood and die on the cross for us. That is Jesus! The Bible tells us that there is more than the visible world seen and measured by science. The Bible tells us that in Christ we will live forever and that we will experience a resurrection like Jesus did.

Science cannot answer questions of meaning, but can answer questions of observable fact to some degree. One of the things that I truly appreciate about science is that the more we learn and discover, the more we realize how much we do not know! Science can be a beautiful door to humility and a deep reverence and even awe in the magnitude and scope of the universe and living creatures. Some can get carried away with science and put too much weight on its findings almost creating scientific myths that require a kind of faith. I get amazed at atheists or agnostics who cling to their scientific faith in spite of the incredible design and intelligence reflected in creation that points to God. They develop intricate theories and explanations that have little or no possibility to be experimentally tested, and cling to these theories in a kind of faith response. Again, this kind of thinking will lead one to imbalance.

Science is not opposed to faith, nor faith to science. Science helps us to more clearly see the world as a macrosacrament of God. It helps us peer more clearly at ordinary realities and see the beauty, intelligence, complexity, and interconnectedness of all things. It can move us to deep awe and raise our minds beyond the created realities to that which is uncreated and eternal Almighty God.

So, if you feel you know little about science, pick up a book and dive in. Some science books are very readable such as A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking, or God and the Astronomers by Robert Jastrow. If you are more of the scientific mind, pick up the Bible. There you will meet the One who created the world which you have grown to respect and appreciate through science.