How do Christians reconcile science with their faith?

entoaggie: How do Christians reconcile science with their faith?
We all know that there are scientific findings that contradict the literal word of the Bible. We also know that there are Christians out there that just ignore anything contradictory that science has to say.

I am interested in hearing from Christians who do not reject science, and how they do not let this get in the way of God. Do you take the entire Bible as symbolism? Do you only take those parts described differently by science as symbolism, and the rest literally? How do you respond to accusations that you are not a true Christian for trusting in what science has to offer? Is there anything that you think is wrong with, or reject, from either science or organized Christianity?

Please no lectures on either the Biblical or scientific creed; I am already very familiar with both. This is something I am genuinely curious about: serious and thoughtful answers only.
Arctic storm: I do not have any “qualms” with the Bible. I am not a Christian, but I do not question that the Bible is the truth Christians–I am not going to criticize it. I am one of those who believes that faith is being able to believe even when you have no concrete, literal reason to. I do not feel this within myself, but certainly others do.

More often I find Bible-believers who have qualms with science. They accept it when it does not contradict the Bible, or otherwise serves them (such as in preventative medicine, leisure technology, etc.), but reject it when it makes them uncomfortable or confuses them.

The “classic” example is evolution. Many people act as though the theory of evolution is somehow an anomoly in science, as though it is seperate and apart from it, run by a group of crazed wackos. Yet, the data that supports evolution was gathered using the exact same scientific method that other data in more “trusted” science was.
edward l: You are absolutely right, and that is because science is not MEANT to discover anything beyond what is physically real in earth in space: I think that is a common misunderstanding with science. It is used as a tool to find NATURAL explanations for NATURAL phenomena. There are those who choose to go a step further and believe that God is behind the natural explanations, but that is beyond the scope of science.
shmurfee68: You don’t have to be defensive; I am not trying to criticize Christians. I am asking a question of Christians who do not reject science. If you do reject science, then you do not have to answer the question–I will not judge you.
Iridium190: I disagree with the notion that evolution is “bad science” (you may want to read some books by people who are not proponents of Intelligent Design), but I thank you for your very thorough and honest answer. I enjoyed reading it.
Hippoterry2005:
1) It is beyond the scope of science to prove or disprove God. The goal of science is to find natural explanations for natural phenomena, not to say whether God caused it all or not. Any hypothesis trying to prove/disprove the existence of God is unfalsifiable, and is therefore bad science.
2) Atheism is not a faith or a religion. Faith is believing in something even when there is no physical evidence to prove it. An atheist may believe that their football team is going to win the Superbowl even though they’ve lost every game, but to say they have spiritual faith is wrong–they do not believe in something spiritual, therefore they do not have spiritual faith.
3) You do not have to be a liar, crazy, or right. Why do you insist on making these artifical distinctions? Could it be that you are sincere, but mistaken?
4) Thank you for your honest response. I appreciate it, although you might not believe it from my response. I like to play devil’s advocate. }:)

Answers and Views:

Answer by jfahd
they pick and choose what to believe. If science contradicts something, they’ll try to explain it away or say that you can’t take the bible literally. If science agrees with one part, they’ll say see, that is the proof!

Answer by arctic storm
Hmmm… Can you give me a specific case in point? Not trying to be a jerk, I’m actually serious. Tell me one of the qualms you have with the Bible.

Answer by Joy M
I’ve come to believe that the Bible isn’t 100% absolutely literally true. A lot of stories in the Bible are symbolic and they highlight what people should do or how they should act rather than how someone actually did. Most of science, however, that contradicts the Bible is just in theory, not proven or currently provable.

Answer by KeKe
Good question…wish I had the answer. I was brainwashed as a child, like many christians, but when matured, religion seemed like a myth.

Answer by larryjhere
The Bible-thumping Christians might not like this, but I consider myself a Christian, by my own definition.
No I do not take the bible literally. My personal feelings are that the old testament passages are folklore that was handed down.
But I believe in “God”; just not the same way that other Christians might. I do believe in evolution, and that “God” is the one who started it all.
I feel that Adam & Eve were “made up” to easily explain how people were created. Nothing wrong with it, it gives Christians a basis of how to live life. But to take the story as literal is a bit far-fetched.

Answer by jp78
They ignore scientific evidence even though some facts help to support the bibles stories.

Answer by doggiebike
They don’t. Most don’t even read the bible (let alone science books) they let others tell them how to think. That is dogma and it is how religion has survived.

Answer by shmurfee68
Dont you people have any thing else to do besides question christians? Are they hurting you? Are they denying the Aethists and the Satanist and the scientists anything they want to beleive?

why dont you just let people beleive what they want to beleive? Thats why they came here in the beginnig anyway. If you want to cconstantly try to claim that you dont agree with someones religeous preferance. . .. then go over to the middle east where you have to beleive in what the dictator says you have to beleive in. Then since you wont want to agree with that, they can kill you or you can become part of the opposition and join Osama wandering from cave to cave. . .

Answer by maria c
I don’t think it has to be a give and take situation. It is not black and white. I don’t think it is difficult to believe that miracles happen – those things that scientists cannot explain. There is much evidence to this type of phenomena. As far as questioning science, I can’t imagine anyone NOT questioning science – as it has proven itself wrong many times over. My own belief is that you should question all things – including the Bible and science, and then decide what you reject or not. After that, you can own your beliefs as your own and not that of other people. I get upset when people believe in absolutes. If you look at the Bible, scientists have found evidence of truths in the Bible. Also, many people take things in the Bible literally. Christians believe that God has no time or space and that anything is possible with God – so to say that the world was created over millions of years and not in one day – maybe millions of years in people’s concept of time is one day in God’s. THese are not difficult concepts to grasp. Many doctors are Christian and use their divine faith and their medical knowledge when they practice on patients. These do not have to be mutually exclusive concepts.

Answer by edward I
Science has only found or discovered what is already here or in space, and/or combined those things in different ways.
Science has not “created anything”
from nothing.

Answer by ThePathMaker
One Christian president often said that science was just a way for us to explore God’s creation, which perfectly explains the answer to your question. Christians who subscribe to this philosophy often treat the bible as a way of life instead of facts. For instance, while I don’t beleive that many things in the Bible occured, I beleive that the ten commandments are good rules for life, and that Christianity in generally a good force in the world. I also belevie that each biblical story contains an importan moral or lesson that we can all benefit from.

Answer by Iridium190
Read HF Schafer’s “Science and Christianity: Coherence or Conflict”

or

CS Lewis’ “Miracles”

or

Hugh Ross’ “Creator and the Cosmos”

I am a devout Christian and a scientist. I do not take the entire Bible as symbolism. Only those parts that demand it (such as the poetry of the Psalms). Although it is important to keep in mind that the OT was written in a style that was much more figurative than our western style.
Did it really rain 40 days and nights on Noah? Or is the the way of saying “it rained a lot!”? I don’t know. Nor does it matter.

Accusations that say I’m not a true Christian, aggravate me to no end. Those people typically do NOT study the Bible in a rigorous fashion. They are losing out, and hurting others at the same time. It sickens me to see the faith treated this way.

Organized (conservative) Xianity in the 20th C is straying far from it’s course. In the US it IS the Laodecian church mentioned in Revelation 2. They have lost their first love, even as their doctrines are pure. They emphasize “The Great Commission” even as they ignore other commands that would ASSIST this matter. They reject the gifts of the spirit.
As the OT frequently commands Israel not to “stray to the right OR the left”, today’s church(es) seems committed to picking one or the other, and then boasting that they are better than the other side.

OTOH, I reject much of the pseudo-science that is taught today. I don’t reject current evolutionary theory b/c I’m a Xian, I reject it b/c it’s BAD SCIENCE! It rejects empirical results and logic and prefers speculation, hand-waving and reason by analogy.
I am critical of global warming studies b/c the authors leap to unfounded conclusions. I am concerned, but I won’t overreact based on non-existant evidence.

Anyway, I like the authors llisted above. I don’t agree w/ them on every detail, but I respect their approach and intellectual honesty.

Answer by dkstringer24
I think they both can work together just fine. Christianity is all about faith. You have faith in whatever it is you choose to believe in. Most (reasonable) religious scholars argue that the bible is not really meant to be taken literally but that it has several “divine truths” in it about what it means to be a human being.

That we should love our neighboor…care about people etc.

I don’t think however that the two should mix. Keep faith at church and not in the classroom.

Answer by TeeM
Find your closest Kingdom Hall and ask them for a copy of the book

“Life-How Did it Get Here? By Evolution or by Creation.”

It’s reviews the scientific evidence.

The September 2006 “Awake” magazine deals with this very subject, and has interviews of scientists and their research.

Louis Pasteur proved that life can only come from life, or was he mistaken?

Answer by S P
Honestly, I have not come across any contradictions that cannot be explained or that are not theoretical in nature/have not been proven. The problem is in today’s age with the increase of knowledge is that the english translations are not sufficient to explain what had been written. I have found that going back to the original language and meanings have opened whole new worlds of understanding to what the Bible truly means instead of guessing. Here is a great site – contenderministries.org

Answer by bh8153
I cannot believe in a God who would arrange for one answer to be put in the Bible and a different answer to be derived from our scientific view that the Universe is His natural creation, it functions logically and consistently, and it includes our minds and their ability to perceive logic and consistency. God doesn’t throw us a curve ball like that.

Answer by hippoterry2005
Both scientists who are Christians and those who are atheists have the same data available to them, but they interpret them differently.
At no time has science either proven or disproven the existence of God although it can be used to support ones faith position – and atheism is as much a faith position as is Christianity. It is important to get the fact/hypothesis/theory definitions clear. Also, just because a theory is popular doesn’t make it a fact or true (eg Newton’s highly popular corpuscular theory of light was discredited after more than a century by Young’s classic double slit experiment.)
I am a scientist and Christian. I find no conflict and can have faith without removing my brain! Some theories in science do conflict with some of my beliefs and I will continue to watch developments in these areas with interest – this does not make me either a bad scientist or a bad Christian.
As a Christian I add my experience of God to my experience of science and make my decisions. I am heartened by the observation that after two or three centuries of systematic scientific research this controversy still exists – my God still walks tall.
My position can be explained in one of three ways: I’m a liar, I’m crazy or I’m right. I can wait for my vindication.