“Does Science Make God Irrelevant?” is the latest addition to the TGC Hard Questions series published by The Gospel Coalition. Each booklet provides a succinct discussion of some aspect of the Christian faith that often troubles modern readers. The length is intentionally short, in this case only 65 pages of text, with an educated lay audience in mind.
Hans Madueme, a professor of theology at Covenant College, is well suited to the challenge of addressing tensions between science and the Bible from the perspective of a theologian in the Reformed tradition. He maintains a deep respect for science and a commitment to biblical authority and inerrancy. Readers will not find much in the book that is new, though packaging the ideas in short form and as part of the TGC series makes it a helpful resource.
Madueme opens with the recognition that many are suspicious of the modern scientific enterprise, exemplified by a growing belief in a flat earth. When Christians reject science, it seems to confirm that science and faith are inherently in opposition, a message that proselytizing atheists like Richard Dawkins and Jerry Coyne are happy to amplify. The sad result is that many churches and Christian parents shield their kids from the study of God’s natural creation. Madueme wants to remedy this, encouraging a love for Jesus and an appreciation of science.
Following the introduction, the book is divided into four parts: 1) A critique of the idea that science and faith have always been enemies; 2) Explaining how Christian assumptions make science possible; 3) Clarifying the perceived tension between science and miracles in the Bible; and 4) Illustrating ways faith and science coexist as allies.
In Part 1, Madueme revisits the histories of Galileo and the Scopes Trial. In contrast to the mythologized versions that falsely portray science triumphing over the mysticism of religion, he provides more nuanced accounts, highlighting where faith and science overlapped in significant ways. The warfare model, Madueme notes, was a recent invention launched in large part by the biased scholarship of John Draper and Andrew White late in the 19th century.
The critique of the warfare model flows naturally into Part 2, as Madueme explains how Christianity contributed to the growth of scientific thought and discovery. Christian theology recognized creatures as material entities rather than divine manifestations, opening them up to objective inquiry. Christians understood the material creation to be good, rejecting gnostic notions that only the spiritual was worthy of appreciation and study. Even the Christian sense of human fallenness advanced scientific thinking, for it led scientists to question ideas developed without observation or testing competing explanations.
The many scientific pioneers who were devout Christians further demonstrate science’s compatibility with Christian belief. Madueme highlights well-known examples like John Ray, Blaise Pascal, Robert Boyle, Robert Hooke, Johannes Kepler, Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, and James Clerk Maxwell, but also introduces us to a lesser-known figure, Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717). Merian was an entomologist and gifted illustrator who wrote of her wonder at God’s workings in the tiniest insects and plants.
Part 2 ends with the challenged logic of the atheist, noting “the science they swear by often functions on the borrowed capital of Christianity. While they have detached science from an explicitly Christian framework, its ghosts roam free; deeper theological assumptions haunt them still.”
Part 3 addresses the perceived tension between science and Scripture, particularly as related to miracles and origins. He notes that science is not Christianity’s enemy, and Christianity is not science’s enemy; scientism is the enemy of both. Scientism is a belief that nothing can be known except what is testable by scientific methods, a belief that is itself untestable by scientific means. It is “self-referentially incoherent,” and does not lead to good science.
Miracles, as supernatural interruptions to the normal operation of nature, only run afoul of science if assuming scientism.
In contrast to scientism, some swing to anti-realism, a belief that science can only give us models consistent with how nature appears, but not how nature truly works. Belief in “apparent age” is an example of anti-realism; apparent age theory avoids conflict by agreeing that the earth looks old without believing that it is old. Madueme does not use this example to defend a young earth view, but to argue that Christians should be realists because science is the study of the real material work of Jesus (1 John 1:1).
Next Madame considers methodological naturalism, a practical approach to scientific investigation that avoids supernatural explanations for natural phenomena or history. He recognizes the value of insisting on natural explanations for phenomena like chemical reactions, but also argues that we limit understanding by ignoring biblical truth. This comes into play especially when considering scientific investigation of the distant past, of miracles, and the cognitive and spiritual aspects of human nature.
Part 4 addresses ways that science and religion function as friends and allies. Madueme exhibits restraint in this part of the book, not arguing for a particular understanding of the biblical creation story. Instead, he simply notes that all Christians are creationists, with disagreement over the details between young earth creationists, old earth creationists, and evolutionary creationists.
He acknowledges there are weighty issues to be resolved in how each position understands Scripture, but for the purpose of this book, they represent internal debates among those who are in agreement that science has not made God irrelevant. Instead, he draws attention to how creation speaks to the existence of its Author, and how science works when studying present observable phenomena (empirical science) and when studying the earth’s distant past (historical science).
There are some who argue that historical science is not true science, that it is nothing more than fanciful ideas to explain a history never witnessed and with no testable hypotheses. Madueme, by contrast, acknowledges historical science as a legitimate science, but with the caveat that it is more prone to error due to the incomplete record of the past and potential intersection with supernatural events. On this point historical scientists will take some issue; there are ways of empirically testing competing hypotheses of what should be found in the earth’s geological archives, such as a global versus regional flood at a particular time in earth’s history.
Madueme stops short of advocating for a young earth view but does argue against equating young earth creationists with flat earthers. According to his understanding, flat earthers reject empirical evidence that can be seen and tested in the present, whereas young earth creationists employ the tools of science to challenge conventional interpretations of the data.
This discussion is the one place where most Christian geologists will disagree with Madueme. In principle, geologists do not object to young earth advocates proposing competing interpretations of data. What frustrates geologists is the reliance on partial datasets and rejecting or ignoring empirical data that does not fit the young earth narrative, yielding some overlap with flat earth systematics.
Madueme next addresses the various ways that creation bears witness to creative authorship and intentionality. He offers a simple version of the Fine Tuning argument, noting several of the fundamental forces and sub-particles that require incredibly finely tuned properties to give rise to planets, stars, and life.
Searching for alternatives to intentionality, materialists postulate an infinite number of universes—the Multiverse—each with its own set of properties. Our universe only feels special because we would not be here to observe it otherwise. Yet as Madueme points out, the possible existence of a Multiverse is not a scientifically testable hypothesis.
Intelligent design theory gets a positive mention, though without delving into the competing and sometimes opposing definitions applied historically and today. Overall, the beauty, architecture, and design of the universe and life bear witness to a craftsman. Such evidence does not prove the existence of God, but it points us logically and consistently in that direction.
The book closes with suggestions for how Christians should think about science and their role in it. Christianity has much to say about academic integrity. Without an absolute moral standard for conducting and presenting investigations, we are left with a set of utilitarian rules that can be discarded for personal gain. Christians should view science as a tool that opens and displays the wonders of God’s material creation. It should foster appreciation for scientists, move us to marvel at the beauty of God’s creativity, and generate awe that, since creation reflects the Creator, we will never exhaust nature’s glory. Does science make God irrelevant? Madueme does more than just answer “no.” He gives us reason to see how God makes science relevant.
Gregg Davidson is a professor of geology & geological engineering at the University of Mississippi and a 30-year member of a PCA church in Oxford, Mississippi.