Science’s Dirty Secret: It Was Born in Christian Soil
When I was in my twenties, I heard someone say, ‘I don’t believe in religion; I believe in science.’ I remember thinking the two were being treated as if they were opposites, when they are not. They are not even in the same category of things! But as the years went by, I would hear similar comments from time to time. By the mid-2000s, it seemed to be the norm, so much so that in 2006 Richard Dawkins wrote, “...one of the truly bad effects of religion is that it teaches us that it is a virtue to be satisfied with not understanding.” [1] I found this even more odd, since I grew up learning about so many great men of science and understanding who were Christians. Dawkins and the “four horsemen” at that time were leading the charge, arguing that “[f]undamentalist religion is hell-bent on ruining the scientific education of countless thousands of innocent, well-meaning, eager young minds.” [2] By 2020, it seemed as though most scientists believed that Christianity made people “anti-science,” and there seemed to be no tolerance for any other viewpoint in academic circles. But these are not even real arguments, they fall into the ‘appeal to authority’ fallacy, where instead of justifying a claim, the speaker cites an authority figure who is not actually qualified on the topic because it sounds “authoritative.”
As a result of this dramatic worldview change, scientists such as Francis Collins, James Tour, and Guillermo Gonzalez have faced hostility in academic circles because of their faith. Guillermo Gonzalez, who is openly a Christian and an intelligent design advocate, was denied tenure at Iowa State.[3] To go against a naturalistic worldview as a scientist seem to be very career-limiting. But why? It did not used to be that way. The claim
that Christianity is anti-science usually rests on a false choice: either one has faith or one has reason. Classical Christianity rejects that split between faith and reason. It teaches that God is rational, creation is ordered, and human beings are made to know truth. If the world is the product of a wise Creator, then the world is not chaos; it is intelligible. Science depends on exactly that assumption. If the world never behaved in stable, rule-like ways that could be expressed in mathematics, then using observations to build scientific theories would stop making sense.
Planetary motion, crystals, spectral lines, and cell division and development are prime examples of orderly systems that existed before humans did. But many scientists overlook or dismiss the evidence and simply say that it has the “appearance of design”. Others, like Carl Sagan, dismiss any evidence that could lead to design and insist that “The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be.” [4] The naturalistic worldview claims that nature is all there is and that every question must be answered by material causes alone. But that is not a scientific conclusion; it is a philosophical one. Christianity begins differently. It says reality is bigger than nature and that the universe is not self-explanatory. The bottom line is that science can describe how the universe works, but it cannot tell us why there is a universe at all, why reason works, or why nature is so deeply orderly.
Because nature was orderly and discoverable, many Christians began to study it. Christianity was one of the major cultural and intellectual forces that helped shape the environment in which modern science emerged. The first major universities—such as Bologna, Paris, Cambridge, and Oxford—arose in Christian settings devoted to learning. Oxford University’s motto is Dominus illuminatio mea, Latin for “The Lord is my light.” Many early pioneers of modern science were Christians, including Johannes Kepler, Robert Boyle, and Isaac Newton. They did not see scientific investigation as a threat to faith, but as a way of reading the “book of nature” alongside Scripture. Perhaps they were inspired by Psalm 19:
“The heavens declare the glory of God;
And the firmament shows His handiwork.
Day unto day utters speech,
And night unto night reveals knowledge.”
Newton is especially important in this topic. He was not only a physicist of extraordinary genius, but also a serious theologian. His writings on God, providence, and biblical interpretation show that he believed the universe was governed by divine wisdom. He wrote on the Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel, and the Apocalypse of St. John as well as theology and biblical-study manuscripts. For Newton, the lawful order of creation was not an accident; it reflected the mind of its Maker.
Galileo Galilei was another brilliant scientist whose story is often oversimplified into a morality tale about religion crushing science. Galileo believed that the Earth revolved around the Sun, which went against the dominant view among most educated people at the time—that the planets revolved around the Earth. This was also the view of the Catholic Church, which sponsored many of the scientists and research at the time. Myths that the Church banned all of his writings and that he was tortured and condemned to death still persist to this day. [5] The real history is more complicated. Galileo was placed under house arrest for promoting a view that went against the common belief at the time, but the episode is far more nuanced than the popular legend suggests. After the 1633 condemnation, Galileo was placed under confinement rather than execution, and he continued to work and publish within the constraints imposed by Church authorities.[6]
Galileo’s story reminds us that faith and inquiry do not have to be enemies. Christians can honor Scripture and pursue truth with humility, patience, and intellectual rigor. In the end, the claim that Christianity is anti‑science gets the story backward—Christian conviction helped give rise to science by insisting that the universe is ordered, intelligible, and grounded in reason. Science is powerful because it can uncover how creation works; Christianity goes further and explains why truth, order, and reason are even possible.
So let the lesson be lived out: read the primary sources, read opposing opinions, and investigate things for yourself—learning to hold belief with charity while letting discovery sharpen understanding. To paraphrase Thomas Aquinas, “Faith and reason are both ways of knowing the truth, and truth can't contradict truth.”
[1] Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion (New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2006), 126.
[2] Ibid., 286.
[3] https://www.chronicle.com/article/concern-over-scientists-support-for-intelligent-design-surfaced-before-tenure-vote/
[4] Carl Sagan, Cosmos (New York, NY: The Random House Publishing Group, 1980), 26.
[6] Ibid.
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