Scientific Ideology

I have been thinking lately about skepticism, empiricism, and ideology. These three concepts are not synonymous but all too often they are treated as if they are... particularly by mend and women like Richard Dawkins. Part of this post, to be sure, is a result of the hub-bub surrounding Ben Stein's new documentary about Intelligent Design and the bias within the scientific community, but part of it predates that hullabaloo and is rooted in conversations with a microbiologist friend about faith and sociology.

Let's start with an examination of definitions. Skepticism denotes the doubt of an item's truth value or, if you like, “disbelief in any claims of ultimate knowledge.” Empiricism is, of course, epistemology through experience—the use of the natural senses (and amplifications thereof) to ascertain true principles about our material reality. Ideology, in the sense that I and my fellow Cultural Materialists employ it, is “any socially constructed and maintained philosophical orientation that operates on conscious and unconscious levels through norms, values, mores, and laws.” Empiricism becomes an “enfant terrible” in light of these other two terms.

I have a great appreciation for the sciences and I am a rather open-minded theist when it comes to scientific data. I've adapted my understanding of the creation account because of what astrophysics tells me about the age of the universe and what microbiology tells me of our species' age and line of descent. [NB: It helps that the literary critical approach to Genesis allows for this view (written as a Hebrew chiastic, it would be both reasonable and permissible to view the creation narrative as a symbolic representation rather than an objective historical record).] I think that Christians need to have this level of openness and must not hedge ourselves in through erroneous applications of perceived timeless truths. I trust the Bible and Tradition because of my trust in the Spirit of God who inspired and preserves them... but I do not twist them to imply what they were never meant to connote. As rational believers, we should embrace much of what empiricism has to offer. There is nothing innately wrong with studying material reality.

The problem, as I see it, is that the scientific community has gone beyond the utilitarian application of empiricism and has, through this abuse, fashioned a skeptical ideology. It is not surprising that this would happen because ALL groups form ideologies. It is inescapable. It's just how the human works as a social animal... and ideology-formation is not without its merits.

But empiricism makes no claims about spiritual reality because it would go beyond empiricism's jurisdiction. It is, by its very definition, unconcerned with items of knowledge which cannot be sensed in the natural way. But that should be the extent of it. To say that empiricism somehow disproves the supernatural is like saying that the color red is absent from the visual spectrum because my microphone has never sensed it! The scientist speaks out of turn when she claims that God cannot exist or, by the lights of empiricism, “probably” does not exist.

It is one thing to use empiricism as a tool to learn about reality. It is quite another to use that system as your sole epistemological tool. It is the IDEOLOGY of the community that brings about the censuring of those who would ponder the possibility of Intelligent Design. It is the IDEOLOGY of Dawkins, rather than his training, which provides him his default antagonism toward religious faith. He endorses the possibility of Intelligent Design, at least in the Stein documentary, but he and all other theorists of note have no universally-satisfactory origin narrative to offer other than “it happened... SOMEhow.” Though he himself would admit that life may well have began through an extraterrestrial, “alien” influence, he cannot (or will not) posit that any details of that external cause could be known in any of our human religious systems.

Why is this? In light of a missing set of data, should he not be open to any reasonable possibility until that data set is found? And is not a highly-intelligent extraterrestrial source as reasonable (or as far-fetched) as a theistic system? The answer is hubris. Pure and simple.

To say that life began beyond of our planet is to table the creation question and allow it to slip into infinite regress (who created our alien creators?). Faced with a dearth of empirical evidence to explain the origin, he says, essentially, well the evidence exists... but it is just “offworld” at the moment, please call again later (presumably after we've explored the galaxy and found that older planet which can offer us our missing link to that first cause).

To petulantly cling to his closed-minded notion, Dawkins and his ilk will promote theories which hold just as little water in the realm of science than does today's Intelligent Design paradigm. His refusal to yield any ground to theists is because his pride will not accept that there can be epistemological pathways other than material empiricism. Rather than embrace that transcendent question mark and say “we honestly do not know,” he will say “well we know that whatever the answer is, it's quite obviously NOT any archaic religious system.”

My problem with Dawkins is my problem with most scientists: he is not scientific enough! The scientist must embrace a practical agnosticism... but Dawkins and his peers have insisted instead on a “necessary atheism.” They do this because they don't see the boundary between the purpose of their pursuit and the ideology of their community.

When faced with the off-the-cuff musing of so-called rational man or the religion that stretched back into antiquity and has been discussed by minds as brilliant as St Aquinas, I'll choose the one that does not smack of the teachings of a sci-fi-writer-cum-religious-guru. Who knows, maybe the publisher of Dianetics would be interested in Dawkins' alien cosmology.

There is One Body

I recently returned from a weekend spent in the vicinity of our nation's capitol. I am amazed at the Catholic presence there. My stay was graciously hosted by a devout group of young believers—local college students, for the most part—who live such beautiful lives of piety, community, and affection that no one remains a visitor for long. After about three hours in their company, I felt like I was part of the family. I was not the only traveler to join them. Though united in their summer ministry projects, the group has members from distant places like California, Ohio, and Georgia. We all congregated in the DC area for a time of spiritual reflection, formation, outreach, and fellowship. It ended a few days later with the March for Life—where tens of thousands of believers annually rally for an end of the Culture of Death and the preservation of pre-born life. It was a transforming experience for me.

Since then I have been reflecting on the nature of Catholicism's “catholicity.” We are one Church. But within this mystical body of Christ there is much variety. I have been pondering the sibling rivalry between the Dominicans and the Franciscans and, to a lesser degree, between and among the Carmelites, Benedictines, Jesuits and others. Even those who are not formally tied to one of these groups will often feel a loyalty or attraction to them. People talk of their “Franciscan spirituality” or their “Dominican nature.” How, then, is this striation different from the denominational camps of the Protestants?

The answer is two-fold.

First, the rivalry among the various Catholics is not at all schismatic. It is jovial. We have the common denominator of the catechism to keep us united under the banner of the Church. We do not have different theologies but share one deposit of faith. As much as one individual might think his particular approach to this theology "superior," he still feels the common bonds of brotherhood and recognizes that his path is superior only for himself and that others' paths are equally valid (so long as they conform to the fullness of truth).

The banter within the Catholic Church is always secondary to its unity. Variation here is, after all, merely social in nature and not theological. The differing approaches are seen as complementary to one another and of equal utility. The Dominicans, for instance, will visit the Franciscans on their feasts days and vice versa. They see each other as expressing the same eternal truths, mediated through different charisms.

It is rare to find a Protestant denomination (at least among the ones I have belonged to in the past) which would be so charitable to another group's expression of faith. Of course this situation is problematized by the warring theologies of the Protestant camps. But even among those whose theologies are similar (if not identicial) but whose social application varies, we rarely find a spirit of unity.

Protestants do have their bible to unite them and the distilled catechism of the Nicaean Creed, but there is a tendency among their ranks to think in terms of pragmatism. What, many of them ask, is the best and proper way to live out their theology? This assumption (which is not necessarily a component of all Protestant groups) that there is one tried-and-true way to live the gospel, universally applicable to all personality types, can lead to a lack of charity and ultimately to schizm and fracture.

One beauty of the Catholic Church is its embracing of difference. Not only do we have varying religious communities, we also have multiple rites with staggeringly different practices. Consider the differences in ritual and custom between the East and the West within the Church. In the Byzantine Rite, for instance, we find married priests. One does not have to look long to find the differences between local customs within the Catholic fold. We are a variegated people but we are one Church.

But how is it that we are united despite this variety? The answer, of course, is the Eucharist.

Believing as we do in the transubstantiated host, we profess that Christ is indeed with us. His holy sacrifice reverberates in every mass in every country in every age. It is indeed one Eucharist for it is one Lord and Savior. We are united in our common reception of God's beautiful and humbling sacrifice. We are Catholic because we consume together the very body and blood of the Incarnate Word. In the blinding light of this sacrifice, all private opinions and group norms/practices are eclipsed by the grace and the mystery of holy communion. We're united because in that spiritual feast we are no longer imitators of Francis or Dominic but are (first, foremost, and only) the children of God, receiving the grace of Christ's gift (communion) because we have received the gift of his grace (salvation).

There is variety in the human creature. We are social by nature and it is our natural proclivity to form bonds with like-minded people. We are made this way and it has great value. The fullness of human expression is never found in one of us mere mortals but is only ever recognized in the full spectrum of humanity. So it is good that we have variety of expression within our Church (while adhering, of course, to official teaching). Those of a Dominican disposition have their space and those of a Franciscan nature have theirs. All live in love under the wide banner of the Church and its one theology. We may differ in our social and philosophical approaches to ontological reality of religious truth, but when we partake in those holy mysteries we have the opportunity to be transformed by receiving Christ within us. I think we have that sense of union because the grace of God transcends the spectrum of humanity. We are one Church because He is one vine. Though the branches may look different, they sway under the same breath of God.