Blasphemy

No, that is not a self-confession, but the title of a novel written by Douglas Preston that Vicki bought me after we arrived in SLC. I had read a review of the book after it was published and had wanted to read it. Anything dealing with religious themes interests me. One Saturday at our local chain book store, Vicki found it on the sale table, which made it even better, and purchased it for me.

The book has an interesting premise. Scientists built a massive particle accelerator controlled by the most powerful computer yet built to investigate conditions at the moment of the Big Bang. At the moment of the device achieving 100% power, from inside the black hole created in the experiment, there is a voice that speaks. This voice claims to be the voice of God and proceeds to impart new truth for the good of humanity. While the premise is interesting, the execution is lacking. The book is filled with predictable plot lines and stereotypic characters. If you are in SLC and want to read it, contact me and borrow my copy.

I found one quote, though, that ought to provide grist for the mill for readers of this blog. The voice explains the rise of and calls for the demise of religion, traditional religion that is.
Religion arose as an effort to explicate the inexplicable, control the uncontrollable, make bearable the unbearable. Belief in a higher power became the most powerful innovation in late human evolution. Tribes with religion had an advantage over those with without. They had direction and purpose, motivation and a mission. The survival value of religion was so spectacular that the thirst for belief became embedded in the human genome. What religion tried, science has finally achieved. You now have a way to explain the inexplicable, control the uncontrollable. You no longer need "revealed" religion. The human race has finally grown up. Religion is as essential to human survival as food and water. If you try to replace religion with science, you will fail. You will, instead, offer science as religion. For I say to you, science is religion. The one, true religion. Instead of offering a book of truth, science offers a method of truth. Science is a search for truth, not the revelation of truth. It is a means, not a dogma. It is a journey, not a destination.

There is way more to unpack in this statement than I will be able to address in this short posting. Instead, I want to focus on the assertion that "science is religion." That is what many who oppose the teaching of evolution have claimed. These folks believe that science in general, and evolution in particular, has become just as much a position of faith and belief as anything taught in a church. They also believe that the goal of "scientists" is to replace traditional religious faith with the scientific worldview.

So, do you see traditional religion on the decline and being replaced by faith in science?