Scientists Search for Truth

Through intimate conversations with some of the world's most distinguished scientists (including two Nobel Laureates), Faith in Science invites us to explore the connections between scientific and religious approaches to truth. Subjects range from the existence and nature of God to the role of spirituality in modern science. The result is a clear account of how two major cultural forces can work together to offer unique insights into questions of existence.

Science and Belief in the Nuclear Age

"On the threshold of the third millennium, a Christian cannot ignore the special role of science in the transformation of contemporary civilization.... In a lucid, compelling way, Science and Belief in the Nuclear Age describes our responsibility for this intellectual heritage that is so essential for Christian tradition. Hodgson, without claiming science should become religion or religion science, convincingly describes an academic community of intellectual interchange that replaces former conflicts and partial perspectives by a new integral vision of science open to theological truth."

Peter Hodgson has lectured on and tutored physics and mathematics in the University of Oxford for forty years, and has been engaged on research in experimental and Theoretical nuclear physics for over fifty years. He was a member of the Council of Atomic Scientists’ Association from 1952-1959 and edited its journal from 1953-1955. He has written about sixteen books and three hundred research papers and is a Fellow of Corpus Christi College and the Institute of Physics. He is the President of the Science Secretariat of Pax Romana, and recently served as a consultant to the Pontifical Consilium for Cultures. 

The Language of Science and Faith

Christians affirm that everything exists because of God --from subatomic quarks to black holes. Science often claims to explain nature without including God at all. And thinking Christians often feel forced to choose between the two. But the good news is that we don't have to make a choice. Science does not overthrow the Bible. Faith does not require rejecting science. World-renowned scientist Francis Collins, author of The Language of God, along with fellow scientist Karl Giberson show how we can embrace both. Their fascinating treatment explains how God cares for and interacts with his creation while science offers a reliable way to understand the world he made. Together they clearly answer dozens of the most common questions people ask about Darwin, evolution, the age of the earth, the Bible, the existence of God and our finely tuned universe. They also consider how their views stack up against the new atheists as well as against creationists and adherents of intelligent design. The authors disentangle the false conclusions of Christians and atheists alike about science and evolution from the actual results of research in astronomy, physics, geology and genetics. In its place they find a story of the grandeur and beauty of a world made by a supremely creative God.

Faith, Reason and the Natural Sciences

In Faith, Reason and the Natural Sciences: The Challenge of the Natural Sciences in the Work of Theologians the author, Giuseppe Tanzella-Nitti, attempts to go beyond Non-overlapping Magisteria, showing why the sciences constitute a fruitful challenge for theologians’ work, and the insights of Judaeo-Christian Revelation constitute a source of understanding for scientists’ ultimate questions.

The author’s intent is not to convince non-believers to believe in God, but rather to help them better evaluate the motivations for their unbelief— motivations that may rely upon an erroneous judgment about what science is or says, or what faith in God is supposed to be or teach. The intent is, rather, to help all —believers and non-believers alike— to practice a sincere intellectual honesty, recognizing that the questions we address to this incredible universe will always exceed the answers we receive.

Why Believing in God Is Reasonable and Responsible

The days have passed when the goodness of God --indeed, the reality of God itself-- could reasonably be called a consensus opinion. God's reputation has come under considerable review in recent days, with some going so far as to say that it's not we who've made a mess of things. Instead whatever it is we call God is to blame.

But is such an opinion really a fair assessment? In this magisterial collection, the contemporary complaints against belief in God are addressed with intellectual passion and rigor by some of the most astute theological and philosophical minds of the day.

Reason, Faith, and Revolution

Terry Eagleton’s witty and polemical Reason, Faith, and Revolution is bound to cause a stir among scientists, theologians, people of faith and people of no faith, as well as general readers eager to understand the God Debate. On the one hand, Eagleton demolishes what he calls the “superstitious” view of God held by most atheists and agnostics and offers in its place a revolutionary account of the Christian Gospel. On the other hand, he launches a stinging assault on the betrayal of this revolution by institutional Christianity.

There is little joy here, then, either for the anti-God brigade—Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens in particular—nor for many conventional believers. Instead, Eagleton offers his own vibrant account of religion and politics in a book that ranges from the Holy Spirit to the recent history of the Middle East, from Thomas Aquinas to the Twin Towers.

The Language of God

An instant bestseller, The Language of God provides the best argument for the integration of faith and logic since C.S. Lewis’s Mere Christianity .

It has long been believed that science and faith cannot mingle. Faith rejects the rational, while science restricts us to a life with no meaning beyond the physical. It is an irreconcilable war between two polar-opposite ways of thinking and living. Written for believers, agnostics, and atheists alike, The Language of God provides a testament to the power of faith in the midst of suffering without faltering from its logical stride. Readers will be inspired by Collin’s personal story of struggling with doubt, as well as the many revelations of the wonder of God’s creation that will forever shape the way they view the world around them.

Francis S. Collins is one of the country's leading geneticists and the longtime head of the Human Genome Project. Prior to coming to Washington, he helped to discover the genetic misspellings that cause cystic fibrosis, neurofibromatosis, and Huntington's disease. He lives in Bethesda, Maryland, and in his spare time he enjoys riding a motorcycle and playing guitar.

Evolution. The Disguised Friend of Faith?

Arthur Peacocke, eminent priest-scientist, has collected thirteen of his essays for this volume. Previously published in various academic journals and edited books, the provocative essays expand upon the theme of the evolution of nature, humanity, and belief. They are grouped in three parts:

• Natural Evolution, covering topics ranging from the implications of deterministic chaos; biological evolution and Christian theology; chance, potentiality, and God; and complexity, emergence, and divine creativity.
• Humanity Evolving in the Presence of God, articulating God’s presence in and to the world as it is unveiled by the sciences; the chrysalis of the human; the nature and purpose of man in science and Christian theology.
• Theological Evolution—the Re-shaping of Belief, dealing with science and the future of theology; public truth in religion; the incarnation of the self-expressive word of God; DNA; and the challenges and possibilities of western theism.

In the epilogue, Dr. Peacocke discusses wisdom in science and education, referring to Robert Grosseteste, a medieval scientist-theologian.

Science, Faith, and How We Make Sense of Things

In Surprised by Meaning, through a non-technical discussion of science and faith, Alister E. McGrath, the author of the best-selling The Dawkins Delusion explains how both science and faith help with the overriding human desire to make sense of things.

We live in an age when the growth of the Internet has made it easier than ever to gain access to information and accumulate knowledge. But information is not the same as meaning, nor is knowledge identical with wisdom. Many people feel engulfed by a tsunami of facts in which they can find no meaning.

In thirteen short, accessible chapters McGrath, author of the bestselling The Dawkins Delusion, leads the reader through a nontechnical discussion of science and faith. How do we make sense of the world around us? Are belief in science and the Christian faith compatible? Does the structure of the universe point toward the existence of God?

McGrath's goal is to help readers see that science is neither antithetical to faith, nor does it supersede faith. Both science and faith help with the overriding human desire to make sense of things. Faith is a complex idea. It is not a blind leap into the dark but a joyful discovery of a bigger picture of wondrous things of which we are all a part.

The Faith of Scientists

The Faith of Scientists is an anthology of writings by twenty-one legendary scientists, from the dawn of the Scientific Revolution to the frontiers of science today, about their faith, their views about God, and the place religion holds--or doesn't--in their lives in light of their commitment to science. This is the first book to bring together so many world-renowned figures of Western science and present them in their own words, offering an intimate window into their private and public reflections on science and faith. 

Leading religion scholar Nancy Frankenberry draws from diaries, personal letters, speeches, essays, and interviews, and reveals that the faith of scientists can take many different forms, whether religious or secular, supernatural or naturalistic, conventional or unorthodox. These eloquent writings reflect a spectrum of views from diverse areas of scientific inquiry. 

Represented here are some of the most influential and colossal personalities in the history of science, from the founders of science such as Galileo, Johannes Kepler, Francis Bacon, Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, and Albert Einstein, to modern-day scientists like Carl Sagan, Stephen Jay Gould, Jane Goodall, Freeman Dyson, Stephen Hawking, Edward O. Wilson, and Ursula Goodenough. Frankenberry provides a general introduction as well as concise introductions to each chapter that place these writings in context and suggest further reading from the latest scholarship. As surprising as it is illuminating and inspiring, The Faith of Scientists is indispensable for students, scholars, and anyone seeking to immerse themselves in important questions about God, the universe, and science.

Science and Faith within Reason

Scientists, historians, philosophers and theologians often engage in debates on the limitations and mutual interactions of their respective fields of study. Serious discussions are often overshadowed by the mass-produced popular and semi-popular literature on science and religion, as well as by the political agendas of many of the actors in these debates. For some, reducing religion and science to forms of social discourse is a possible way out from epistemological overlapping between them; yet is there room for religious faith only when science dissolves into one form of social discourse? The religion thus rescued would have neither rational legitimisation nor metaphysical validity, but if both scientific and religious theories try to make absolute claims on all possible aspects of reality then conflict between them seems almost inevitable.

In this book leading authors in the field of science and religion, including William Carroll, Steve Fuller, Karl Giberson and Roger Trigg, highlight the oft-neglected and profound philosophical foundations that underlie some of the most frequent questions at the boundary between science and religion: the reality of knowledge, and the notions of creation, life and design. In tune with Mariano Artigas’s work, the authors emphasise that these are neither religious nor scientific but serious philosophical questions.

Dawkins' Case Against God

Answering the New Atheism: Dismantling Dawkins' Case Against God

The essential book for dismantling Richard Dawkins' atheistic agenda. Scott Hahn and Benjamin Wiker collaborate to debunk Dawkins' theories and show how inconsistent and illogical his conclusions truly are. This is the definitive book for college students or faithful Christians hoping to answer Dawkins' claims and assert the logic and beauty of their faith.

Darwinism and the Divine: Evolutionary Thought and Natural Theology

There remains a widespread perception that Charles Darwin's theory of natural selection marked the demise of any viable Christian natural theology - most notably, that of William Paley. But did Darwinism really shake such fundamental beliefs to the core? Or did Darwin's "dangerous idea" instead serve to transform and illuminate our views on the relation between the natural world and the divine? Darwinism and the Divine presents a detailed examination of the implications of evolutionary thought for natural theology, from the publication of On the Origin of Species more than a century-and-a-half ago through to the present day. Integrating and extending the latest scholarly research from across a wide variety of disciplines, world-renowned theologian Alister E. McGrath first explores the forms of natural theology that emerged in England from the late 17th century until 1850, showing us how these views were affected by the advent of Darwin's theories. McGrath offers the most detailed account of the intellectual background to William Paley's natural theology currently available, and offers an informed assessment of the impact of Darwin on such approaches. He then considers how Christian belief has adapted to Darwinism, and whether there is a place for design both in the world of science and the world of theology. Journeying well beyond On the Origin of the Species, Darwinism and the Divine offers a scholarly and thought-provoking consideration of the co-existence of natural theology with Darwinism in today's world.

José Manuel Giménez-Amaya

Jose Manuel Gimenez-Amaya is Professor of Anatomy and Embryology. MD and PhD in biomedical research at the Autonomous University of Madrid; he is also PhD in Philosophy at the University of Navarre. He has published 2 books and more of 150 contributions in specialized journals and books. He has given around 100 conferences in research institutions of Europe, United States and Canada. He has been visiting Professor at MIT (Cambridge, Massachusetts), Rochester Medical School (Rochester, New York), University of California at San Diego (San Diego, California), Aarhus University (Denmark) and Heidelberg University (Germany). At present, he is the Director of the Research Group in Science, Reason and Faith of the University of Navarre.