5 Lessons Learned from Teaching College Students about Science and Christianity

For twenty years I have taught a senior-level interdisciplinary course on science and Christianity at a small Southern liberal arts college. I teach students who self-identify as Atheist, Agnostic, Protestant Liberal, Protestant Conservative, Catholic, Greek Orthodox, Muslim, Jewish, (well, you get the point), and the first day of class is always rather tense.

In my students’ eyes I see their skepticism. “What is this guy going to sell me?” is visible in the bubbles popping out of their heads. As the semester progresses, however, the students come to appreciate the importance of both science and faith in modern society. I have learned much each time the class has been offered, both about the subject matter and about the attitudes of college students toward such complex topics. Here are my top five lessons learned.

1. Even though the majority (65%) of my college students identify as “nones” on the question of religious affiliation, they are hungry for information on both Christianity and science, as long as it does not have spin.

Students today are saturated—indeed drowning—in information, but most of this information is presented with an agenda. It turns out that students appreciate delving into primary source material, not material that is interpreted through the lens of individuals who are trying to change their minds on particular topics. These primary works include historical readings such as the Bible, Aristotle’s History of Animalia, Darwin’s Origin of the Species, and Galileo’s Dialogue, as well as contemporary writings such as Pope Francis’ Laudito Si, Ray Kurtzweil’s The Singularity is Near, and many scientific journal articles on environmental health.

When students read such works and are challenged to determine their meaning and implications, they come to the conclusion that the perceived conflict between science and Christianity is just that—perceived, but not real.

2. Students are unaware that the majority of influential Christian thinkers, from Billy Graham to Pope Francis to John Calvin, have no qualms with the insights from science.

Likewise, students don’t realize that almost all of the scientists during the Scientific Revolution and many contemporary scientists find the need for both scientific and religious modes of inquiry.

I’ll never forget the day I was perusing the shelves of a bookstore and happened upon a newly released book by my favorite scientific writer Steven Jay Gould. Gould wrote frequently and eloquently on the neo-Darwinian synthesis and how evolutionary change originates with changes in embryonic development, but the title of the book on the shelf caused me to freeze: “Rocks of Ages: Science and Religion in the Fullness of Life.” If Steven Jay Gould, one of the biggest science advocates on the planet, saw the necessity of religion for a fulfilled life, then there must not be an inherent conflict between science and faith. Indeed, philosopher Alvin Plantinga correctly identifies naturalism, and not science itself, as the only belief system precluding faith as a legitimate mode of inquiry.