Thoughts in a Haystack

John F. Haught is the Landegger Distinguished Professor of Theology at Georgetown University. and a Roman Catholic theologian* of some note. For the wider public, he is notable as the sole expert witness on theology to testify in the Kitzmiller case. Judge Jones said that Professor Haught:

I have been reading Professor Haught's book, Science & Religion: From Conflict to Conversation (1995, Paulist Press, New York). Professor Haught does, in spades, what some people have criticized Richard Dawkins' much more widely known book, The God Delusion, for failing to do. Haught set out to discuss whether modern science is compatible with those religious beliefs that are more sophisticated than fundamentalism and creationism. Haught, if nothing else, produced a thought-producing ... and, no doubt, a blood pressure testing ... book in which most everybody will find something to hate.

Haught's approach, in a throwback to dialogues like Hume's, is to take certain issues nominally dividing science and religion and have proponents of four different views make their cases. The four viewpoints are:

The issues examined include: "Is Religion Opposed to Science?", "Does Science Rule Out a Personal God?" and "Is Life Reducible to Chemistry?" The dangers of this approach are many. The attempt to break down complex views about a broad subject into only four categories is bound to result in blurred borders, a problem Haught acknowledges. For example, the most stark division -- atheism vs. theism -- crowds out any other in Haught's book. All Haught's advocates except the atheistic Conflict supporter, speak of their theology's relation to science. My own agnosticism, tending to the Contrast view, with dollops of Contact and Conflict, finds no voice in the dialogue. But that is a relatively small point, easily enough filled in by the reader.

A larger danger is failing to fairly represent the arguments of one's opponent's -- the charge that has been made against Dawkins. Haught admits his preference for the Contact view, supplemented by Confirmation. He sees that as the "most fruitful and reasonable response to the unfortunate tension that has held so many scientists away from an appreciation of religion and an even larger number of religious people from enjoying the discoveries of science." Needless to say, many will reject even the attempt.

There is no way, of course, that Haught could perfectly succeed in representing all sides. Proponents of atheism will, no doubt, complain that Haught has missed the nuances of their arguments and many religious advocates may object that he has given too much credit to science. In fact, Haught hopes that the "polemical edge" he gave each proponent won't serve as an indicator of dead-end hostility but only as an inducement to discussion. In my opinion, Haught has, despite the dangers, produced a stimulating and valuable work that belies the notion that there are no sophisticated arguments for theism. But, as Haught himself states, it is less a conversation than a prologue to a conversation.

Now, if we can only get somebody interested in listening.

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* In the interests of full disclosure, I was raised in the Roman Catholic religion and attended Catholic schools for sixteen years, through college, the latter under the gentle tutelage of Jesuits. I had lost what faith I might ever have had well before the end of that time but it is possible, as my wife often says, that "you can take the boy out of the Church but you can't take the Church out of the boy." In any event, during those years, I met many people who struck me as possessing both a deep faith and considerable intellectual rigor . Those experiences no doubt resulted in my being less disdainful of believers than I might otherwise have been and less certain of the righteousness of my own infidelity.