I recently listened to the audiobook of one of my academic heroes, Francis S. Collins. He is a brilliant physician/geneticist, the former head of the Human Genome Project and the current director of the National Institute of Health. He also is a Christian and plays guitar.
The book, “The Language of God,” presents several scientific arguments which suggest that current scientific understanding is not incompatible with the existence of God. He also discusses some of the different viewpoints on the topic and reviews their scientific merit. Collins also weaves into the book his own journey from atheism to Christianity.
I really enjoyed how Collins challenged what he called the “God of the Gaps” thinking. This refers to the way people often want to ascribe to God aspects of the world which are currently unexplainable by science. He attributes many of the clashes between science and religion to such controversies, such as the conflict between Galileo and the Catholic Church.
Instead, we can see God not only in the gaps of that which is natural, but as the author of the mechanisms which science has discovered. I think we can use such a paradigm to learn more about how our world is a manifestation of the one who created it, a word from God. I highly recommend that those who are curious about such matters should give this book a read!
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