Science vs. Religion, or Not?

I wanted to respond to James’s post on science and religion. He spoke about the conflict between science and religion that we discussed in class the other day. He believed that most people should have admitted to believing other religions, which they did not belong to, looked ridiculous to them. Additionally, he also introduced the issue of people’s feelings about science and how much religious ground they were willing to concede to it.

James said, “If one is loyal to one's sect of faith, then one should believe that is the word of God and all other religions are merely pretenders.” I disagree to this statement. As was apparent in class, I have an entirely different perspective than the rest of the class, coming from the Eastern religious tradition. Hinduism has a religious tradition of incorporation; it easily assimilates the teachings and deities of other religions. For example, Hindus gave Buddha the status of one of the ten avatars, or earthly incarnations of God (similar to Jesus, given the belief that Jesus is God and not the son of God), making him part of its religious tradition. This was a clever political move that prevented Buddhists rallying against Hinduism. The Hindu motto should be ‘Do not fight other religions, instead make them part of your own’! The incorporation of other religions, however, can be justified by more than political rationale. Looking closely at the foundation of most religions, it is easy to see how identical they are in many aspects. The underlying principles are the same in most religions. “Love thy neighbor”, love everyone, the Golden Rule, they all same essentially the same thing at their cores. Coming from this point of view, I can believe in both Christianity and Hinduism and believe that the teachings of both are the “word of God”.

The other issue James introduced was the strength of people’s convictions in science versus religion. I do not feel that the fields necessarily are in conflict. Though today they are perceived as opposing forces, the origin of science as a field was to prove religious beliefs. And as someone said in class, religion tells us what happened, science explains how it happened. The heart of the debate between the two fields seems to revolve around human origin, creationism versus evolution. A new, emerging theory, however, reconciles those differences by proposing that both forces were at work. I have always believed this as it fits well into my religious views of the world. Let me explain further how this fits into my religious views. The way I always explain Buddhism or Hinduism is “the force” in Star Wars. God is everywhere and in everything; he is the ultimate energy that pervades everything and keeps the world turning. With this explanation as background, it is easy to view evolution as something that occurred within the context of creationism; the energy that came together to form the Big Bang was God, setting in motion evolution as scientists explain it. Personally, I do not see the conflict among different religions or between science and religion.