World renowned physician-geneticist and apologist Francis Collins called on Christians to “re-anchor” their worldviews on biblical principles in the midst of turbulent political times. “As people of faith, we need to re-anchor our worldview, not in political arguments or messages, but in biblical principles,” he said.
Collins gave the keynote address for the BioLogos Faith & Science Conference 2024 held in the Raleigh Convention Center, North Carolina, which was publicized this month (August) on the BioLogos website and social media.
Speaking on the topic ‘Come Let us Reason Together: On Truth, Science, Faith and Trust’, Collins said, “Christians should be in the best position to advocate against divisiveness and animosity and in favor of love, grace and truth, especially when it comes to the admonition to love our enemies and to pray for those who persecute us, because our faith is the source of our hope and from which we draw our strength.”
He pleaded for fellow Americans to regain respect for each other and institutions, as he spoke on four topics: truth, science, trust and faith. After referring to extremist elements at play in American society, he appealed to the “under-appreciated, exhausted majority” to support efforts to gain societal stability again.
Collins opined that post-modernism in the present era had unraveled from taking a subjective approach to art and literature, followed by the same in the field of science, and now emerging individualistic attitudes within political discourse.
This meant people could be easily offended if they don’t like certain messages, or even the messenger. And for Collins, finding such signs of this anger and division in church communities was troubling.
“We really need to call ourselves back to our foundations to be part of the solution,” he said, calling for churchgoers to regain a sense of trust “because you can have truth, and you can have science and faith… but unless we figure out what information to trust, what institutions to trust, we’re going to continue to slip into a more chaotic environment.”
On the matter of truth, Collins outlined four “circles” for discerning truths.
Firstly, he said there were necessary truths, such as math sums, followed by established truths, such as the Earth’s circumference which “don’t care about how you feel. It’s a fact.”
Next is a “zone of uncertainty,” such as the somewhat enigmatic nature of dark energy: “We seem to think that it’s a real thing, because the physics point to it. But we don’t know enough about it to say with any great clarity what that is.”
Finally, there are opinions. For example, saying dogs are better than cats.
For Collins, the societal issue is that people don’t know which circle to discern for political truths in American society.
“The problem I think we’re having right now is not distinguishing…which category are we in here? And if we could be more clear about that, I think it would help our discourse a lot,” he said.
Scientists were distrusted by people in the Covid pandemic, alongside uncertainty about the vaccines. Collins said four times the number of unvaccinated Americans (200,000 people) died compared to those killed in the Vietnam War.
“Some of the scientists, myself included, didn’t do a great job of communicating the facts of the matter in a way that explained our uncertainties as this was blowing up in front of us. The bottom line is somehow the enemy, the virus, was replaced by other enemies of people around us; it must be their fault. And we’re still there now. And that is deeply troubling.”
Climate change was another scientific issue confusing people. Yet for Collins, the facts were clear: “Thermometers don’t really care what political party you belong to.” He referred to a graph showing an upturn in temperatures on Earth since 1850.
However, he believed that positive action by individuals and governments could change the situation. “Some of the goals out there are not pie in the sky.”
Collins said that studies showed a decline in trust by the public of American institutions, with the military as an exception. People queried competency, expertise and humility when looking at whom to trust. Yet a fourth question of whether a political figure's values aligned with an individual troubled the scientist. He called for differences to be recognised without “demonizing others.”
Collins is respected in his field as a former leader of the international Human Genome Project. He was once thanked by fellow scientist and atheist Richard Dawkins, who felt “very grateful” after the expert in disease genes and his team kept atheist and ardent debater Christopher Hitchens alive for another six to nine months after an oesophageal cancer diagnosis, thanks to genomic analysis resulting in targeted therapy.
At the end of his BioLogo talk, Collins himself shared some poignant news. After the event he would undergo treatment for an aggressive form of prostate cancer. However, he voiced publicly his trust in medical staff looking after him and more than anyone, his savior Jesus Christ.
“I trust, certainly, in my surgeon or I wouldn’t have picked him. I’ve trusted the rest of the medical staff that will be taking care of me. I trust in all the people who’ve done the work up until now to assure me that this is probably going to be curable.
“But mostly, I have trusted Jesus will be right there beside me. And that gives me the greatest comfort of all.”
