Religion, Science, and Culture: Learning from Langdon B. Gilkey

Abstract

When Langdon Gilkey began his engagement with religion and sci ence, the primary concern was the implication of contemporary sci ence for religious faith. He focused on the intellectual and cognitive challenges of a scientific worldview to a religious worldview, on the challenges of a world that can be known through science to the idea of God at work in the world. The problems being engaged by much of the dominant literature on religion and science today continue to revolve around the ontological and epistemological implications of science and of the scientific method to faith claims of particular religious traditions. At the same time, there continues to be increasing engagement with the ethical questions raised by what science enables humanity to do to and with the world through technology. Whether the approaches are apologetic, constructive, or historical, the dominant per spectives in the dialogue between religion and science continue to assume the existence of robust science and technological activities that create and sustain an established scientific-technological culture that has lead to secularization (and the offshoot of religious fundamentalism?at least in the case of the United States). Notwithstanding the widespread recognition of the importance of the global and religiously plural context in which the religion and science discourse takes place, what is still commonly overlooked is the reality that science and religion come into contact also in contexts where science and technology have not yet led to an established scientific and technological culture or to the problem of secularization. Today, in many parts of the world (such as the Philippines), reli gion remains the dominant cultural force, and science is perceived as something alien and a threat to faith. While technology has had a significant impact on the lives of people, it has not necessarily led to a shift in worldview. In such a prescientific and explicitly religious culture, the influence of science and technol ogy creates different sets of challenges from those confronted by theologians of science in the developed North. The issues of economic underdevelopment and the prevalence of poverty constitute the dominant concerns. In these contexts, science and technology may prove beneficial in the efforts to overcome poverty