1. Faith and Science

1. 1. Faith and Science

2. Introduction Human nature and functioning can be viewed from a variety of disciplines • Economically • Politically • Culturally • Educationally • Socially • Biologically • Psychologically • Theologically

3. Introduction No one discipline provides all the answers for human behavior! Both psychology and theology have as their object the study of man • Some in psychology don’t see the value of theology • Some in theology don’t see the value of psychology

4. Thinking both psychologically and “christianly” about behavior • Gospel presentations to children vs. adults • Church growth and pastoral leadership development • Ministry to those experiencing loss or death • Best way to bring up a child • “Revival”, “conversion”, “baptism in HS” • Ministries of Jimmy Swaggart or Ted Haggard

5. Integration between psychology and theology: a complex endeavor • Many psychologies and many theologies • Complicated by existing perceptions of faith and science (Entwistle, 2004: Chapters 1 and 2) • Further complicated by perceptions with respect to: • Worldview (Entwistle, 2004: Chapter 4) • Epistemology (Entwistle, 2004: Chapter 5) • Cosmology (Entwistle, 2004: Chapter 6) • Philosophic anthropology (Entwistle, 2004: Chapter 7)

6. Integration between psychology and theology: a complex endeavor • The very ancient debate between Jerusalem and Athens • Tertullian (Entwistle, 2004, p. 11) • Augustine: Dichotomy between the City of God and City of Man • Not as hotly debated in other professions • Christian dentist? Christian pilot? • The difference…

7. My Personal Framework • Trained for pastoral ministry (pre-seminary major; psychology minor) • 8 years of experience in pastoral ministry (three churches in South Africa: Johannesburg, Cape Town) • Trained as a counseling psychologist • Trained as a social worker • Entwistle’s first two paragraphs in Preface

8. My Personal Framework • Five degrees (theology, psychology, social work) and two diplomas (MFT and Senior Business Management) • Passionately committed to Pentecostal theology • Committed to the rigors of the scientific method • Recoil from attempts to separate spirit from body (unbiblical dichotomy) • Frustrated with an ecclesiology that does not promote biblical holism and discipleship • Committed to Kingdom principles and the role of the church as God’s instrument for peace

9. Moving towards “integration” • We have to understand the discussion in terms of worldview and philosophical issues: this is rarely discussed • We must become aware of our own personal presuppositional backdrops • Developing the skill to articulate our own understanding of how to integrate the two (psychology as a Christian discipline)

10. Moving towards “integration” • I am passionately committed to integration: “All truth is God’s Truth” • My Christian worldview WILL affect the way I engage the social sciences • My commitment to science WILL affect the way I look at the church

11. “The knowledge of man is as the waters, some descending from above, and some springing from beneath; the one informed by the light of nature, the other inspired by divine revelation” Francis Bacon (1561-1626)

12. History of conflict: Faith & Science Middle Ages • Church is the supreme source of knowledge • Philosophy is the handmaiden of theology • Thomas Aquinas (1224-1274) in Summa Theologia

13. Theology “surpasses other speculative sciences…because other sciences derive their certitude from the natural light of human reason, which can err; whereas (theology) derives its certitude from the light of divine knowledge, which cannot be misled” “Whatsoever is found in other sciences contrary to any truth of this science must be condemned as false” Thomas Aquinas Summa Theologia

14. History of conflict: Faith & Science Middle Ages • Church is the supreme source of knowledge • Philosophy is the handmaiden of theology • Thomas Aquinas (1224-1274) in Summa Theologia • But validity of theological interpretation is not the same as authority of scripture • This was the argument of the Reformers: “Sola Scriptura!”

15. History of conflict: Faith & Science Middle Ages • Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) prosecuted and condemned in 1633 of heresy! “…namely having held and believed a doctrine which is false and contrary to the divine and Holy Scripture: that the Sun is the center of the world, and does not move from east to west…”(Entwistle, 2004, p. 23)

16. Contribution of Christianity to origins of scientific thought • Scientific thought emerged in 16th and 17th century EUROPE (not elsewhere) • Christianity formed the philosophical landscape • Medieval insistence on faith in rationality • World is created by a powerful and rational God • Mechanistic world view: expectation of order, rules, laws • Major figures were Christians • …a fertile ground for advances in mathematics, rational discourse, belief in orderliness of nature

17. Contribution of Protestantism to origins of scientific thought • Significantly over-represented in scientific community • Protestant work ethic: middle class, vocational opportunities • “All the world reflects the glory of God” • Studying the book of God’s word and his works

18. Contribution of Protestantism to origins of scientific thought • Establishment of the first American universities

19. Contribution of Protestantism to origins of scientific thought “In gloriamdeiincrementumquescientiarum hoc aedificiumuniversitatiprincetoniensi” However, Christianity cannot be said to be the CAUSE in rise in science

20. Age of Enlightenment (18th Century) • Gradual replacement of scriptural and ecclesiastical authority by “reason” • Beginning of periodic antagonism between theology and science

21. Thomas Hobbes English political philosopher Author of “Leviathan”

22. David Hume Scottish philosopher “empiricism” “scientific skepticism” “naturalism”

23. Immanuel Kant John Locke Personal liberty with respect to property

24. Adam Smith Scottish economist Laissez-faire economic theory

25. Thomas Jefferson Ben Franklin

26. Soul and Psyche “…from the moment modern psychiatry emerged as a distinct profession, psychiatry and religion have overlapped and at times overtly competed. The reason for this is clear: both seek to heal forms of brokenness that stand on the ambiguous borderline between body and what is variously referred to as ‘psyche’ or ‘spirit’” Browning & Evison (1990, p.3-4)

27. 19th Century Enthusiasm for “holistic” ministry in both England and America • Social engagement • Established welfare societies like Salvation Army • Schools for immigrants • Homes for unwed mothers • City missions • Agencies to help poor, sick, prisoners • Supported legislation to bring about social justice

28. Soul and Psyche • Long history of “soul care” in the church dating back to a time before Augustine and Aquinas • Before 1879 it was rooted in philosophy, religion or folk wisdom • After 1879 this responsibility gradually passed from pastors to secular professionals

29. Soul and Psyche Leipzig 1879: Wilhelm Wundt’s laboratory • Using the scientific method (paradigm of the natural sciences) to research humans • Visual perception, attentional processes, reaction times • Drastic departure for psychology: from metaphysical discipline to experimental enterprise • Many of first psychologists from religious families (Wundt was Lutheran PK)

30. Soul and Psyche From France to Vienna • France: Franz Mesmer (1734-1815) and Jean-Martin Charcot (1825-1893), Freud’s mentor • Sigmund Freud (1865-1939) • “uncovers” the dark secrets of the unconscious • Pathology is caused by defense mechanisms • Took psychology from psychophysics to psychotherapy: “talk cure” can cure pathology! • Pathology is not “sin”

31. Soul and Psyche Since “Vienna” psychology has often left it’s scientific roots and ventured onto the metaphysical. “…psychology functions as a science only so long as it uses the scientific method in application to its subject. As soon as it considers metaphysical questions, it returns to being a philosophical enterprise” (p. 46 note 8).

32. Christian Response Catholics • Initial suspicion to engagement • Vatican II under Pope John XXIII (see p. 38) • Gaudium et Spes(1965) the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World (see quote p. 52) • Some eloquent Catholic clergy on psychology: William Meissner and Henri Nouwen (“The wounded healer”, 1979)

33. Christian Response Liberal and neo-orthodox response • Embrace psychotherapy • Evaluate psychology from a Christian perspective • Anton Boisen (Hospital chaplaincy, CPE) • Paul Tillich (“The courage to be”, 1952) • Reinhold Niebuhr (“just war” philosopher) • Philosophic analytical tools: existential-phenomenology and American philosophic pragmatism • Came at a cost: from “salvation to self-actualization” • Purves (2001) quote on p. 54

34. Christian Response First Evangelical response: Fundamentalist faction • Rejection of psychology in toto • Characterized by anti-intellectual, anti-social action, anti-ecumenical • “Social gospel” replacing evangelism • Chief of critics: Jay Adams (quote p. 57): counseling interventions are exclusively the domain of the church

35. “The late 19th century was a period of time when European religious thought penetrated the church in the United States. What has become known as the "modernist/fundamentalist" debate was waged. Core Christian beliefs like the authority of Scripture, the Virgin Birth, the deity of Christ, vicarious atonement, and the resurrection of Christ were undermined by the influence of European scholarship. As a result of this debate, lines were drawn between those Christians who wanted to focus on winning souls and those who affirmed a social gospel that valued social change and reform as the focus of Christian ministry efforts. A huge breach in American Christianity was forming and the breaking point was personified in the Scopes Monkey Trial that took place in Tennessee in 1925.

36. The "modernist" position is personified in the defense lawyer Clarence Darrow whose rhetoric and defense of evolution being taught in public schools was clearly presented. The "fundamentalist" position was argued by William Jennings Bryan, the Nebraska populist, whose courtroom presentation sounds much like a Billy Sunday evangelistic meeting. The nation’s attention was riveted on this trial because it personified the nation’s religious allegiances and highlights the evangelism versus social action/gospel bifurcation as a unique American experience. The Scopes Trial solidified the considerable opinion lines within American Christianity, and it wasn’t until 1947 when Carl F.H. Henry wrote The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism that Bible-believing Christians were challenged to reconsider the broadest implications of the gospel” Klaus, 2004

37. “The Great Reversal” • Move from post-millenialism to pre-millenialism (Scofield Bible tended to de-invest in the world) • Age of optimism gave way to pessimism • Suburbanization (upward social mobility) • Rise of “social gospel” • Focus on prohibition • American philosophical individualism

38. “The Great Reversal” • Evangelists like Charles Finney gave up on the city: More success with “camp meetings”

39. “The Great Reversal” • Revivalists preaching on individual reform (D.L. Moody and Billy Sunday)

40. “The Great Reversal” • Fundamentalist battle with Darwinian evolution (Scopes Monkey Trial) Clarence Darrow: Scopes Monkey Trial

41. Response of Churches

42. Christian Response Second Evangelical response: Integrationist movement • Clyde Narramore, Paul Tournier, James Dobson, Gary Collins, Bruce Narramore, Larry Crabb • Interpreting psychological issues for the Evangelical community • Progress: • Several APA accredited training programs • Two journals • Two major professional organizations

43. Christian Response Recent Developments • Massive growth of AACC: http://www.aacc.net/conferences/2009-world-conference/ • Second generation “Biblical Psychology” actively cooperating with AACC: separate track

44. APA Response: Spirituality • Division 36 of APA http://www.apa.org/divisions/div36/homepage2.html • Since 1996 APA publishes more than dozen books on spirituality

45. APA Response: Spirituality Eg.: Sperry & Shafranske (Eds.)(2005) • “First book to critically survey how spirituality can be incorporated into a range of psychotherapeutic approaches” • Chapter by Tan & Johnson, “Spiritually-oriented cognitive-behavioral therapy”