Beliefs

 

I Believe

I believe for every drop of rain that falls
A flower grows
I believe that somewhere in the darkest night
A candle glows
I believe for everyone who goes astray, someone will come
To show the way
I believe, I believe

What do you believe?

Must  followers of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math, STEM, disciplines be atheists? When I was first working, a co-worker said that someday since I was an engineer, I would stop believing in God and become an atheist.  Now almost 45 years later, it still has not happened.  I have instead realized that the position that was being put forward is merely one of nomenclature. Scientists believe in an absolute and the absence of an absolute.  For example they believe in a temperature of absolute zero. Theists believe in God and the absence of God.  Exchange absolute for God, and they are both saying the same thing. Technologists believe in an absolute, even though technologists have never obtained either an absolute or an absolute zero. Theists believe in God, even though theists have not seen God or the absence of God.

Instead what scientists and other technologists believe is that through research and study they can discover  how the absolute/God works, NOT that there is no absolute/God. If there are rules, those rules are the mind of God. The problem is the belief that understanding how rules works means that if you follow those same rules that YOU are then God. It does not mean that studying the rules, or personally testing those rules, means you don’t believe in the rules.  In the New Testament of the Christian Bible, when the Apostle Thomas doubts that the others have seen the Risen Christ he is not saying that there is no Risen Christ, only that he personally needs the proof that there is a Risen Christ. He won’t accept the word of others that there is a Risen Christ. Christ himself does NOT chastise Thomas for this doubt.  Christ instead appears before Thomas, and asks Thomas to inspect his wounds.  But Thomas did not say that by inspecting those wounds he had become the Risen Christ, only that he believed in the Risen Christ.

If the rules are those of the absolute/God, knowing those rules means that you believe in the rules, not that you ARE the rules.