Church Talks
SCIENCE AND RELIGION
[Talk was given by John E. Enslen at a Wetumpka Ward sacrament meeting on Sunday, May 30, 2021.]
I am grateful for an assignment from the bishopric to speak on the subject of “Science and Religion.”
All Truth Can Be Circumscribed Into One Great Whole
Although the world may seek to characterize a discussion of science and religion as “science versus religion,” the actual relationship between true science and true religion is one of perfect compatibility. All fixed, immutable, and unchanging truth is contained within the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and all truth harmonizes without conflict. All truth can be circumscribed into one great whole with Jesus Christ at the center.
But for the time being, we are relocated, transient sojourners in a temporary telestial world, and we really don’t know, or remember, very much about science, and we have myriad unanswered questions about religion. The quantum of truth that is unknown far exceeds the quantum of truth that is known. No mortal being can possess more than the tiniest scintilla of “knowledge of things as they are, and as they were, and as they are to come.” (D&C 93:24) We find ourselves in company with Nephi who recognized his limitations: “I know that [God] loveth his children, nevertheless, I do not know the meaning of all things.” (1 Nephi 11:17)
The beginning of elementary wisdom is our acknowledgment of God, and comprehending that the more we come to know, the better we realize how much we do not know. A quick comparison of our knowledge with God’s knowledge should be one of the most humbling experiences we can entertain. For us “to be learned is good, (but only) if [we] hearken unto the counsels of [a much wiser] God.” (2 Nephi 9:29)
Some Truths Are Much More Important To Know Than Other Truths
Though a part of the whole, not all individual truths are of equal value. Certain truths are more important to know, to prioritize, and to act upon.
Granted, the secular truths are extremely important because they provide us with safety, comfort, and ease. Without an understanding of secular truths, there would be no pasteurized milk, pressurized tennis balls, motorized machines, or COVID vaccines.
However, secular truths are not essential to our achievement of everlasting joy and happiness in the presence of God. We don’t have to know how to use a cell phone in order to get to heaven. Truths connected to the underpinnings of eternal life are the most important because they directly impact our eternal welfare as opposed to our temporary mortal welfare. “It is impossible for [us] to be saved in ignorance” (D&C 131:6) of the basic gospel truths which consist of faith in Jesus Christ, ongoing repentance, the receipt of authoritative ordinances, and simple consistent obedience to the commandments of God throughout our lives.
Acquiring eternal life in the presence of God is what every sane man or woman should desire. It is an association with other faithful, like-minded family members and friends in the presence of our Heavenly Father and His Son Jesus Christ on a celestialized earth, that will bring the most joy to our existence. After all, “men are [or men exist] that they might have joy.” (2 Nephi 2:25) It is in our own self-interest to seek eternal personal joy, accomplished ironically by forgetting our own self-interest and serving the interest of others. (See Matthew 10:39)
Gospel Truths Are Not Learned By Man’s Scientific Method
Gospel truths are not learned through the generally accepted scientific method. There never will be a litmus test to determine if Jesus Christ is the Son of God, or whether Christ performed the great atoning sacrifice, or whether Christ commanded Joseph Smith to reestablish Christ’s Church upon the earth for the last time in preparation for His return. Those things are learned spiritually, through a process which is absolute “foolishness” to the natural man. (See 1 Cor. 2:14) But that does not mean that faithful people are non-thinkers.
Even with regard to the study of spiritual matters, we are instructed to “arouse our faculties.” (Alma 32:37) In other words, we should turn on our brains in order to spiritually “experiment” upon His Word. Contrary to a common stereotype, we don’t have to set our brains aside in order to be good Latter-day Saints. The opposite is true: Thorough and consistent critical thinking will lead us toward God and His Kingdom, not away from them.
What we learn with our brains is an essential part of our testimony. When Oliver Cowdery tried to translate The Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ, the Lord told him that both mental labor and the feelings of his heart or bosom were part of the process: “[B]ehold, I say unto you, that you must study it out in your mind; then you must ask me if it be right, and if it is right I will cause that your bosom shall burn within you; therefore, you shall feel that it is right.” (D&C 9:8) After the appropriate amount of intellectual work, it is a “feeling,” the confirming witness of the Holy Ghost, that constitutes the ultimate acquisition of knowledge. That confirmation by the Holy Ghost surpasses any conviction based on an accumulation of sterile empirical data.
Because spiritual learning involves both the brain and the heart, it can be difficult and time consuming. To test a righteous principle, we fully engage our intellect with “real intent” (see 2 Nephi 31:13; Moroni 7:6; 10:4), and that means not having a fixed, unalterable, preconceived answer. “With real intent” also means a sincere desire to obey the answer that is received. The full test often includes consistently living the principle for a time in advance of the answer, all the while continuing to repent of our sins and earnestly knocking, asking, and seeking for an answer from God.
The confirmation of truth comes in the form of feelings that can vary in their nature from individual to individual. But there is a definite awareness and consciousness of a sensation centering around our heart or bosom. The sensation or feeling can come in different degrees, ranging from slightly sweet and tender to overwhelming and all-consuming, spreading from the tips of our toes to the very tops of our heads. Physically speaking, the feeling can range from warm to a burning fire within us, all the way to the marrow of our bones. (See Jeremiah 20:9) We have no control over when it comes or how long it stays. God chooses when to talk to us and for how long, the same as he controls the comings and goings of the wind. (See John 3:8)
For King Lamoni, the joy of emerging from darkness into the marvelous light of truth overcame his natural frame. “And the light...did light up his mind, which was the light of the glory of God,...[for it] had infused such joy...that the light of everlasting life was lit up in his soul....” (Alma 19:6)
When the Holy Ghost does come, we know it. The positive answers produce within us undeniable confidence, assurance, certainty, peace, and joy. The truth sets us free (see John 8:32) from our fears, peer pressure, addiction, and Satanic influences. If we walk through life unaided by this divine source of truth, unhappiness and misery are more likely to plague us.
As Latter-day Saints, We Seek To Know And Accept All Truths
As Latter-day Saints, we seek to know and accept all available truths. I quote our founding prophet, Joseph Smith: “One of the grand fundamental principles of [our religion] is to receive truth, let it come from whence it may.” (Discourses of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 199)
The Lord has instructed us to “seek learning even by study and also by faith” (D&C 88:118), and we are counseled to not only learn gospel principles, but secular theories in astronomy, history, geology, archaeology, and politics. We should study the best available books in those subjects. (See D&C 90:15) Even though we can’t know it all, we should desire to know as much as we can. The personal “advantage” we gain by learning now continues to be an “advantage” to us in the next world. (See D&C 130:19)
A desire to learn and understand truth is a basic principle of Latter-day Saint discipleship. Truth-seeking individuals sincerely yearning for light and knowledge make wonderful disciples of Christ, like those willing to form their own opinion of The Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ by personally reading it with real intent, as opposed to those willing to form their own strong opinion of the Book of Mormon without ever reading it. Truth seekers have the courage to elevate newly discovered truths above the false “tradition[s] of men” (Colossians 2:8) which label truth as fiction, and fiction as truth-—like the fiction that God is unable to speak to his children outside of the Bible.
Most of our acquired knowledge we would characterize as “secular” —acquired primarily through experience. But secular truths do not come exclusively from secular sources. They are still divinely inspired, notwithstanding the original recipient may be unaware of such inspiration. At a very minimum, God prearranged all of the circumstances for the discovery of every so-called secular or scientific truth, and “against none is [God’s] wrath kindled, save those who confess not his hand in all things....” (D&C 59:21)
God may not always be the most proximate cause, but He had a definite hand in every event at some earlier point in time. When we deal with the subject of causation, God is always the original moving cause, the Alpha, beginning with the organization of our intelligences (Abraham 3:21) and the introduction of Satanic “opposition in all things.” (2 Nephi 2:11) And God will be the ultimate, final, and triumphant cause—the Omega.
The Gospel of Jesus Christ Is A Science
God himself is certainly not anti-science. The gospel of Jesus Christ is an exact science. There are fixed divine laws in place which bind, restrict, confine, and define every outcome, based on the behavioral ingredients that we voluntarily place in our individual test tubes of life. In other words, the manner in which we each exercise our moral agency, as judged only by God, has precise, certain, predictable, “scientific” consequences. “There is a law, irrevocably decreed in heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated—And when we obtain any blessing from God, [the greatest of which is eternal life], it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated.” (D&C 130:20-21)
That is a scientific equation relating to our joy and happiness that is infinitely more important than E=mc2. The only input into the test tube over which we have control is the exercise of our agency. The most important elements we can add to the test tube are our obedience and ongoing repentance. Christ has already added his merciful ingredients to the test tube, and everyone’s reaction time will have been fully completed by Judgment Day. “Who am I that made man, saith the Lord, that will hold him guiltless that obeys not my commandments?” (D&C 58:30)
The Truth Never Changes, But Science Is Always In A State Of Flux
Latter-day Saint scientist Henry Eyring once answered his own rhetorical question: “Is there any conflict between science and religion? There is no conflict in the mind of God, but often there is conflict in the minds of men.” (Henry Eyring, Reflections of a Scientist, Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1983, p.2)
Although truth is unchanging, man’s world of science is always in a state of flux. Some who were considered the greatest thinkers in prior days determined that the earth was flat, that the sun revolved around the earth, and there were no horses in the Americas before the Spanish conquistadors. Some well accepted science eventually turns into science fiction.
There is still much that we do not know about the earth, the deep seas, the heavens, ancient history, or even our own human bodies. And when it comes to flux and non-quantifiable variables, the interpretive, behavioral sciences like sociology, psychology, and anthropology lead the way in the always-changing category. Fortunately, science tends to be self-correcting over time. Weak conclusions eventually die. Thus, we need to hold and reserve judgment.
We Are To Exercise Patience And Embrace The Uncertainty
There will be many additional scientific discoveries, and there will be continuing revelation through modern prophets. We believe in scientific and religious progress, not stagnation. With each new revelation, each new secular discovery, and each liberation from a previous faulty scientific assumption, our appreciation of God will increase. We will marvel at His patience and the manner in which He accomplishes His purposes despite the weaknesses of humanity.
I do not wish to downplay or totally ignore the apparent conflicts between our scriptures and accurately revealed science, even after conceding that our scriptures are not intended to be scientific textbooks. There are plenty of legitimate areas of uncertainty and debate. God is fully aware of the situation. He would have us patiently embrace the uncertainty and strengthen our confidence in His revelatory timetable.
The conflicts will be reconciled in time, and in the meanwhile, there is plenty of room for amiable disagreement amongst faithful members. But we must be careful when expounding as a self-proclaimed expert upon a subject about which very little has been revealed.
We can find much solace in this scripture: “Yea, verily I say unto you, in that day when the Lord shall come, he shall reveal all things—Things which have passed, and hidden things which no man knew, things of the earth, by which it was made, and the purpose and the end thereof—Things most precious, things that are above, and things that are beneath, things that are in the earth, and upon the earth, and in heaven.... And seek the face of the Lord always, that in patience ye may possess your souls, and ye shall have eternal life.” (D&C 101:32-34; 38)
Conclusion
When it comes right down to it, we can only know what God allows us to know, and He will not allow knowledge to replace our need for faith and thus destroy His whole purpose behind our probationary testing. “Faith is not to have a perfect knowledge.” (Alma 32:21) With regard to answering the hard questions, there will always be multiple choices between faith and coincidental, natural, or random-looking alternatives. In that way, we are allowed to live in an environment where we can freely develop our faith through the exercise of our agency.
Latter-day Saints have a healthy appreciation for science. But qualitatively speaking, our faith in science, reason, and scholarship is inferior to our faith in God. The one thing we can feel most absolutely sure about, and the one thing that makes the most sense in life, is the gospel of Jesus Christ. Scientists will never comprehend changing water to wine, controlling the weather and the seas, walking on water, moving mountains, multiplying loaves of bread and fishes, instantaneous healings, 72 continuous hours of daylight, or bringing back to life dead human bodies that have already commenced to decay, all accomplished by simple voice command, or by the “word of [His] power.” (Moses 1:35)
It is obvious that God understands a more advanced science than that which we understand—a higher science which ignores our understanding of gravity and physics. Yet with God, the miracles are all natural. With God, there is no such thing as the super-natural.
As we make our daily-life decisions, we must each individually decide upon that which we will most heavily rely. Elder Boyd K. Packer observed: “Each of us must accommodate the mixture of reason and revelation in our lives. The gospel not only permits it, but requires it.” (Boyd K. Packer, “I Say Unto You, Be One,” BYU Devotional, 12 February 1991)
Fortunately, most of the time, we will be able to accept scientific teachings without abandoning revealed saving doctrines that have been confirmed by the Holy Ghost. The more we study the scholarship, the more intellectually convinced we will become that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God and that The Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ is a translation of an authentic ancient text. But having a knowledge of the secular evidences will not be sufficient to keep us faithful. It is the spiritual manifestations that prevent us from abandoning our faith—the burning in our bosoms and the fire in our bones that propel us to retain, to keep, to hold, to cling and adhere to those dear, sacred declarations of eternal truths—even in our Job-like times of tribulation.
It is my testimony to you that God, to whom all things are spiritual (see D&C 29:34), lives. He is the literal Father of our spirits. Jesus Christ is His only begotten son, the promised Messiah who atoned for our sins and provides us with a resurrected body. The Bible is the word of God. The Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ, is authentic ancient scripture, preserved with the intent to bless us in our day. Joseph Smith is a most genuine prophet. We are led this very moment by a modern-day prophet, President Russell M. Nelson, who holds the keys to sacred covenants that lead to eternal life in the presence of a loving Heavenly Father.
This I declare without reservation or hesitation in the holy name of our Savior, Jesus Christ, Amen.