People of faith have a bad rap. In his book The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins says:

Faith cannot move mountains (though generations of children are solemnly told the contrary and believe it). But it is capable of driving people to such dangerous folly that faith seems to me to qualify as a kind of mental illness.

New atheists have recently fortified their no-god position by building a bunker beneath the soil of human ingenuity and scientific discovery.

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The scientific revolution is a fairly new phenomenan. The Age of Enlightenment, also known as The Age of Reason, began in the 18th century. This movement deified mans intellect and catapulted humanity toward a trajectory of self-reliance and autonomy. By highlighting the intellect, humanity has been able to mine creativity and ingenuity within the collective conscious mind like never before. If necessity is the mother of invention, our thirst for greater scientific innovation has become a catalyst and a reinforcing feedback loop that continues to expand exponentially. The greater the desire, the greater the necessity to satiate that desire. We have become science and technology junkies.

Is faith incompatible with science?

Let’s define faith. Faith is often understood as being “belief that is not based on proof.” But this begs the question, what is proof? — Science utilizes the mental apparatus to probe physical reality. Proof is based upon obtained empirical information: information you can touch, taste, measure, see and feel. Proof is obtained through the scientific method. Ultimately science must be observable, measurable, repeatable and in the present. All 4 of those components must exist simultaneously to qualify as genuine science. That is the only way to establish unrefutable scientific proof.

What about science that can’t be repeated and in the present you ask? Good question. Where science is incomplete, imagination takes over. We all have faith commitments that exist in the absence of irrefutable scientific proof. However, faith does not exist in a vacuum. Evidence can often times guide and direct our belief.

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Mad scientist?

Sir Isaac Newton, one of the Age of Enlightenment scientists, once said:

“He who thinks half-heartedly will not believe in God; but he who really thinks has to believe in God.”

Isaac Newton exemplified that reason and faith can coexist. He utilized the scientific method to prove the law of gravity while simultaneously committing himself to faith in the transcendent.

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Are people of faith mentally ill? -- Let's be reasonable.

----> What do you think?