How Christian spirituality reconciles science and transcendent reality

¶ … worldview is a "set of presuppositions (assumptions which may be true, partially true or entirely false)," ("Four Major Worldviews," n.d.). The presuppositions that form our personal worldview have a strong bearing on our ongoing attitudes, behaviors, goals, and expectations. Our worldview might change throughout the course of our lives, due to exposure to new ideas, new people, or new ways of looking at the world. Naturally, religious upbringing and culture have a major influence on worldview development.

The seven major questions that help identify worldview and gain better understanding of self and others pertain to issues like prime reality and belief in deity, life after death, and ethics. Although there are potentially infinite worldviews depending on one's core beliefs and answers to major epistemological questions, pluralism, scientism, and postmodernism are some of the prevalent structures guiding contemporary worldviews.

Pluralism acknowledges the great diversity of human experiences and cultures, but disavows any absolute reality. In other words, pluralism is by definition relativistic. While pluralism permits tolerance of diversity in a pluralistic, heterogeneous society, the pluralistic point-of-view leads to weak worldview development due to there being no concept of absolute truth, and similarly, no concept of absolute right and wrong. Postmodernism shares much in common with pluralism in that it denies objective truth in favor of a relativistic one (MacPhail, n.d.). Whereas pluralism would affirm the truth in all faiths, for example, postmodernism denies that any faith can offer certainty of the nature of existence. The postmodern view is cynical and pessimistic, highlighting the ways religion as a social institution becomes a means of social and psychological control. Yet both pluralism and postmodernism show how worldview does influence the ways people think and what they think. Scientism is a method of thinking about reality that strongly materialistic. Reality is only that which can be observed, catalogued, and analyzed, denying the reality of spiritual experiences as being anything other than psychological coping mechanisms (Leigh, 2015).

What is prime reality?

My personal worldview extends beyond scientism, postmodernism, and pluralism even though I do believe that each of these points-of-view is valuable and valid. After all, "how we understand science and nature is rooted in our worldview," (Cobern, 2005). The Christian can fully embrace both science and religion, by acknowledging what science shows through the methods of empiricism, and simultaneously showing that the prime mover or prime cause of all that science proves is God.

Therefore, the answer to the first worldview question related to the nature of prime reality is a transcendent universal power called God. God as the prime reality does not mean that God is anthropomorphic. Rather, God as prime reality entails God as a completely transcendent and unknowable field of reality that science cannot understand fully due to the limitations of the human senses.

What is the Nature of the World Around Us?

The nature of the world around us is composed of organic substances including the chemical elements we learn about through science and empiricism. Yet rather than stop here, I believe that the nature of the world around us is grounded in spiritual truth and beauty. Nature is a neutral force, which is why sometimes nature creates chaos and wreaks havoc on human beings. Human biology is an integral part of nature, too. I also believe that objective reality does exist, because people are not born into an empty world. The world exists independently of human beings, even though human beings frequently perceive things from our own limited perspectives and points-of-view.

What is a Human Being?

A human being is a biological creature with a more advanced set of psychological tools than all other animals on Earth. In the Bible, it is said that the human being is made in the image of God, suggesting that human beings are mirrors of the divine. However, human beings are imperfect creatures, far from being divine. The purpose of life for a human being is to strive for spiritual perfection through practices like prayer and meditation. Human beings have tremendous potential to create either positive or negative reactions in the world, because human beings are extremely powerful creatures.

What Happens to a Person at Death?

This is one of the most challenging questions in the human experience. Death certainly signals the end of one stage of life. The body is no longer usable and it decays like all other organic material. However, the soul of a human being might remain alive in another form. There is no way for me to know for sure what happens after death, but I do believe in some form of reincarnation in which the human soul can exist either in another form or even through another human being.

How do We Know What is Right or Wrong?

The knowledge of what is right or wrong does not vary overly much from culture to culture, which is why both pluralism and postmodernism are ineffective means of understanding ethics. Yet a deeper investigation shows that different cultures have different beliefs about the ethics of killing people. For example, killing people is generally considered ethically permissible during times of war, but the rules of war may change from situation to situation. Right and wrong is codified in scripture like the Ten Commandments, but even the Ten Commandments do not specify issues in all situations. The commandment to "honor thy mother and thy father" would not, for example, pertain to a child who is being abused by their parents. Generally, I believe that causing pain and suffering to other beings is wrong.

What is the meaning of human history?

Human history has value in guiding future actions, as we hopefully learn from our mistakes. Scripture provides us with allegories that shape the way we think about the world, and also reveal patterns in human history. Human history shows that people stray from God's will by acting in sinful ways and that it takes strength and courage to overcome temptations. Moreover, human history shows how human beings have evolved to become more technologically advanced, with an ultimate goal of making the world a better place.