Tensions in Religion and Literature I

My father is a scientist who studies the relationship of science and religion, so, growing up, I heard probably more than your average Jane about the tensions between the scientific and religious worldviews. However, while my upbringing was perhaps unique, I don’t think I’m the only one who has heard a lot about the intersection of science and religion. Given the prominent voices in the media today of, on the one hand, America’s religious right and, on the other, vocal atheists like Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Sam Harris, we–that is, Americans and to a lesser degree Europeans–are constantly bombarded with the question of how to reconcile science and religion. Indeed, I think it’s safe to say that ever since the scientific revolution, the interface of science and religion has been the primary battleground in the great war between the church and the academy, between faith and reason.

And understandably so. If there’s one thing I’ve learned from hearing my father talk about his work, it’s that reconciling science and religion is a tricky business deserving of extreme care and attention. However, while I think discussing the science and religion interface is important, I can’t help but wonder if, in our attention to the religion and science front, we’re neglecting other fronts in the war between the academy and the church–fronts that were discussed more often in the days before the scientific revolution and that today, in a postmodern age when some argue that how we talk about truth is at least as important as truth itself, require our attention again. I’m thinking about the front between religion and the humanities, and in particular between religion and literature.

Most people assume that religion and literature make good bedfellows. When I tell friends or relatives that I study religion and literature, the usual response is, “Oh, they go together well!” Certainly, on some level, religion and literature do go together well. Afterall, biblical studies is really literary criticism, systematic theology is really philosophy, and church history is really, as its title suggests, history.

However, my experience in the literary world has taught me that the relationship of religion and literature isn’t so simple. Over and over, I’ve observed that in Christian colleges and universities, it is the English departments and not the science departments that are, as one of my English professors put it once, “the liberal holdouts.” Far from easily swallowing their institutions’ theological lines as some might expect, then, English professors actually seem to be the most eager to challenge theological teaching.

Indeed, after graduating from an Seventh-day Adventist undergraduate institution and watching my SDA friends go their separate ways, I’ve noticed that, at least within the SDA church, it is the humanities majors who stop attending church, not the science majors.* To be sure, many of my scientist friends do have questions about their faith. However, maybe because they see that the church is interested in talking about their questions, they seem to keep attending church faithfully. My humanities friends, though–perhaps seeing that the church doesn’t address their questions and then concluding that it is uninterested in, unaware of, or unable to answer them–seem to give up on church altogether.

Which leads to the million dollar question: what are the questions that humanities majors are asking that the church isn’t? Or, to phrase it differently, what are the tensions between religion and the humanities? For the next few posts, I plan to describe what I think are some of the big conflicts between religion and the humanities–and, in particular, between religion and literature. My goal is not so much to reconcile religion and literature or to encourage the church and my humanities colleagues to reunite; like science and religion, literature and religion are not easily reconciled and sometimes I’m not even sure thay should be reconciled. Instead, I hope merely to bring to light in an articulate way some of the tensions between religion and literature that have long been overlooked.

*I think it would be fascinating to compare the retention rates of humanities students in other Christian faiths. My hunch is that Catholic or high church Protestant humanities majors would be more likely to stick with their churches than their low church Protestant counterparts because Catholicism and high church Protestant faiths have historically engaged more in pre-scientific revolution issues like the tension between religion and literature than have low church Protestant faiths.

How Seventh-day Adventism Taught Me to Appreciate the Natural World

I’ve recently discovered that I like reading nature writing, particularly spiritual nature writing, and, as my reading log betrays, during the last month I’ve gone on a bit of a spiritual nature writing binge. I’ve enjoyed Terry Tempest Williams’ An Unspoken Hunger, Jane Goodall’s Reason for Hope, Stanley Kunitz’ The Wild Braid, and Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s Gift from the Sea, and on my “to read next” list are Diane Ackerman’s Deep Play and Edward Abbey’s Desert Solitaire.

All of this reading about the relationship of spiritual things and the natural world has prompted me to think about the relationship of the spiritual and the natural in my own experience. In particular, it has made me think about Seventh-day Adventism’s relationship to the natural world and about what Seventh-day Adventism has taught me about nature. Though I’ve only had limited experience with other faiths, I’m beginning to think that the SDA faith has made me appreciate nature more than other faiths might have.

Seventh-day Adventism stresses the relationship of spirituality and nature in important, if not immediately obvious, ways. For instance, in her writings, the SDA prophetess Ellen White heavily emphasizes the role of nature in one’s spiritual journey. I’ll always remember her famous line from the opening chapter of Steps to Christ–“‘God is love’ is written upon every opening bud, upon every spire of springing grass”–because the quote hung in needlepoint at the entrance to my Seventh-day Adventist grandparents’ home.

The SDA belief about the nature of man may also contribute to its interest in nature. Many Christian denominations believe that a person’s body and soul can be separated and, in fact, are separated at death. SDAs, however, lean on the Hebrew term nephesh–meaning a living being composed of an inseparable body and soul–which is used to describe the human person in Genesis 2:7, and they argue that a person’s flesh and spirit are thus inseparable. The consequences of this doctrine are far-reaching. If the human person is composed of both a body and a spirit together, the natural and the spiritual realms are inextricably linked. Moreover, if a human is created to be as much flesh as he is soul, his flesh–and by extension the fleshly or natural world–is esteemed more than it might be in faiths that shun fleshly things. For an SDA, the natural becomes something to be prized.

Finally, I think the SDA emphasis on the Sabbath contributes to the value it places on nature. The classic Sabbath afternoon activity–one with which I grew up–is the trek into nature. Whether a mountain hike, a trip to the beach, a visit to the local nature museum, or just a walk around the neighborhood, SDAs frequently spend the hours after their hearty Sabbath lunches enjoying the out-of-doors. In fact, for some traditional SDAs, one of the only acceptable excuses, outside of sickness, for missing church is spending Sabbath morning in nature.

I am extremely thankful for what my SDA upbringing has taught me about the connection between the natural and the spiritual realms. Whether or not I buy all of the theology behind the SDA esteem of nature, I think the idea that nature and spirit are inseparable is beautiful and powerful. In fact, it’s an idea that I think SDAs could take even farther than they do. Particularly after my reading of nature writing, I am even more convinced that as human beings we need to be more careful about how we treat our environment, and I think SDAs, if they would go a few steps further in their thinking, could make a significant contribution to the effort to preserve our world.