I promise I will get back to themes that really touch on specific aspects of Christianity, for those of you who glance at this current stuff and find it somewhat unappealing. For whatever reason, I feel called to write about these things because, unlike much current discourse, I find Christianity entirely rational and consistent with scientific explanations of natural phenomenon.

So we left off with this wall. A wall built up during what I’d call the second, or modern, epoch. This epoch pretty much coincided with an historical period that ran from the late 18^thcentury to the late 20^thcentury. (I’ll put a nice starting peg in the timeline at 1789, which was the beginning of the French Revolution and just two years after the adoption of the revolutionary U.S. Constitution. For a frame of reference, Adam Smith’s seminal work, The Wealth of Nations, acting as the philosophical foundation for economic capitalism, coincided exactly with our own Declaration of Independencein 1776. This was also the exact time when the Industrial Revolution began and the beginning of some remarkable breakthroughs in science. Heady times, indeed!)

But, beginning mid-20^thcentury and accelerating rapidly through the 1970s and 1980s, gathering more and more steam until it’s now on full tilt mode, was the launch of a new epoch, an epic that is quickly casting away all sorts of things we’d been relying upon for how we live our lives and for trying to make sense of the things that are important to us.

Now, to use the term postmodern to define this new era, in which we are currently residing, would be to court a term that has some very distinct meanings, not necessarily in the context I’m examining. One such interpretation is that it defines an era which abandons a thing like objective truth. It’s certainly an era when the trust in traditional institutions like governments, churches and even schools is diminishing. Just look at the polls and other studies.

I have certainly talked about the nature of truth and concepts of whether it is an objective or subjective (relative) thing. But that’s not the focus here.

Instead, I want to look at what very recent scientific developments have done to destabilize that wall.

We should dwell momentarily on such a statement.

The wall has been constructed largely by scientists (who translate their scientific beliefs into philosophical worldviews) and by the philosophers who align with them and large swaths of he  public who believe them. From their side of the wall, the objective is to influence vast numbers of people that the believers in Theism or Supernaturalism are misguided and should be sidelined or even destroyed. Of course, this is happening all around us and has been accelerating, especially in the universities and popular media.

But, this wall was not built just by scientists and associated philosophers who discarded God as a figment. It was also supported by many Christians who were reluctant to engage with science, holding to very rigid viewpoints such as young earth creationism (the belief that the earth is only a few thousand years old). This latter approach only served to cement the opinions of many that such religious “fundamentalists” were irrational and that their “faith was blind.” Regardless, popular culture was making its decision that the fundamental issues were firmly settled.

But a funny thing happened on the way to ending the debate.

And, that thing was and is technology, the product of incredible investments of time and resources within the scientific community.

If the Industrial Revolution is the major economic element of the modern era, then the Technological (or Information) Revolution is the economic element of the post-modern era. I will refrain here from getting into the relationship between economic forces and their impact upon things like institutions and belief but there are some fascinating connections.

In our case, however, it is to the massive advances in technology employed by scientists in physics, chemistry and biology that are not only creating cracks in the edifice but also suggest the portent of some remarkable new understandings.

As the debate is now launching, new sophisticated technologies are allowing us to peer far more deeply into the complexities of the tiniest organisms as well as the furthest reaches of space, including the nature of matter, energy and time. And through these, a single radical new perspective is emerging. And, it’s emerging from science, not theology.

Simply put, maybe the theists had it right all along. We’ll see.

Now, for those of you who are committed believers in God, especially of a Judaic or Christian God, this may come across as largely irrelevant. You’ve managed to sustain your beliefs for all sorts of reasons (faith in the inerrancy of the Bible being a common one accepted by large groups of Christians). Others may come to faith through a rational examination of fundamental values and principles, such as C.S. Lewis did and as expressed beautifully in his great Mere Christianity. Still others had such influences as a conversion experience or the mentoring by parents, pastors and friends that led you to belief and help sustain those beliefs. It’s a long list.

But, relatively few people over the last two hundred years have come to belief in God because physics, chemistry and biology actually point to God. As I’ve been saying, it’s largely the opposite.

Enter technology and this unfolding Age of Information and let’s put on our seat belts.