Faith vs Physics?

It's a question that I've asked myself many times, and a question that's been asked of me:

How can you be a christian and a physicist at the same time?

This is an important question to me. I'd rather not hold conflicting identities - if these are indeed conflicting identities. And in fact, the most common answer I've heard from both parties - non-christian physicists and non-physicist christians - is: 

You can't.  

Some Physicists have told me that since faith requires looking at the world in a different way than science looks at the world, faith must therefore be 'wrong' by a scientific definition. But it seems downright silly to start with the assumption that the scientific method must by definition be the only ruler by which to measure faith. We're a post-modern society; we've moved beyond these sorts of limited circular definitions.


Others have said that physics somehow replaces God. Now the Higgs boson may hold the common name of 'God particle', but it really doesn't follow that we've somehow replaced God simply by learning more about the incredible universe we find ourselves in. I certainly can't see any reason for Christians to be afraid of physics - it's done nothing to disprove or replace God (though the media and some physicists have been known to put a controversial spin on physics research to boost readership). I don't believe learning about creation nullifies a creator. 


Some Christians have told me that physics is like Babylon, and goes against faith. Physicists are trying to play God, interfering where we shouldn't interfere. Hiroshima is sometimes used as evidence for the 'dark side' of physics. But while physics has led to the creation of some harmful technologies - I certainly don't want to downplay complex tragedies like Hiroshima, it has also given us an amazing array of technologies which improve our quality of life, save people from otherwise impossible circumstances, let us experience the phenomenal beauty of our world (and beyond!), and connect us with each other. Also, physics describes sunshine and rainbows - and who doesn't love that? If God made us as creative curious people, it seems only natural and good that we would want to invent and learn about the universe we live in. 


But 'You can't' isn't the only unsatisfying answer I've heard. Other's have told me:

You can... because physics explains faith.

But does it really? I'm sure we've all seen the books and websites that stretch and misinterpret dear Mr. Schrodinger's and Mr. Heisenberg's equations until they barely resemble the beautiful physics they were supposed to describe. And after this sad process, these stretched concepts are used to say that we can scientifically 'prove' God's existence. It hurts my physics heart to see the concepts I've studied and fallen in love with not only distorted beyond recognition, but also taught poorly to innocent people who are just starting to learn about our field.

So I'm still in the process of answering this question - can faith and physics be friends? And perhaps I will be for some time. But for now, my current answer is:

You absolutely can be both a christian and a physicist - because neither of these identities requires the other to be wrong. 

I believe that the bible was written so that we can know God, learn how to love each other and love God, learn how to lead lives that honour God, and other such good things. I don't believe it was written as a science textbook. So I don't need to warp physics to awkwardly force it to fit with my faith.  Similarly, my physics textbooks were not written for the purpose of teaching me about God's character. So I don't need to change my faith to fit with my quantum class.  

The passage that most people cite as the main source of tension between physics and christianity is Genesis. I think it is very helpful to think about the role and purpose of the creation story in our faith. If we believe that the bible was written for the purpose of being the first science textbook, we might assume that the creation story was written to provide a scientific record for us to go back and analyze the age of the earth. If this really is the purpose of the bible, then it would be pretty much impossible to be a christian and physicist. But this seems to be a very unlikely theory: that God would send his Son to live with us on earth, build relationships with us, and write the story of the bible - all for the purpose of giving us a science textbook? And if the bible was written for the purpose of teaching us science, I'd have to say, it doesn't do a very good job at accomplishing this - where are the pretty colour coded diagrams?

Instead, if we believe that the bible was written to reveal God's character and give us the opportunity to know God, we will read the creation story very differently. We'll read the incredible truth that we were made in the image of God, called to be stewards responsible for caring for His world, called to love and care for each other. As people made in the image of God and stewards of our world, we can absolutely be creative and innovative physicists, finding solutions to climate change and environmentally safe sources of energy.

The bible does a great job of telling us the story of God's love and faithfulness to His creation, and explaining how we can live in relationship with God and each other. Jackson's Classical Electrodynamics does a great (well, at least okay) job of explaining Maxwell's equations. So I believe we can respect and embrace both faith and physics without denying either.  Probably the best way to do this is to learn about both :)