April 2022 Newsletter
In this Clergy Letter Project update you’ll find the following twelve items:
- The Future of Evolution Weekend;
- Astrobiology News for April 2022: Celebrating Citizen Scientists and 5,000 Strange New Worlds;
- "Evolution Is A Hoax Funded by Jews”;
- Science and Religion at the Smithsonian;
- Darwin’s Notebooks Returned;
- Funding Religion and Science at Universities;
- Three Great Reads;
- Easter’s Cosmic Meaning;
- "The Mysterious” versus “The Unknown”;
- Growing Support for Evolution in Canada;
- "Trust in Science” at the Methodist Theological School of Ohio; and
- Engaging Faith-based Communities in Citizen Science.
1. The Future of Evolution Weekend
As you may have noticed, over the past several years participation in Evolution Weekend has been declining. While there may be many reasons for this decline, I do think it is something that we, collectively, should not ignore. Yes, it is possible that the decline might be attributed to the pandemic, but it is also possible that, after 16 years, Evolution Weekend has run its course and it is time to move on.
Before saying anything more, I want to make it clear just how proud I am of all we have accomplished. Indeed, over those 16 years, together we’ve reached well over one million parishioners directly via your efforts. We’ve demonstrated the many ways in which religion and science can be compatible, we’ve shown that those loud voices claiming otherwise are not speaking for thousands upon thousands of clergy around the world, we’ve engaged in interesting and spirited conversations, and we’ve done all of that with respect for those who disagree with our perspective. We’ve accomplished a great deal and we’ve been making a difference in how people view the relationship between religion and science.
But, as I said, the number of congregations that have been participating has been in decline. I propose that we hold a referendum next month to determine the future of Evolution Weekend. I’m proposing that we do this next month rather than right now to give you all time to think about strategies in the hope that you share those strategies with me so I can place them before our full membership. While I have some options we might consider, and I’ll share them below, I suspect that many of you will have ideas that I have not yet considered. I hope we will be able to offer our membership a robust menu of options.
So, my request to you is as follows: Please think about the future of Evolution Weekend and if you have an idea for the best way to proceed, please send me a note outlining your plan. I’ll include all of your ideas in a list and present them to the membership of The Clergy Letter Project in next month’s newsletter.
Here’s a list of preliminary possibilities:
*Continue with Evolution Weekend as we’ve been doing – the numbers will take care of themselves;
*Rename Evolution Weekend, perhaps along the lines of Religion and Science Weekend;
*Reconfigure Evolution Weekend into a slightly different sort of event, the details of which have yet to be determined;
*Find a more convenient date for Evolution Weekend; or
*Declare victory and not schedule a 17th Evolution Weekend.
Please note, I’m NOT asking you to vote for one of these options now. Rather, I’m asking you to think about possibilities and to suggest others that are not yet on the list above. I very much hope you write to me with your ideas so we might be able to vote on a full range of opportunities next month. Thanks for considering participating in this effort and for all you have done over the years.
2. Astrobiology News for April 2022: Celebrating Citizen Scientists and 5,000 Strange New Worlds
Thinking about exoplanets as Earth Day approaches. In this month’s Astrobiology News essay, Grace Wolf-Chase, Senior Scientist and Senior Education & Communication Specialist at the Planetary Science Institute as well as a Clergy Letter Project consultant, discusses the variety of exoplanets that have been found as well as the work done by citizen scientists to help find some of them.
This April marks many festivals and celebrations, including Easter, Passover, and Ramadan. Folks of all religious persuasions are also taking part in Earth Day(1) activities that promote caring for our planet, and collaboratively working with professional scientists to tackle diverse research challenges during Citizen Science Month(2) events.
Of course, caring for the Earth and participating in people-powered research aren’t activities that are (or should be) restricted to a specific month! Earlier this year, Astronomy magazine published its list of top 10 space stories of 2021.(3) Citizen scientists aid major discoveries made #5 on the list, which included several research papers; among them, a paper my colleagues and I published on young star-forming regions known as “yellowballs,” which were discovered by volunteers who worked on the Milky Way Project,(4) and papers reporting new discoveries of exoplanets. In fact, many people around the world actively contribute to searches for planets outside of our Solar System.(5)
The first exoplanets were discovered orbiting a star no one expected to harbor planets. In 1992, astronomers Alexander Wolszczan and Dale Frail reported the detection of two or more planet-sized worlds orbiting a pulsar(6) – the “dead” remnant of a supernova. Just last month, the tally of exoplanets exceeded 5,000.(7) The diversity of these worlds rivals the diversity of worlds envisioned by the most creative science fiction writers, and brings to mind quotes attributed to Sir Arthur Eddington, J. B. S. Haldane, Werner Heisenberg, and others, that the Universe truly is stranger than we can imagine.
Exoplanets are diverse in size, temperature, and distances from their stars. Of the currently known worlds, only about 4% are considered to be small rocky worlds similar in size to the Earth, and smaller. The remaining 96% include gas giants (30 % Saturn-sized and larger), ice giants (35% Uranus- and Neptune-sized), and so called “super-Earths” (31%), which have no counterparts in our Solar System. Present and future observatories hold great promise for elucidating dramatic differences in the compositions of all of these mysterious worlds. Check out NASA’s beautiful sonification(8) of exoplanet data over the past three decades!
Finally, many of you responded to Michael’s call last June to fill out one of the surveys we used to evaluate my project to engage faith-based communities in citizen science through Zooniverse.(9) I hope you’ll read my article summarizing the results of this project, which was published by the AAAS Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion late last month!(10) Some of you may also be interested in an activity that my colleagues and I are currently beta testing, which is designed to give introductory astronomy students a research experience using the Milky Way Project “yellowball” data. We’re hoping to make this activity widely available to undergraduate, and perhaps high-school, astronomy classrooms next year, so stay tuned.
Until next month,
Grace
Grace Wolf-Chase (gwolfchase@gmail.com)
Senior Scientist & Senior Education & Communication Specialist, Planetary Science Institute (www.psi.edu/about/staffpage/gwchase)
Vice President, Center for Advanced Study in Religion and Science (CASIRAS: www.casiras.org)
1. https://www.earthday.org/earth-day-2022/
2. https://scistarter.org/citizensciencemonth
3. https://astronomy.com/magazine/news/2022/02/top-10-space-stories-of-2021
4. https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/povich/milky-way-project
5. https://exoplanets.nasa.gov/citizen-science/
6. https://www.nature.com/articles/355145a0
7. https://exoplanets.nasa.gov/news/1702/cosmic-milestone-nasa-confirms-5000-exoplanets/
8. https://exoplanets.nasa.gov/resources/2321/5000-exoplanets-listen-to-the-sounds-of-discovery-360-video/
9. https://sciencereligiondialogue.org/projects/zooniverse/
10. https://sciencereligiondialogue.org/resources/engaging-communities-through-zooniverse-summary/
3. "Evolution Is A Hoax Funded by Jews”
The headline from a recent article in Rolling Stone says it all: “Fox Nation’s Lara Logan Suggests Theory of Evolution is a Hoax Funded by Jews.” Not surprisingly, not a single claim made by Logan is accurate, but the piece is well worth reading.
4. Science and Religion at the Smithsonian
The Smithsonian recently opened an exhibit entitled “Discovery and Revelation: Religion, Science, and Making Sense of Things” which attempts to demonstrate the compatibility of religion and science rather than their conflicts. Religion & Politics just ran an interesting review of the exhibit. If you can’t get to Washington to see the exhibit, I encourage you to read both of these sources to gain a fuller perspective.
5. Darwin’s Notebooks Returned
The BBC just ran a story entitled “’Stolen’ Charles Darwin notebooks left on library floor in pink gift bag.” Although the headline really says it all, the notebooks referenced are worth millions of pounds and were last seen 22 years ago. It’s well worth reading this “feel good” story!
6. Funding Religion and Science at Universities
Religion News Service just published an article detailing an exciting $3.6 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation to “institutes of Catholic thought” associated with six institutions of higher education. The funding “will go toward developing programming and on-campus activities focused on the relationship between science and religion.”
The article quotes Michael Le Chevallier, the acting executive director of the Lumen Christi Institute, as saying, “Unfortunately, today, Catholics have inculturated some of the worst divisions between science and Christian faith into our own mental worldview in America. You have a number of Catholics who believe that evolution is in conflict with modern Catholic faith, and you have a number of young adults who identify that modern science and the Catholic faith are in conflict — often resulting in leaving the church.” The initiative is fully in keeping with the goals of The Clergy Letter Project.
7. Three Great Reads
The latest issue of Reports of the National Center for Science Education, published by the National Center for Science Education, has just been released. This free issue has three great pieces that I suspect many of you will want to read.
1) An article entitled “Teaching Evolution to Students of Faith;”
2) An interview with Bruce S. Grant about his new book Observing Evolution: Peppered Moths and the Discovery of Parallel Melanism; and
3) A review of Jonathan Marks's book Why Are There Still Creationists?
All three can be accessed here.
8. Easter’s Cosmic Meaning
As I’ve done quite often in the past, I want to share a wonderful blog post written by Reverend Ted Peters, a member of The Clergy Letter Project. In this piece entitled “Easter’s Cosmic Meaning,” among other things, Ted addresses the meaning of Easter, past and future, and uses this as a way of discussing the nature of both science and theology. I suspect you’ll agree with me that the piece is well worth your time.
9. "The Mysterious” versus “The Unknown”
Our good friends at Sinai and Synapses just published a summary of some fascinating research conducted, in part, by Telli Davoodi, a psychologist at Boston University. She discusses what it means for people to “believe” without “knowing” and, among other things, concludes that “in their respective ways, both religion and science can serve crucial functions in people’s lives, which explains the intergenerational transmission and success of beliefs and practices from both domains.”
10. Growing Support for Evolution in Canada
Our good friends at the National Center for Science Education just reported on some good news from Canada. According to a recent survey, support for evolution is growing in that country. “Almost two thirds of Canadians think that human beings evolved from less advanced life forms over millions of years.”
11. "Trust in Science” at the Methodist Theological School of Ohio
MTSO (the Methodist Theological School of Ohio) will hold a virtual event entitled “Trust in Science? Responses to the Challenge of Science Denial” on May 10, at 7 pm Eastern. The event is free and open to the public. You can read more about the event and sign up to attend via Zoom here.
12. Engaging Faith-based Communities in Citizen Science
In her Astrobiology News column this month, Grace mentioned the article she published summarizing the work she’s done to engage faith-based communities in Citizen Science projects through Zooniverse. Because her work is so important and exciting, and because many of you were involved in some of the projects supported by her efforts, I wanted to be certain that no one missed the reference. You can read her article here.
Please join me in thanking Grace for her wonderful work on this project, for her continued support for The Clergy Letter Project, and her tireless commitment to advancing a deeper understanding between religion and science.
Concluding Thoughts
These are deeply troubling times. The outrageous brutality we are seeing being committed in Ukraine, the apparent decline of the United States into an autocratic state with governmental attacks on the rights of citizens simply because of their sexuality or due to their gender choices, the government’s increasing eagerness to control women’s reproductive options and its desire to limit the books we may read, and the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic coupled with an unwillingness by our elected officials to take meaningful action to mitigate its spread or to plan for the future, leaves very little energy for much else. And yet we can’t give up. Together we must continue to speak up and to work to shape the world in which we want to live and the world we want to leave for the next generation. We must let our voices be heard, we must stand for science rather than opinion, for truth rather than lies, we must advocate for fairness, for peace and for a green future. And, as members of The Clergy Letter Project, we must always strive to reach across the divide that separates us from those who think differently, to respect them even as we disagree with many of their ideas. We must work to create a better environment for all of us. If we don’t do this, I fear that no one will. But, even in my darkest moments, I am buoyed by all that I have seen so many of you do. Simply put, you are amazing!Finally, as always, I want to thank you for your continued support and as I do every month, I urge you to take one simple action. Please share this month’s Newsletter with a colleague or two (or post a link via any social media platform you use) and ask them to add their voices to those promoting a deep and meaningful understanding between religion and science. They can add their signatures to one of our Clergy Letters simply by dropping me a note at mz@theclergyletterproject.org. Spread the word; change the world. Together we are making a difference.
Michael
Michael Zimmerman
Founder and Executive Director
The Clergy Letter Project
www.theclergyletterproject.org
mz@theclergyletterproject.org