Truth is sought by all people; whether to find purpose, how something works, how to deal with things, or to find what is real. How to define and discern Truth has created conflict for many years; starting strongly around the 1600-1700's during the Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment, and continuing today, where Faith and what scientific progress has to say clash.
Before the Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment people generally found Truth based on logic and science, but ultimately Faith. For anything involving religion, tradition, or things that would attempt to disprove long believed tradition, faith was the superior and deciding factor. From the Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment came the idea of the need for materialistic evidence for truth. That the evidence or opinion of a number of scientifically learned men could over rule long believed matters of faith. Neither way is bad in itself; but when materialistic views attempt to disprove and throw out matters of faith, conflict arises between people on either side; and those confused and stuck between the two.
Some examples of this in history would be the battle between Heliocentricism and Geocentricism, and the scientific contributions in the Encyclopedia that went against Church teachings. Conflict still rises in modern times with the idea of Creation versus The Big Bang Theory and Evolution.
Copernicus proposed the idea of Heliocentricism (a sun centered universe) but Galileo was the one to really bring about conflict with the Church through his publicity of the Copernican idea and his continuing effort to show the evidence he believed to prove it as truth. The Church was opposed to this because it had always taught that the earth was the center of the universe due to other scientist's (such as Bacon) beliefs, and ultimately the scriptural passages of the Bible that seem to suggest an earth centered universe. Galileo said all the proof could be seen through his telescope; that there was enough material evidence to prove his theory, and faith was not necessary. The Church however did not agree. If it came down to having faith in the Bible and the scientists who believed in the teachings of the Bible, or believing Galileo and his material evidence, it was obvious for them to choose faith. Galileo still held to his Heliocentric Copernican ideas because the material evidence was more to him than faith.
The Encyclopedia was created in the in the 1700's by Diderot and a few contributors. The Encyclopedia was a resource to things of every subject; math, science, history, food, specialized skills, and more. It was a relatively new concept to have such a variety of information available to practically anyone, and consequently the Encyclopedia became very popular. Some of the scientific articles in the Encyclopedia were written based on the beliefs of scientists who believed what they thought to be truth due to the form of logic they had used to arrive at their conclusion. For them the logic was enough to prove the idea as truth. Some of these logic derived scientific "truths" contradicted church tradition and teaching. The Church disproved these ideas because it did not believe that the logic used by some scientists was enough to over rule the faith they had in their long held traditional teachings. Diderot believed that the logic used by these scientists and himself was enough proof for truth, but the Church was afraid of publishing true facts along with Diderot's ideas that went against church teachings. The Church did not feel that these ideas were well enough proven and that having them written in a book with proven facts could confuse the people.
The beginning of the world is very controversial today. Christian Creationists have faith in the Bible and God, that the world was created by God. In the past one hundred years another idea for the origin of the world has become widely accepted called The Big Bang Theory which simply put says that due to density and temperature the universe has expanded to it's present state. This theory totally throws out the idea of God creating the world, causing conflict that is still unresolved. The scientists and those who follow them believe the evidence found in favor of The Big Bang Theory is enough to suffice for truth. Those opposing believe that the evidence is not substantial enough and that their faith in God is more solid than the evidence presented against his existence. Neither side gives way for the other because if one is true, the other is utterly wrong.
Another theory that is conflicting with creation is the Evolution Theory. The Evolution Theory was proposed by Charles Darwin, and is the idea that over time animals and plants have evolved to their present state slowly from a previously existing form. This theory conflicts with Creation because it says that humans animals and plants evolved, and in creation God created the animals and plants and then humans from dust and bone. If evolution were to be truth then the Bible, the basis of all Christianity, and any other evidence to prove otherwise would be wrong. Many modern scientists firmly believe in evolution, but people who believe in creation of life by God generally stand against evolution because of their faith and the belief that the theory is not firm enough to be truth. But the Evolution Theory holds enough ground for many to take it as truth.
Because of the conflictions between finding truth through only materialistic science or using faith, many things have changed. Firstly, Galileo and Copernicanism, and the articles against church teaching in the Encyclopedia brought stronger questioning of the Church, and more than that, it made science seem separate from religion; where before they went hand in hand. The church tried to compromise with Galileo by having him write a book showing both views equally on what the center of the universe was and have the Pope's opinion placed in the book. But Galileo firmly believing in his sun centered universe wrote a completely biased work that insulted the Pope. The compromise failing the separation between modern science and religion grew. Now, with the Big Bang Theory and Evolution, modern science is often completely against religion all together, so that if you wanted to believe in the science of today it would be almost impossible to have religion at the same time. Some compromises have been tried, such as the idea that the seven days were not literally seven days but a longer span of time allowing for evolution to take place, or that if there was a Big Bang, God caused it to happen. For the most part though Christian people believe these theories go against God and their faith, and that the evidence is no where close to enough for it to replace their truth. Religion and modern science have never been more separated.
What it comes down to is there are people who will believe material evidence, but when it challenges a matter of their faith, Faith prevails. This is because they will trust their religious tradition and God more than the evidence that another man can put before them. There are also people who need materialistic evidence that can be presented before them; that they can use their senses to try to comprehend. They need something that is on their level, not above them; they will trust that, and find it truth before they will consider something that is beyond their comprehension, as faith would require. Both sides know that if one alone is right the other must be wrong. There can not be two conflicting truths; they would not be true. So one side must be right, but neither will give in to the other. Both these views will continue to exist, and so long as they do, conflict can not be avoided.
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