While this semester has been one hell of a challenge, it’s almost over and I’ll survive the semester with passing grades, at the very least. 

However, the point of this piece isn’t gonna be a rant about how rough this semester’s been. Rather, I want to focus on my final project for my Logic and Contemporary Rhetoric course (which fills the Sociology credits I need). My final project (which I’ve been researching for this entire semester) focuses on the question, “Why are so many Americans losing trust in science- or more accurately- scientists?” 

As I’ve been researching this question, I’ve read and summarized about 20 articles at this point. However, this weekend, one caught my eye that didn’t quite fit into my project, but I found very interesting regardless. It’s titled, “Are Scientists Biased Against Christians? Exploring Real and Perceived Bias Against Christians in Academic Biology.”

Now, I grew up in a very large, blended, and ideologically diverse family. Most of my older relatives are very conservative, evangelical, fundamentalist Christians. Thus, that’s the type of Christianity I grew up to know, and later reject in my “angry atheist” teenage years. I’ve since reconciled my faith and consider myself a devout Christian today. But my faith hardly reflects the faith that I grew up with- aside from the fact that I believe Jesus Christ died for my sins (which all Christians believe). 

Unlike my conservative, Christian relatives, I “believe” in all aspects of evolution, including that humans and chimpanzees share a common ancestor. I “believe” that the earth is approximately four billion years old, and the universe is around fourteen billion years old. I “believe” that dinosaurs existed long before humans came to exist. I put “believe” in quotes because I don’t simply “believe” in science. There are many ways one can confirm something as scientific fact. Evolution, for example, is a scientific fact thanks to numerous studies (AKA experiments) that have all concluded that evolution happens; that living things (including animals) evolve from one species/kind to another over time. 

Yet, I must admit, I still feel like I stick out like a sore thumb at university, partly because I still consider myself a Christian. Meanwhile, it seems like the majority of my professors and peers are agnostic and/or outright atheist.

Hell, beyond CU Denver, it seems like the majority of scientists, academics, and science communicators in general are agnostic/atheist, especially the most famous ones. Richard Dawkins, Bill Nye, Isaac Asimov, Adam Savage, Stephen Hawking, Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Hank Green, Forrest Valkai, Jane Goodall, James Watson, Noam Chomsky, Dave Farina, Carl Sagan- all of these guys, and more, were/are outspoken atheists. The only famous, modern scientist who is an outspoken Christian is Dr. Francis Collins. 

I say "modern scientist" because I'm well aware of the fact that most scientists were religious way back in the day. Sir Isaac Newton, Gregor Mendel, Charles Darwin, Galileo, and many more, were all scientists who were staunch Christians and contributed massively to science. Even the scientific method itself was invented and developed over centuries exclusively by Christian scholars interested in learning about God's creation (AKA the natural world). But, that was centuries ago. 

Nowadays, most famous scientists and science communicators are explicitly atheistic, and damn proud of it, too. This isn't an inherently bad thing. But, it certainly doesn't help to mend the perceived growing gap between science and faith, at a time when scientists are being defunded by the federal government in record numbers, because the majority of the voting public decided that they can't trust scientists anymore. 

Of course, that’s not to say that there are almost no modern scientists who are also Christian, or that there aren't scientists out there trying to regain the public's trust in science by making it more relatable to people from all walks of life. Obviously, they exist. However, the journal article I read pointed out that only about 30% of scientists identify as Christian. It’s even worse in the biological sciences, where only 25% of biologists claim to be religious, at all, let alone Christian! And none of those scientists are exactly well-known. The well-known ones are, as I stated before, damn near anti-religious and proud of it, too. 

In other words, I’m not crazy for feeling a bit “out of place” on my university campus. I’m not crazy for perceiving that science is overwhelmingly represented by atheists and agnostics. I'm not crazy for thinking that a few scientists are openly hostile towards religion and religious folks, especially Christians (something, something, The Four Horsemen). 

Plus, there’s a very real lack of Christians (or religious people in general) who represent modern science. But there are more than enough Christian influencers who outright reject modern science, as well as atheist influencers who outright reject religion on the basis of science.