In the beginning there was a void -- a curious form of vacuum, a nothingness, neither time nor space, neither stars nor planets -- neither rocks nor trees, neither animals nor human beings. There were, however, in place the laws of nature, or so we believe. And these laws dictated that the curious vacuum would explode, and in this initial incandescence there were created space, time, and a hot plasma of primordial particles. As the universe cooled and grew less dense, particles coagulated and forces differentiated. Pristine symmetry gave way to evolving complexity. Protons and neutrons formed, then nuclei and atoms and huge clouds of dust, which, still expanding, condensed locally here and there to form the galaxies and the stars and the planets.

On one planet -- this one, a most ordinary planet, following precise mathematics, orbiting a mediocre star, one speck on the spiral arm of a standard galaxy -- turbulent landmasses and more turbulent oceans organized themselves, and out of the oceans an ooze of organic molecules reacted and built up the protein, and eventually life began. Plants and animals evolved out of simple organisms, and, in time, human beings arrived.

        This is "Genesis" in the words of Nobel Laureate Leon M. Lederman in the Phi Beta Kappa Sidney Hook Memorial Lecture, 1991.

Each religion has a cosmology -- a cosmic creation story of how the universe came to be, how it is organized, and how humankind fits into its scheme -- and each cosmology offers the prospect of a religion. That is to say, each portrayal of the universe identifies humankind in its relation to the cosmos, places humankind in some line of continuity, suggests patterns of reverence and ethical behavior, etc. It is only in the last half of the twentieth century that science has been able to posit the cosmology stated by Lederman.

Those of you who have been with me as I seek to get my head and my heart together around a concept of God will understand how I am attracted by a scientific cosmology. This is a statement with an empirical base; and if there is truth in my assumption that reality is all of one piece then, perhaps, the universe can teach me what is "supremely significant and ultimately real," i.e., what is God. The universe can teach me, if I am open to it, how the universe works, what my identity is within it, and what my role is in creation and evolution as they continue.

When I was growing up, the image that gave me meaning and purpose and that defined ethical standards was "the brotherhood of man under the fatherhood of God." For that time the image was a positive force, but now I recognize it as patriarchal, hierarchical, and even if it were more gender inclusive I would find it difficult to respond positively to a parental image of God. In addition, if we are to communicate with one another, words must have a substantial degree of common meaning. "God" means so many different things to different people that I am uncomfortable using the term without adding a definition.

The cosmology presented by Lederman is accepted by, among others, Brian Swimme, Thomas Berry, David Darling and Matthew Fox who ask about the human place in such a cosmos. It is based on the best knowledge that scientists can furnish about what happened after the Big Bang, and hypotheses are clearly understood for what they are -- best guesses to be verified or corrected as further data are discovered. Does that cosmology help us to answer questions of human identity, values, purpose, and ethics? I think it does.

Cosmology has been of interest to religious thinkers for some time. Teilhard de Chardin worked at reconciling science and religion around cosmological issues; Thomas Berry, a Roman Catholic priest, as was Teilhard, was greatly concerned about ecological problems and discussed them within the context of cosmology; Brian Swimme, a mathematical cosmologist and colleague of Matthew Fox, has identified cosmic dynamics that have special relevance for the role of humankind in the universe.

This, then, I have come to believe (at least to hypothesize):

1. The essence of reality is wholeness. Reality is a unity in which humankind is interconnected not only with every living thing but also, through participation in the creative/evolutionary process, with aspects of reality whose processes move at the pace of geologic time.

2. Wholeness of self, of society, and of the planet are interwoven and are the responsibility of humankind.

3. All that has gone before from the beginning of time is part of us, and we are part of all that will happen in the future.

4. We are dependent upon the natural laws and processes that provide the binding energy of all reality and life -- gravity, electromagnetism, chemical bonding, genetic coding, photosynthesis, homeostasis (and others, like the second law of thermodynamics that deals with expansion and entropy).

5. Our connectedness with all humankind is also reflected in Jung's concept of the collective unconscious in which the shared archetypes of all peoples are to be found. When we are most completely our deepest selves, we are most in touch with that cosmic connectedness. (This concept is not included in the cosmologies I have read, but it makes sense to me to include it.)

6. Humankind provides the self-aware, imaginative and co-creative element of the universe.

7. All elements of our experience come to us as gifts for our learning, our health and our wholeness.

8. These gifts include forces for health and wholeness, both within us as, for example, dreams are generated, and outside us in the forms of food, air, water, and human community, as well as the natural laws and forces mentioned above.

9. Our appropriate response to these gifts is gratitude, awe and wonder, followed by (in Matthew Fox's terms) meeting pain and emptiness, responding to life creatively, and acting in compassion, celebration, and justice-making.

10. This is both a mystical (right-brain) and a rational (left-brain) process. One of the forms of wholeness to be attained is the balance of right and left brain activity.

11. Evil, pain, suffering exist. There are natural predators and natural processes of life and death. There are natural disasters. There are also those who seek gain from a perspective that is too narrowly confined to give attention to the consequences for the larger whole. People have a great capacity to hurt one another, as they have a great capacity to love one another.

12. The universe teaches rules to be followed in the quest for health and wholeness. For me, Jesus was the best teacher and example of these. He lived the epitome of a human life, and in his complete humanness modeled divinity.

13. All facets of human experience in and with the universe have been built into the great religious traditions. I can readily see how people in earlier times, experiencing the universe without the benefit of modern science, but with the expectation that spirits inhabit everything, constructed belief systems to explain the mystery and to account for the learnings that they derived from their intimate daily contact with the natural world. And those systems -- those that survived -- were refined in subsequent generations and have come down to us as the world's religions. They offer alternative patterns for understanding ourselves and our relationships with one another and with whatever we deem to be ultimate.

I don't believe that all of the world's religions say the same thing (though there are many important parallels) or that one religion is just as good as another. "By their fruits you shall know them" seems to fit here. If a religion supports discriminatory or exclusivist behavior, then it is not worthy. But in this pluralistic world, several religions have something for me: Native Americans give me a much needed ecological reverence; Taoists teach me to let go, to give up trying to control, to let it be; Christians offer the life and teachings of Jesus and the sense of that spirit continuing in community.

The approach through scientific cosmology offers another alternative, and while it is just as metaphoric and analogical as the others it comes to me fresh and free of the weighted meanings that traditional Judeo-Christian words carry for me.

I can, to my satisfaction, translate between the new cosmology and Christianity:

I can say "God" and mean creativity, binding energy, healing forces, wholeness, love, etc.

I can understand the continuing presence of Jesus' teachings and example of unconditional love in community as "Christ" (or "Holy Spirit").

I can call healing "salvation."

I can call the gifts I receive "grace," as I recognize that life is improved when all experiences are received, in gratitude, as blessings.

I can understand the moral and ethical force in my connectedness and in the power to affect the continuation of the creative/evolutionary process and call it "God's will."

I can do that translating, but I don't feel any great need to. For now I want to continue to look for personal meaning in the new cosmology. I will be reading both those authors who approach it from a Christian perspective and those who write about it without a mention of God. Interestingly, I have found representatives of both approaches who respond to the cosmos with gratitude, awe and reverence, who see in it great beauty, who find in it an ethical imperative -- who are, in short, mystics and prophets and spiritual guides.

* * * * *
There is the question of WHY? Why the cosmos? Why the creative/evolutionary process that has culminated (so far) in humankind? What caused the Big Bang? What super-intelligence created such a marvelous complexity of conditions for sustaining life? Scientists have projected their knowledge back to within micro-seconds of the first explosion, but not earlier. Stephen Hawking suggests that the Big Bang was not a beginning but a continuation of the cosmic process by which black holes (the void, the nothingness) explode as super novas. Does a creative process presuppose a creator? I don't think so, but as Leon Lederman in presenting his statement of cosmology noted, there is room in it for divine intervention.

(Copyright 1997 by C. Grey Austin, all rights reserved.)

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