Francis Collins is a physician-geneticist who is well known for his important discoveries of disease genes and for his leadership of the landmark Human Genome Project. Collins has been described by the Endocrine Society as “one of the most accomplished scientists of our time,” but he is equally well known for his outspoken Christian faith.
Collins says he grew up in an agnostic home and by the time he finished his studies, he was a firm atheist. However, dealing with dying patients led him to investigate different faith paths and also to familiarise himself with God in cosmology. Collins was greatly affected by C.S. Lewis’ book ‘Mere Christianity’ and he eventually became a Christian as a result.
In a recent keynote speech to 31st Annual Christian Scholars’ Conference at Pepperdine University in Malibu, Collins said he has never struggled between his belief in evolution and his belief in God, because he sees evolution as God’s elegant way of creation.
Collins informed his audience that billions of years sound long to humans, but if God operates outside of time then it might not seem long to God. The Director of the NIH reminded the scholars that when Darwin’s evolution theory was first introduced, the Church hardly protested, and in fact many clerics backed it as a credible explanation of how God created the world.
“God is the author of it all and we just learn something more about the how,” insisted Collins. “God is an awesome mathematician and physicist … God’s plan included the mechanism of evolution to achieve that, to create this marvelous diversity of living things on our planet.”
Collin’s view of evolution being a part of God’s creation plan is called theistic evolution.
Even more interesting than his views on evolution, Collins also insisted he did not believe that Adam and Eve were the only people on earth. Scientists who investigate today’s genetic variations, have found that we have an ancestral pool of at least 10,000 people.
“I can’t see how you get there by going through a bottleneck of a single individual,” argued Collins about present-day genetic variations. “You have to carry along variation and variation requires a population. This could not happen if you have just one person as the ancestor of all of humanity.”
“So I think you can preserve the idea of a literal, historical couple (Adam and Eve) as long as you don’t try to say they were the only humans and we are all descended from just them,” said Collins. “That second part science won’t support.”
Collins also spoke at length about his belief that faith and science need not clash, but could operate harmoniously.
“People in the world are hearing you can’t have both. It has got to be one or the other,” said Collins. “The essential thing is we’re about the truth. A faith that basically asks people to disbelieve facts is not about the truth. If there are aspects about our Christian faith that has gone down that road, it is up to all of us to try to pull that back.
“Look at the facts, look at the truth, and in the process, admire all the more and worship all the more God the creator. But in the nonessential things, let’s not get too worked up about those options about Adam and Eve as long as they’re consistent with the facts.”
A smiling Collins told his audience that a key principle he uses to harmonize science and his Christian faith is based on a famous statement by former New York Sen. Patrick Moynihan: “You are entitled to your own opinion, you are not entitled to your own facts.”
“I think we are also rather engaged with that view that when it comes to these issues of science and faith, we are wide open to options and opinions about how it all fits together as long as we recognize there are certain facts that do have to be dealt with,” added Collins. “Facts about the Bible and facts about science.”