Last fall, I dug up over a dozen raspberry canes from my grandparents' back yard. You see, these were nostalgic for me, and since my grandparents didn't want them anymore, I thought I'd try to transplant them to Vegas so that I could continue the familial line for raspberries. Before long, they went dormant, but with our mild winter, they have already begun to metabolise. To my great dismay, very few of them survived.
Part of this is my fault. You see, I had nights when it was cold or dark or when I was out late where I should have watered them. I didn't pay attention enough to their care, and so some of them probably died as a direct consequence of my inattention. Likewise, a friend of mine who's been helping me with landscaping my house pointed out that I needed to water the two trees planted out front at least every other day. Since they were pricey and since I want them to survive, I have been pretty good since he told me about watering them with dedication.
I read a fair handful of posts and memes and other rotgut yesterday trouncing religion as the derangements of a misguided mind. Ironically enough, people have been using this attack line for centuries and people still believe in a Creator. The fact of the matter is that everyone believes in something. We all take things on faith. My students rely on me to give them accurate information, and I know one young lady in my chemistry class who hates having to make corrections crumpled up a paper one night with great theatrics after I told them I had made a mistake. The fact that they do not water or fertilize issues of faith means that faith does not grow for them. The fact that they water and fertilize their own particular beliefs and values and norms means that they are caring for and nurturing what they believe.
Most people are less interested in discovery of the truth than they are in hoping to discover that the truth coincides with their preconceived notions. Of course the people who believe nothing harvest no fruit from matters of faith because they do not cultivate faith. They cultivate other things. Ironically enough, the things they cultivate bear as little fruit as they believe my faith produces. However, it is one of the greatest crimes a human may commit against another to destroy his faith and leave nothing in the wake thereof.
When the time comes to harvest berries, I have very few surviving canes. It is possible that the survivors are stressed enough that they will not produce any berries at all. That does not mean they are fruitless or worthless; it only means they are bearing fruit in accordance with the nurturing care they received. When our faith is not immediately validated with miracles and divine assistance, frequently we throw out the baby with the bath water. It is not necessarily because faith is wrong or even that we have done anything wrong; sometimes we have not done the right things long enough.
With very little exception, only things that are nourished bear fruit. Even the spontaneous berries and nuts in the wild come about because circumstances were sufficient for their nourishment in the wild. Just because those trees produce very little next year does not mean they are worthless. It only means they are not sufficently nourished to produce fruit. Even the best of seeds cannot grow to maturity without the necessary nutrients. We learn of what a seed is made only after we make the material investment to see it grow into that for which we hope.
Most men who discount faith do so because there is no proof. Well, if we had proof, that would not be faith, it would be knowledge, and if a man has knowledge of a thing what need is there for faith? Faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things. The man of faith hopes for things unseen that are true. The same is true of a man of science- he hopes for things unseen that are true. Men of science ignore their own faith because it's frequently a shorter path from hope to knowledge, but that doesn't mean we won't be vindicated. In 1492, everyone knew the earth was flat. A great deal of people went to the Spanish shoreline to watch Columbus sail off the edge of the earth to his death. Several months later, perhaps to their great disappointment, he returned and eventuall proved every man of science in his day to be a complete fool. In the 1830s, the US Patent office closed with a statement that 'everything that possibly could be invented already has been'. They have since admitted they were wrong and reopened it.
Only nourished seeds produce fruit. Men of science feed the seeds of their faith with grant money, the lives of graduate students, and large budgets. They begin with knowledge that they also take on faith. I don't know many people who have reproduced Franklin's kite experiment, Mendel's pea garden, or Jablot's petri dishes, but we move forward from that place with the same faith as men who take as truth that Moses parted the Red Sea, Jesus walked on water, and Elijah called dow fire from heaven. None of us have recreated those things either, but that is where we begin. Do not assume we are wrong, for science demonstrates more often than not that what we take to be true is anything but. Someday, what we men of faith nourish will also bear fruit.
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