University of Chicago Sermons: By Members of the University Faculties (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from University of Chicago Sermons: By Members of the University Faculties

We are getting beyond the point where we are concerned to harmonize religion with science. The only harmony that is necessary is that religious men shall be utterly scientific in their thinking and that scientific men shall be vitally religious in their faith. Confusion arises, on the one side, when religious experience is made the credential for opinions which ought to be scientifically founded, and, on the other side, when the limits of scientific knowledge are set as the limits of the venture of faith.

Of course faith and science apprehend reality in different ways. Faith is practical, expectant, idealistic, daring to go beyond knowledge in its eager search for spiritual values. Science is analytic, investigative, critical, passionately seek ing truth, but ever demanding its credentials. There is no necessary opposition here.

The classroom and the pulpit are places of different emphasis. The mood of faith belongs in the theological classroom, and must indeed irra diate all thinking upon religious truth; but the classroom is fundamentally a place for thought. And the scientific spirit ought to possess the preacher, for no depth Of religious conviction may excuse loose thinking; yet the pulpit is especially the place for the expression of experience.

The theological professor may therefore well be a preacher. He rejoices in the religious freedom Of the pulpit which permits him to speak messages complementary to those expressed in his scientific lectures and treatises. This book is a collection of such messages by professors in the divinity and allied departments of the University Of Chicago. The sermons were not made for a book, but are those which have been preached in the course Of occasional pulpit ministry to the churches. The title Of the book is suggested by the fact that many of these sermons have been preached at the regular Sunday morning religious service Of the University.

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