Paul writes to the church in Rome that, “The whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now.” I invite you to consider that part of what Paul is hinting at in this verse is the process that we witness every spring as the barren landscape of winter bursts forth into the flowering of spring and into the lush green of summer in which we currently find ourselves immersed. We humans don’t do anything to make the flowers bloom; nonetheless, new life springs forth each year before our eyes with no effort on our part. The progress of the seasons happens without human intervention, which is not to say that we human have not had some effect — both positive and negative — on this earth. But to begin to explore in the largest sense of what it means to say — far beyond the scope of human control — that, “The whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now,” I invite you to consider to the following metaphor from Roman Catholic theologian John F. Haught:
Imagine that you have thirty large volumes on your bookshelf. Each tome is 450 pages long, and every page stands for one million years. Let this set of books represent the scientific story of our 13.7-billion-year-old universe. The narrative begins with the Big Bang on page 1 of volume 1, but the first twenty-one books show no obvious signs of life at all. The earth story begins only in volume 21, 4.5 billion years ago, but life doesn’t appear until volume 22, about 3.8 billion years ago. Even then, living organisms do not become particularly interesting, at least in human terms, until almost the end of volume 29. There the famous Cambrian explosion occurs, and the patterns of life suddenly burst out into an unprecedented array of complexity and diversity. Dinosaurs come in around the middle of volume 30 but are wiped out on page 385. Only during the last sixty-five pages of volume 30 does mammalian life begin to flourish. Our hominid ancestors show up several pages from the end of volume 30, but modern humans do not appear until the bottom of the final page. The entire history of human intelligence, ethics, religious aspiration, and scientific discovery takes up only the last few lines on the last page of the last volume.
We can use Haught’s analogy to give us twenty-first century scientific insight into Paul’s words from 2,000 years ago that, “The whole creation has been groaning in labor pains” — groaning for 13.7 billion years.
Haught writes at a later point that the “labor pains” of creation — he uses the word “emergence” — can be summarized into eight stages: “pre-atomic, atomic, molecular, unicellular, multi-cellular, vertebrate, primate, and human stages of increasingly complexity over the course of billions of years” What Haught is tracing on a macro-scale is what we often witness on a much smaller scale: the progression, for example, of trees emerging from the barrenness of winter, to almost unnoticeable green buds, to an almost blinding burst of blossoms. I have deep respect for the scientific method — the empirical process of relentlessly testing hypotheses in the crucible of reality — but part of what I mean by the word “God” is that there is something “More” going on in the universe than the scientific method alone can explain. There is something more in the universe that bring new life and warmth out of winter. Indeed, there is something more in the universe than has prompted and lured Creation as we know it from pre-atomic to atomic to molecular to unicellular to multi-cellular to vertebrate to primate, and to human stages of increasingly complexity over the course of billions of years” — not merely random chance.
Likewise, Paul writes that, “the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.” The same God whose Creation causes flowers to bloom, that helped craft the evolution of pre-atomic particles into molecules and into ever-increasing stages of complexity, is also the same God whose “Spirit helps us in our weakness.” The same God who has been ever-present since the beginning of time for the labor pains of creation is the same God who knows that we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.” Thanks be to God.
Notes
1 Imagine that you have thirty large volumes — John Haught, Christianity and Science: Toward a Theology of Nature (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2007), xii.
2 “Emergence” can be summarized into eight stages — John Haught, “Teilhard de Chardin: Action, Contemplation, and the Cosmos.” Radical Grace: A Publication of the Center for Action and Contemplation 23:2 (April – June). Albuquerque, NM: 4-5. For a longer version see Harold J. Morowitz, The Emergence of Everything: How the World Become Complex (New York, NY: Oxford Univ. Press).
3 On the use of the metaphor “More” as a name for God, American psychologist and theologian William James (1842-1910) writes of the possibility of becoming “conscious that [the] higher part [of one’s self] is coterminous and continuous with a MORE of the same quality, which is operative in the universe outside of [one’s self], and which [one] can keep in working touch with, and in a fashion get on board of and save [one’s self] when all [one’s] lower being has gone to pieces.” William James, Writings 1902-1910 : The Varieties of Religious Experience / Pragmatism / A Pluralistic Universe / The Meaning of Truth / Some Problems of Philosophy / Essays (New York, NY: Library of America, 1987), 454.
4 Not merely random chance — For more on the relationship between evolution and science, see John F. Haught, Making Sense of Evolution: Darwin, God, and the Drama of Life. See also, Philip Clayton, Adventures in the Spirit: God, World, Divine Action.
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