Not to raise an old conflict but...

We were told over and over again.  Follow the science.  If it is about the science, then the science is concerning.  According to one of the most comprehensive studies so far, Italian researchers have shown that those who received at least one Covid jab were about 30 percent more likely to be infected with Sars-Cov-2 than the unvaccinated, see the Italian research here.  It clearly shows that Covid shots raise the risk of getting a Covid infection.  The post-Omicron variant revealed that the shots performed even worse than before, with those vaccinated at about 50 percent higher risk of being infected by Covid.  The peer-reviewed study also noted the differences between the vaccines.  Among those people who have taken three or more Moderna mRNA jabs, the Moderna-only recipients were 71 percent more likely to die from all causes than people who took only Pfizer jabs -- a statistic even after the researchers adjusted for age and medical problems.  Moderna’s vaccine contains much more mRNA than Pfizer’s, so the finding begs the question of whether the mRNA is driving those deaths and if the more times vaccinated increase that risk.

While some will gloat and others dispute this, my point is not about the results of the study as it is about the nature of science.  Science does not rest on suppositions but on data.  The more data we find out, the clearer the conclusions that can be drawn.  That is science.  Science, real science, is not ideological.  It does not proof text for the sake of its point but adjusts as the data guides.  Real science is not a conclusion that never is reviewed but the constant review of the conclusions.  Science cannot substitute for religion and certainly not for Christianity.  Science is not something you believe in -- unless you believe in a process without presuppositions or conclusions unless the data hold to them.  My point is this.  You cannot have science as your God.  It is a fool's errand.  Neither can science exist outside of or apart from the moral values that define the boundaries of what is good in comparison to what may be possible.  As Scripture plainly tells us -- all things may be possible but not all things beneficial (salutary).  Science depends upon its partnership with morality and the higher truth of religion or it will always end up ahead of itself.  Follow the science means following a wandering path that must occasionally reverse itself or turn in an entirely different direction.

If there is a lesson from the pandemic about the science, it is this.  Science will give you its best guess now but it reserves the right to change that guess as the data come in.  Especially in areas like mRNA, science is not settled but constantly moving.  It is for this reason also we cannot make science our God.  We need not a log flowing along with a current but an anchor to hold us fast.  Those who pit science against faith are setting against each other the very things that belong together.  As we have repeatedly seen, the science eventually catches up to the faith if we let it.  It helps no one -- even advocates of science -- to presume that what science says now is the last and final word on anything.  True science is always looking and always learning -- therefore, always adjusting.

There are a host of other areas in which we have failed to listen to the science and allowed the fake science to become ideological and a sort of religion.  This includes, for example, the way Americans have distanced themselves from others in the West in taking the aggressive course of treatment (puberty blockers) with trans youth.  In fact, the true science dismisses the legitimacy of felt choices that violate the objective data and thus raises questions about the primacy of feelings to define everything from sexual desire to gender.  There is no science to support this.  The fake science of ideology has led us where true science would refuse to go.  I could list other examples.  The reality is that when we build a wall between science and faith, science and morality, technology and values, we always end up with huge problems.  We will have to face this on a host of fronts soon -- from reproductive technology to artificial intelligence.  Now is not the time to trust the science.  Now is the time to sort out fake science from true science and to bring to bear upon our observation and conclusions the divine revelation of Scripture. 

By the way, actuaries have released a table showing their data on the mortality rate for the years of Covid and thereafter: