Last week, Robin Varghese wrote a thoughtful post “The Tsunami, Theodicies and Science,” in which he mentioned Richard Dawkins’s response to Martin Kettle’s article about possible theological reactions to the tsunami tragedy in The Guardian. Since then, there has been a series of outraged responses to Dawkins there (and elsewhere), to which he himself has replied thus.
Liz Byrne, one of the outraged many, writes in to The Guardian:
What exactly can science offer or say to the suffering of a parent whose child has been swept out to sea, to thousands who wait for news and to others who watched, powerlessly, as loved ones and strangers drowned in front of them, moments etched cruelly on their minds for ever?
This reminded me of a letter written by T.H. Huxley to the Reverend Charles Kingsley in 1860, soon after Huxley’s young son had died, and in response to a letter of condolence Kingsley had written urging Huxley to accept the immortality of the soul as a way of assuaging his grief. Among other things, Huxley says:
…a deep sense of religion was compatible with the entire absence of theology. Secondly, science and her methods gave me a resting-place independent of authority and tradition. Thirdly, love opened up to me a view of the sanctity of human nature, and impressed me with a deep sense of responsibility.
If at this moment I am not a worn-out, debauched, useless carcass of a man, if it has been or will be my fate to advance the cause of science, if I feel that I have a shadow of a claim on the love of those about me, if in the supreme moment when I looked down into my boy’s grave my sorrow was full of submission and without bitterness, it is because these agencies have worked upon me, and not because I have ever cared whether my poor personality shall remain distinct for ever from the All from whence it came and whither it goes.
And thus, my dear Kingsley, you will understand what my position is. I may be quite wrong, and in that case I know I shall have to pay the penalty for being wrong. But I can only say with Luther, “Gott helfe mir, Ich kann nichts anders.”
I know right well that 99 out of 100 of my fellows would call me atheist, infidel, and all the other usual hard names. As our laws stand, if the lowest thief steals my coat, my evidence (my opinions being known) would not be received against him.
But I cannot help it. One thing people shall not call me with justice and that is–-a liar. As you say of yourself, I too feel that I lack courage; but if ever the occasion arises when I am bound to speak, I will not shame my boy.
Science can, it seems, to those who are committed to it, provide “a resting-place independent of authority and tradition.” And it is to the kindness and love of human beings that we must turn, as Dawkins also suggests, to find solace. Huxley’s steadfastness and bravery in the most trying of moments is intensely moving and inspiring to me, and perhaps answers Liz Byrne’s question to some degree.
Read the rest of Huxley’s letter here.