The church has tended to have a tenuous relationship with science. While some of the earliest church fathers allowed for interpretive license when it came to biblical texts, later church leaders were rather firm in their objections to new scientific theories and their implications for biblical interpretation.


Nonetheless, the earliest innovators in modern science, including Galileo Galilei and Isaac Newton, were committed Christians. They believed that their Christian faith provided fertile ground for exploring the natural world.


The question that remains for the church then, is how to appropriate texts that on the surface appear to teach a particular account of creation. Does science become subservient to a theological text?