Language of God

Milmer Martinez Vergara grew up in Colombia and never saw a distinction between science, care for the environment and the faith that was instilled from a young age. His love for science and the ocean brought him on a wild journey from mangrove swamps, to the National Aquarium in Cuba to the oceanside cliffs of California, eventually leading him to a job at Plant with Purpose. In the episode, he talks about his journey and his work with communities in Latin America and the Caribbean, where science can come alongside the needs of the people and together they can find solutions that allow both people and the environment to flourish. 

We recorded this interview in person during the BioLogos Creation Care Summit. Several of the speakers from the summit have been on the podcast before and we’ve had many other great podcast guests talking about creation care. You can find all creation care themed episodes here.

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Rick Potts has always had an interest in origins. As a kid, exploring the origins of musical instruments and the solar system fascinated him. In high school he stumbled upon the study of human origins; he has not stopped investigating since. Dr. Potts tells Jim stories of excavations in China and southern Kenya and of people encountering the exhibit on Human Origins around the US. Reverberating throughout their conversation is the question, ‘What does it mean to be human?’

Find out more about the Hall of Human Origins on the Smithsonian website.

This episode originally aired on May 30, 2019

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For those of us who have worked at BioLogos or spent any time on our forum, the name Christy Hemphill is quite familiar. As a collaborator on the BioLogos school curriculum project, INTEGRATE, and a long-time moderator on the forum, her work has been a blessing in our community. We realized, however, that still far too few of us have heard the poignant insight and testimony she brings to her work with us. On today’s episode, Christy shares with us her experience as a Bible translator working in a remote community in Mexico, the important work she has done with us on INTEGRATE and the Forum, and how her experience homeschooling her kids has helped her navigate faith with her children. 

Watch the viral video of a cockatoo meowing to kittens.

Read Christy's recommendations for how to approach the difficult subject of origins from a gracious perspective.

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Sy Garte didn’t have the kind of upbringing that would typically lead one to preaching sermons. His parents were members of the communist party, materialists, and atheists. But as he started studying science he found some things that started him wondering about this idea that science can answer every question. His wondering opened the doorway, and he walked through, eventually encountering Jesus Christ and finding that his study and practice of science could go hand in hand with being a follower of Christ. 

Sy Garte's Youtube Channel

Sy Garte's Website

Sy Garte's Book

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Jason Fileta didn’t start out as an environmental activist. His first passion was to alleviate the suffering of the poor and hungry. As he met and heard the stories from those struggling with poverty and hunger he often asked them the question: if we could get a million Christians in North America to raise their voices on an issue that impacts your community, what would it be? He was surprised when a farmer in Uganda said climate change. But then he started to hear story after story of how climate change has made the lives of people harder, and this has led Jason to understand the deep connection between our caring for the planet and the lives of the poor and hungry around the world.

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A new report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warns that the climate emergency has reached a “code red”. New research also shows that over 50% of Americans agree that climate change is happening and demands urgent action. So why does it seem like so little is being done? Internationally renowned climate scientist, professor and author Katharine Hayhoe returns to the show and tells us what keeps her hopeful despite the dire situation we find ourselves in. She also tells us about her forthcoming book, Saving Us: A Climate Scientist's Case for Hope and Healing in a Divided World, which expands on why she’s hopeful. Katharine is also an ardent Christian and she shares with Jim the biblical foundation for climate action.

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At first glance, biblical genealogies appear to straightforward family trees, the kinds we see on ancestry.com that map out the precise relationships between parents and offspring, tracing back as far as we can go. But is that how the genealogies in the Bible are supposed to be read? It turns out there’s a lot more going on in the genealogies than just that straightforward accounting. Bible scholar, Richard Middleton, shares with us some of the historical context that helps us to see the genealogies as another part of the story of God’s creation. 

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Throughout the pandemic, COVID-19 related news and public thought has often centered around the countries we reside in. Our guest today, Father Nicanor Austriaco, invites us to peer beyond our own situations to see how the rest of the world is dealing with the disease. Father Nicanor shares with Jim how his home country, the Philippines, is handling the tumultuous time as well as what it’s like to be both a Catholic priest and a molecular biologist during a pandemic.

Learn more about Father Nicanor's project on St. Thomas Aquinas and evolution here.

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As the series comes to a close, Jim and Colin take stock of one more distinguishing feature of humans—the image of God. While the previous episodes in the series question if humans are uniquely unique from other species from the ground up, this episode changes perspectives to approach an answer from the Heavens down. As usual, they bring in a range of experts from a variety of fields to weigh in on what it means to be made in the image of God. They come to some significant conclusions, including a warning against idolizing human rationality, but also point out where this quest may continue. 

In this new Language of God mini series—Uniquely Unique—Jim is joined by our producer Colin for a deep dive into these questions and more. The quest? To try to come to a better understanding of what it means to be human, to bear the image of God. Along the way, you’ll hear from a variety of experts from a wide range of disciplines, drawing on biology, history, anthropology, philosophy, theology and more to try to make sense of our human identity.

Check our new animated video series including a video exploring what it means to be human. 

Join a conversation about this episode on the BioLogos Forum.

In the long history of searching for what makes humans special we have repeatedly caused great harm to our neighbors, both human and non-human. In fact, it seems that one of the things that makes our species unique is our ability to cause such destruction. The search for human uniqueness can lead to a kind of thinking that devalues everything non-human. When ‘human’ is defined too narrowly, that can leave some humans out. In the first part of this episode we look at how ideas of race have caused us to treat a large portion of our population as less than human. Then we look at how human-centric thinking has had a detrimental effect on our planet.

In this new Language of God mini series—Uniquely Unique—Jim is joined by our producer Colin for a deep dive into these questions and more. The quest? To try to come to a better understanding of what it means to be human, to bear the image of God. Along the way, you’ll hear from a variety of experts from a wide range of disciplines, drawing on biology, history, anthropology, philosophy, theology and more to try to make sense of our human identity.

Check our new animated video series including a video exploring what it means to be human. 

Join a conversation about this episode on the BioLogos Forum.