Theology and science: The quest for a new apologetics

Abstract

This paper claims that the hazy intersection between the diverse fields of theology and the other sciences is not to be clarified in the first place by exploring methodological parallels or degrees of consonance between theology and the sciences. What should be explored first is the epistemological question of the nature and status of explanations and of explanatory claims in theology and science. The similarities, as well as important differences between theology and science, will thus be highlighted when we focus this discussion on the shaping of rationality in theology and science, on the hermeneutical problem o f relating context and meaning, and on the fallibilist nature of both theological and scientific truth claims.