BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

OBJECTIVE TRUTH EXISTS

Science without religion is lame; religion without science is blind.

ALBERT EINSTEIN

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Faith and Reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth.

POPE JOHN PAUL II

WHEN I WAS A KID, one of my favorite riddles went like this:

A boy journeying through a foreign land arrives at a fork in the road guarded by two men in native dress. One man belongs to a tribe that always lies; the other, to a tribe that always tells the truth — but the boy doesn't know which is which. One road leads to danger; the other, to safety. Riddle: What is the one question the boy can ask the two tribesmen to make sure he takes the right road?

I will give you the answer later in this chapter, but first I want to ask you another question. It is the simple but deep question that Pontius Pilate put to Jesus, who claimed to represent the truth: "What is truth?"

When I was science editor for Good Morning America, I did a story about a tourmaline mine in Southern California. The best part of the assignment was that I got to go mining for gems, something I'd never done.

I was led deep inside the earth to a cramped space where the air was cool and humid. With my bare hands, I dug into the cave's creamy mud wall and soon struck something hard and sharp-edged. I seized the mystery find, pulled it out, and wiped it off. That's when I saw it: a magnificent, fully formed, pink tourmaline gemstone.

I imagine truth — objective truth — being like that. Something real and beautiful. Something natural, not of our making, with definable qualities, waiting to be unearthed.

Do such truths actually exist?

I claim they do. And in this book, I elaborate on ten objective truths that I consider amazing because of what they tell us about life, the world, and the Creator. And because — wonder of wonders — science and the Bible agree on all ten being absolutely, positively, demonstrably true.

Obviously, my position is at odds with skeptics who believe that science and the Bible cannot possibly agree on anything, and with relativists who insist that objective truth doesn't exist, not in science and certainly not in religion. But the evidence for my thesis is considerable, as you will see.

Why does it matter that objective truth exists? For one thing, because the journey of life is noted for its vexing forks in the road. Whenever we come to one, we are forced to choose which path to take. And our choices