IS THERE ROOM FOR SPIRITUALITY IN SCIENCE?

Controversial question: Is there room for spirituality in science?

In modern times, one would say no. Yet spirituality, mostly in the form of Western interpretations of Easter tradition, is now woven into the entire “wellness” movement, and the wellness movement claims to be backed by science. So, which is it? And how did this come to be?

I recently published a biography of Candace Pert, who was Chief of Brain Biochemistry at the National Institute of Mental Health, part of the NIH. Her seminal studies proved the mind-body link and formed the basis of integrative or functional medicine.?

While Candace operated at the highest levels of science, she was also deeply spiritual. Later in life, she referred to herself openly as a “recovering atheist” who’d come to view science as a mystical process, “like having God whisper in your ear . . . It’s this inner voice that scientists must come to trust.”

Candace believed that science was a vehicle for her own spiritual transformation and an expression of her God-given gifts. Through research, she sought the meaning of life in general, as well as her personal significance, and she’d begun to sense an interconnectedness, viewing the human body as a microcosm of the universe. Just as the body functions through coordinated, communicating systems, she reasoned, so the universe is an amalgam of integrated, inextricably linked components that form a greater, collective whole.?

In the 1990s, when Candace began using words like “God,” “Spirit,” and “soul” in her work, she knew she was uttering heresy. But she wasn’t unique in chronicling mystical experiences or a heightened perception beyond the normal five senses, as history presents a long line of groundbreaking scientists, artists, musicians, and leaders who have attributed their inspiration to the hand of the divine.?

In 1865, the German organic chemist August Kekule? claimed to have intuited the six-membered ring of carbon atoms of benzene in a dream in which he’d seen the ouroboros, an ancient Egyptian symbol later used in Greek alchemy and Gnosticism that shows a serpent devouring its own tail. Similarly, in 1869, Russian chemist Dmitri Mendeleev dreamed that he saw a chart classifying the fundamental sixty-three elements, giving birth to the periodic table. Nobel Prize–winning German psychobiologist Otto Loewi was also inspired by a dream to perform the first experiments on neurotransmitters and discover acetylcholine in the 1920s. Even Albert Einstein said, “I believe in intuition and inspiration . . . at times I feel certain I am right while not knowing the reason.”?

Most notably, contemporary scientists conveniently ignore that Rene? Descartes, the founder of modern philosophy and science, was a devout Catholic who reported having a series of three dreams in 1619 in which he was visited by the “Spirit of Truth.” These dreams initially propelled him to consecrate himself to the Blessed Virgin Mary and vow to embark on a pilgrimage from Venice to Notre Dame de Lorette. But Descartes later came to view his visions as an exhortation to devote himself to scientific observation as his divinely chosen path. The irony of Descartes’s famous declaration of reason, “I think, therefore I am,” is that it was channeled from a transcendent place of open feeling. Central to this statement is a notion generally overlooked in modern times: Descartes’s staunch belief in the existence of a God who has designed a logical, orderly universe for humans to discover.?

As witnessed by the success of Candace’s 1997 memoir Molecules of Emotion, in merging science with spirituality she had tapped into Western society’s deep need to address this duality. Scholarly advances in history, archaeology, and religious studies had shown many parts of both Old and New Testaments to be allegory rather than fact. Most educated people did not believe that God created the heavens and Earth in six days or that Eve had sprung from Adam’s rib, much less tempted him with an apple that damned humanity with original sin. For millennia, wars had been fought on behalf of vengeful gods, and many questioned whether organized religion had been corrupted by vainglorious men consolidating power rather than living God’s truth.?

Still, the lessons of love, compassion, forgiveness, and acceptance inherent in religious texts applied, and people continued to seek a connection to forces greater than themselves. Increasingly, individuals were rejecting divisive, doctrinaire institutions and instead declaring themselves “spiritual,” cultivating a personal relationship with their higher power. Candace affirmed that divine devotion need not conflict with faith in science and technology. After all, both science and faith rely on the assumption that the universe consists of more than our five senses can perceive.?

Candace’s message was subversive bordering on heretical, as it defied hegemonies in both religion and medicine. Just as prioritizing a personal relationship with God disintermediates the priest, so encouraging individuals to take charge of their own health through integrative or functional medicine sidelines the demigods known as doctors. Her audience was hungry for autonomy, and after decades spent bowing to false idols, Candace felt that she too was channeling the spirit of truth.?