God and Nature Winter 2021
from free lancer to first editor |
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by Emily Ruppel Herrington
It is gratifying, exciting, and profoundly humbling to look back on ten years of God and Nature magazine to find that what we hoped to provide ASA members with this publication—a space for content on science and faith with focus on topics beyond the so-called ‘culture wars’—is thriving. As Randy Isaac observes in this issue of God and Nature, navigating from page to page on the site today and reading the content curated herein is as much now as it ever has been, ‘an informative and enjoyable expression of science and Christian faith.’
I want to take this retrospective moment to tell the story of how this now-voluminous archive of fascinating interviews, essays, artwork, and more, got started. It is a story that feels relevant in the already alarming and challenging start to 2021, a story about the practices of community and the gestures of love, generosity, and duty to each other that can make us feel connected spiritually and oriented faithfully when we’re physically far apart. And it’s a story about spiritual timing, or if you will, the mysterious uncanny timing of the holy spirit.
On February 12, 2011, I opened an email forward from my older sister Nancy, who—despite being hundreds of miles away at the time doing development work in Port au Prince, Haiti, and thus unable to participate in the social events of her home church in Washington D.C.—was still reliably opening messages from community members announcing small group events, potlucks, special worship services, social programming, and in this case, a writing opportunity. My sister thought of me when she read Tom Burnett’s description of the needed storyteller. Tom was seeking, “a freelance science writer to contribute to God and Nature, an online publication that promotes the science and religion dialogue in a collaborative and constructive manner…” I was studying science writing at MIT and wasn’t opposed to the idea of a recurring gig that could help me practice my science interviewing skills, and although neither my sister nor I had ever heard of the American Scientific Affiliation, I thought it might be nice to meet my sister’s friend and have a conversation about their project. Maybe it wouldn’t come to anything (a lot of blog projects don’t, and I was a bit skeptical about this one) but the contact with Tom also seemed to represent a way of feeling close to Nancy, if indirectly—it would be something to share in mind, at least, across the Atlantic miles.
An occasion to meet Tom Burnett and to talk with then-ASA Director Randy Isaac about the fledgling God and Nature project came quickly as the AAAS (American Association for the Advancement of Science) was hosting its annual conference the next month and I was registered to go as a graduate student in science communication. I was shy about attending the ASA dinner meetup since I wasn’t yet a member and the guest list was intimidating, but upon arriving at the crowded downtown restaurant where the local ASAers were gathered, I felt immediately the caring, intelligent warmth of the group and I felt welcomed into each new conversation as I took in the loud and colorful, distracting environment of the D.C. restaurant. Tom Burnett turned out to be effervescently interesting and nice and seemed to know everything about the history of science; Randy Isaac, despite being an accomplished scientist and a well-respected leader of the group, seemed more like a fond and loving friend to each person gathered. I enjoyed exceptional food that night while I talked with Tom and Randy about their ideas for the God and Nature project, about the blog they’d put together so-far on WordPress, and about how I might contribute to their effort of representing undervalued synergies of science and Christian faith through creative and engaging content, drawing on the resources of their impressive community.
I think the rest of this narrative is ASA history! In looking back on the evolution of the God and Nature magazine effort, my imagination goes out to—and my heart enjoys reliving again and again—the uncountably many moments of cooperative labor that brought each successive issue of the magazine to fruition. I remember my reverse-commute train ride from Boston’s North End, where I lived after school, to photogenic Ipswich where the ASA office was then located. I remember fun and illuminating intergenerational lunchtime chats with our small office staff, and also the irregular but always wonderful mornings that I would arrive on the train in time to catch the end of Randy Isaac’s weekly coffee conversations with Jack Haas, his mentor.
I’m unspeakably grateful for these memories and that I found the ASA when I did, or vice versa (through my sister Nancy). I am surprised—but not that surprised—that Tom Burnett’s blog project has grown organically into the life of the ASA such that it functions apparently “obviously” as part of the work of the organization. It was a labor of love shared by many, and the variety of the gifts we each brought to the work made it special and rewarding even when the project faced its occasional frustrations. As I watch snow gently fall outside my window in Pittsburgh, the marathon isolation of pandemic lockdown feels dissipated somewhat by these recollections.
Emily Herrington is a writer and researcher living in Pittsburgh, PA, with her husband Paul and a cat named Iago. She holds a PhD in Communication and an MA in Bioethics from University of Pittsburgh and an MS in Science Writing from MIT.
It is gratifying, exciting, and profoundly humbling to look back on ten years of God and Nature magazine to find that what we hoped to provide ASA members with this publication—a space for content on science and faith with focus on topics beyond the so-called ‘culture wars’—is thriving. As Randy Isaac observes in this issue of God and Nature, navigating from page to page on the site today and reading the content curated herein is as much now as it ever has been, ‘an informative and enjoyable expression of science and Christian faith.’
I want to take this retrospective moment to tell the story of how this now-voluminous archive of fascinating interviews, essays, artwork, and more, got started. It is a story that feels relevant in the already alarming and challenging start to 2021, a story about the practices of community and the gestures of love, generosity, and duty to each other that can make us feel connected spiritually and oriented faithfully when we’re physically far apart. And it’s a story about spiritual timing, or if you will, the mysterious uncanny timing of the holy spirit.
On February 12, 2011, I opened an email forward from my older sister Nancy, who—despite being hundreds of miles away at the time doing development work in Port au Prince, Haiti, and thus unable to participate in the social events of her home church in Washington D.C.—was still reliably opening messages from community members announcing small group events, potlucks, special worship services, social programming, and in this case, a writing opportunity. My sister thought of me when she read Tom Burnett’s description of the needed storyteller. Tom was seeking, “a freelance science writer to contribute to God and Nature, an online publication that promotes the science and religion dialogue in a collaborative and constructive manner…” I was studying science writing at MIT and wasn’t opposed to the idea of a recurring gig that could help me practice my science interviewing skills, and although neither my sister nor I had ever heard of the American Scientific Affiliation, I thought it might be nice to meet my sister’s friend and have a conversation about their project. Maybe it wouldn’t come to anything (a lot of blog projects don’t, and I was a bit skeptical about this one) but the contact with Tom also seemed to represent a way of feeling close to Nancy, if indirectly—it would be something to share in mind, at least, across the Atlantic miles.
An occasion to meet Tom Burnett and to talk with then-ASA Director Randy Isaac about the fledgling God and Nature project came quickly as the AAAS (American Association for the Advancement of Science) was hosting its annual conference the next month and I was registered to go as a graduate student in science communication. I was shy about attending the ASA dinner meetup since I wasn’t yet a member and the guest list was intimidating, but upon arriving at the crowded downtown restaurant where the local ASAers were gathered, I felt immediately the caring, intelligent warmth of the group and I felt welcomed into each new conversation as I took in the loud and colorful, distracting environment of the D.C. restaurant. Tom Burnett turned out to be effervescently interesting and nice and seemed to know everything about the history of science; Randy Isaac, despite being an accomplished scientist and a well-respected leader of the group, seemed more like a fond and loving friend to each person gathered. I enjoyed exceptional food that night while I talked with Tom and Randy about their ideas for the God and Nature project, about the blog they’d put together so-far on WordPress, and about how I might contribute to their effort of representing undervalued synergies of science and Christian faith through creative and engaging content, drawing on the resources of their impressive community.
I think the rest of this narrative is ASA history! In looking back on the evolution of the God and Nature magazine effort, my imagination goes out to—and my heart enjoys reliving again and again—the uncountably many moments of cooperative labor that brought each successive issue of the magazine to fruition. I remember my reverse-commute train ride from Boston’s North End, where I lived after school, to photogenic Ipswich where the ASA office was then located. I remember fun and illuminating intergenerational lunchtime chats with our small office staff, and also the irregular but always wonderful mornings that I would arrive on the train in time to catch the end of Randy Isaac’s weekly coffee conversations with Jack Haas, his mentor.
I’m unspeakably grateful for these memories and that I found the ASA when I did, or vice versa (through my sister Nancy). I am surprised—but not that surprised—that Tom Burnett’s blog project has grown organically into the life of the ASA such that it functions apparently “obviously” as part of the work of the organization. It was a labor of love shared by many, and the variety of the gifts we each brought to the work made it special and rewarding even when the project faced its occasional frustrations. As I watch snow gently fall outside my window in Pittsburgh, the marathon isolation of pandemic lockdown feels dissipated somewhat by these recollections.
Emily Herrington is a writer and researcher living in Pittsburgh, PA, with her husband Paul and a cat named Iago. She holds a PhD in Communication and an MA in Bioethics from University of Pittsburgh and an MS in Science Writing from MIT.