Evil gets a closer look after shootings

Seung-Hui Cho's killing spree at Virginia Tech rekindled the debate over the causes of madness and evil. Scientists and theologians often disagree on that question; the Rev. Richard J. Coleman seeks to reconcile them. The retired United Church of Christ clergyman said he believes our scientific era demands an evolutionary explanation for sin, as well as the mediating morality of religion. Theology, he contends, puts the brakes on science's potential for repeating Adam and Eve's original sin of trampling necessary boundaries in a rush to know all things. Coleman, 65, who lives in Pembroke, wrote a book published in November presenting his views, "Eden's Garden: Rethinking Sin and Evil in an Era of Scientific Promise." Excerpts from an interview this week follow.

Q What makes us sin?

A One answer has been because Adam and Eve sinned. It is hard for Christians to explain -- that was a long time ago, and maybe it did not happen. The second way is to say there must be something about our inherent human nature. I want to add to that the perspective that we sin because it is who we are. That's not to say we can find it in our genes, but we evolved our way into it, in terms of our becoming ever more self-conscious.

Q For example, as we evolved language, we evolved the capacity both to tell the truth and to lie?

A True. The more we became aware of our own actions, the more we became aware that we are both good and bad.

Q You make a distinction between evil and sin.

A Evil is larger. It is a contagion. It sweeps us up, as in war. We think of evil as we have reached a point where the body content has grown so big. Evil is larger than the individual. It has a life and synergy of its own. Sin is the discreet act of individuals.

Q Was Cho's rampage sinful, evil, or neither?

A I would say sinful. We can't excuse him because of his mental state. Otherwise, we can excuse all kinds of actions as the devil-made-me-do-it kind of thing.

Q Some neuroscientists question the whole notion of free will and say it's a myth.

A To argue that is only to make the same kind of argument that is made for why we have faith: Yes, it does involve a neurocircuitry, but that does not exclude the fact that we are a conscious being, which we cannot explain entirely by looking at the physiology. It's not an either-or case.

Q New York Times columnist David Brooks says science has developed insights into the origins of madness, including that it can be ignited by chemical anomalies in the fetal brain. If some kill because their brain had an anomaly in the womb, can we describe their acts as sinful?

A Science may add to the Christian tenet that it is God who will judge us. We may not be as free as we think we are; that's not to excuse us, but to say thank God it's God who will then stand in final judgment, because only God knows everything of who we are. Science is probably going to always reduce it down to just a chemical, biological thing. Theology is saying that's not a fully good explanation.

Q Author Francis Fukuyama wrote that terrible things happen when people demand respect. Another Times columnist, Bob Herbert , says that's exactly the common denominator among mass murderers in recent decades. [Is that] the root cause of sin?

A I would say [they're] really close, but not quite there. The Christian tenet [says] sin has to do with our relationship to God as well as to our fellow human beings. There is the vertical as well as horizontal dimension. Both of these authors describe well only one, the horizontal. Sin can also be looked at as simply when we overreach, meaning science is saying knowledge is always good. No, knowledge can have a potential for good and evil.

Q Are you worried the Virginia Tech slayings will spur that sinful arrogance, if Brooks is right that science thinks it knows what makes people mad?

A We should encourage scientists to do all they can so these terrible things don't happen again. The danger is that we want to think that we are better than we are, and we have reached an age when science can promise us a thing we can take that will make us a better person, so that we no longer need to speak about sin and evil. We will simply evolve to a point where these are a past thing. Science is always going to be on the optimistic side, and theologians probably on the pessimistic side.

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