Questions for a millennium: Religion and science from the perspective of a scientist

This essay addresses a series of eight questions about what religion can do for science. It explores the secular role of religion in contemporary science and the need for greater synthesis between science arid religion. It concludes that, for survival in the twenty-first century, religion cannot exist without acknowledging and using the enormous information pool of science, and science can no longer shun or ignore religion. Humankind will always need the large, synthetic explanations that religion provides of why we are here what we ought to do and believe. The world needs to mark this new millennium with a sense of respect, cooperation, and even synthesis between science and religion.