A Case of Conscience
James Blish's A Case of Conscience is worth reading for its attempts to bring together science and religion and for its insistence on taking religion seriously in a science fiction novel (a rarity). The chief protagonist, Father Ramon Ruiz-Sanchez, a Jesuit priest and a biologist, is a member of a team sent to the planet Lithia to evaluate the possibilities of using it as a waystation without causing harm to either humans or the inhabitants of Lithia, 12-foot reptilian creatures who are highly intelligent and rational. The "case of conscience" that Ruiz-Sanchez must face is whether or not the Lithians' ability to live morally, ethically, and productively without God is possible without interference from the devil. Is this planet's Edenic existence evidence of the fact that morality and goodness can exist without God? Or is it evidence that the devil is capable of creating ruses such as this to trick people into believing they don't need God?
The book is somewhat uneven, dealing with this issue bluntly at times (as in a long explanation of the theology and biology of this point late in the first part of the book) and at other times leaving it alone altogether (as in the second half of the book when Ruiz-Sanchez disappears for long stretches of time and the focus shifts to other characters with other concerns).
In addition to the problem of focus is the question of perspective. The two sides of the issue are made very clear indeed throughout the book, but it is hard to tell which side Blish himself supports or which side the reader is meant to be nudged toward in the end. Typically, science fiction privileges science and rationality over things such as faith and religion and there is some skepticism toward Ruiz-Sanchez's interpretation of the state of affairs within the book, but those characters who express their skepticism are either bad guys or no more reliable than Ruiz-Sanchez, who is treated sympathetically throughout. The final events of the book are left just open enough to allow an atheist reader to see how deluded Ruiz-Sanchez has been or, alternately, to allow a Christian reader to see the awful power of God and of Ruiz-Sanchez's faith in Him. In this way, I suppose, the book itself becomes "a case of conscience," a case that the reader must solve for him or herself based upon the clues provided by Blish, a case that raises another set of questions entirely in the end: Why does Ruiz-Sanchez make the final choice that he does? How does his grief at his choice reflect upon the morality of that choice? And finally, what of the Lithians? Ruiz-Sanchez's concern has been primarily with theology and Lithia's implications for humans, but what of the possibility that (as in Harry Harrison's "The Streets of Ashkelon") the real risk was not to the humans involved but to those others who are touched, tainted, by humans?
The book is somewhat uneven, dealing with this issue bluntly at times (as in a long explanation of the theology and biology of this point late in the first part of the book) and at other times leaving it alone altogether (as in the second half of the book when Ruiz-Sanchez disappears for long stretches of time and the focus shifts to other characters with other concerns).
In addition to the problem of focus is the question of perspective. The two sides of the issue are made very clear indeed throughout the book, but it is hard to tell which side Blish himself supports or which side the reader is meant to be nudged toward in the end. Typically, science fiction privileges science and rationality over things such as faith and religion and there is some skepticism toward Ruiz-Sanchez's interpretation of the state of affairs within the book, but those characters who express their skepticism are either bad guys or no more reliable than Ruiz-Sanchez, who is treated sympathetically throughout. The final events of the book are left just open enough to allow an atheist reader to see how deluded Ruiz-Sanchez has been or, alternately, to allow a Christian reader to see the awful power of God and of Ruiz-Sanchez's faith in Him. In this way, I suppose, the book itself becomes "a case of conscience," a case that the reader must solve for him or herself based upon the clues provided by Blish, a case that raises another set of questions entirely in the end: Why does Ruiz-Sanchez make the final choice that he does? How does his grief at his choice reflect upon the morality of that choice? And finally, what of the Lithians? Ruiz-Sanchez's concern has been primarily with theology and Lithia's implications for humans, but what of the possibility that (as in Harry Harrison's "The Streets of Ashkelon") the real risk was not to the humans involved but to those others who are touched, tainted, by humans?