Gregory J. Rummo, D.Min., M.S., M.B.A., B.S., is a Lecturer of Chemistry in the School of Arts and Sciences at Palm Beach Atlantic University and an Adjunct Scholar at the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation. He is the author of The View from the Grass Roots, The View from the Grass Roots - Another Look, and several other volumes in the series. His 2024 doctoral dissertation, Reaching Gen Z with the Gospel in the College Classroom was published in January 2025 by Wipf & Stock.
For millennia, man has wondered whether he is alone in the universe. Organizations such as the SETI Institute (Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence), founded in 1984, once employed more than 100 scientists, educators, and support staff in their quest to “explore, understand and explain the origin, nature and prevalence of life in the universe.” To […]
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The majority of students on college campuses currently are members of Generation Z (Gen Z). They are adults, born between 1997 and 2012, and the most stressed cohort to ever embark on their journey through higher education. They are reporting “the highest stress levels of any generation in the country,” according to the American Psychological […]
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Editor’s Note: This is the second of two essays titled “An Extra Credit Assignment Inspires Reflection on Study Habits.” You can read the first one here. An essay I wrote, “Incoming college STEM freshmen, take note: You need to take your classes seriously,” was published as a special to the USA TODAY Network and in two South […]
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For unto us a child is born. Unto us a son is given. — Isaiah 9:6 On Christmas, we celebrate a phenomenon theologians call the incarnation. The birth of Jesus Christ was the trans-dimensional irruption of the Son of God into our world from the heavenly realm. Both the Old and New Testaments give witness […]
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This week is my favorite week of the year. Thanksgiving offers an official period of several days away from the office and school to reflect and give thanks to family and friends for our abundant blessings as Americans. It is worth remembering the original story of the Pilgrim’s embarkation on the Mayflower as recorded in […]
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An essay I wrote entitled, “Incoming college STEM freshmen, take note: You need to take your classes seriously,” was published as a special to the USA TODAY Network and in two other South Florida newspapers. I offered ten suggestions for success to incoming college freshmen planning to major in a STEM discipline. Among the suggestions […]
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Editor’s Note: This essay is a condensed version of the author’s previous piece for Minding the Sciences, titled “The Evolution of Intelligent Design Theory.” You can read the full-length version here. Headlines occasionally flash across the start page of my Microsoft browser’s newsfeed that feature articles about Darwinian evolution or the supposed chemical origin of […]
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This past year, I have seen headlines flash across the start page of my Microsoft browser’s newsfeed that featured articles about the supposed chemical origin of life. Was it the result of aliens seeding our planet billions of years ago—a theory called Panspermia? Or an asteroid bombardment with trace amino acids and nucleic acids, the […]
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Editor’s Note: The following is a brief excerpt from the author’s in-depth essay, “Using the Cultural Mandate of Genesis 1:28 and the Ten Commandments as the Foundation for a Christian Ethic of Earth Stewardship,” originally published by the Cornwall Alliance on November 7, 2023. Shared here with permission. Introduction As recently as the 2018 Gallup […]
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College was a transformative period in my life. I held my professors in high regard, viewing them as beacons of wisdom. For most of my time there, I was a teaching assistant and laboratory technician in the chemistry department, a role that made me feel like an integral part of the university community. The camaraderie […]
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Editor’s Note: This essay is the third excerpt from the author’s doctoral project titled “Reaching Generation Z with the Gospel at a Christian University through Faith Integration, Radical Hospitality, and Missional Opportunities,” completed as part of the Doctor of Ministry program at Knox Theological Seminary. The content has been edited to adhere to MTC’s guidelines. […]
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“But ye shall receive power after the Holy Ghost is come upon you; and ye shall be witnesses unto Me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.” – Acts 1:8 As a college professor concerned with the broadening of my students’ compassionate understanding of […]
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Editor’s Note: This essay is the second excerpt from the author’s doctoral project titled “Reaching Generation Z with the Gospel at a Christian University through Faith Integration, Radical Hospitality, and Missional Opportunities,” completed as part of the Doctor of Ministry program at Knox Theological Seminary. The content has been edited to adhere to MTC’s guidelines. For […]
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Editor’s Note: This essay is an excerpt from the author’s doctoral project titled “Reaching Generation Z with the Gospel at a Christian University through Faith Integration, Radical Hospitality, and Missional Opportunities,” completed as part of the Doctor of Ministry program at Knox Theological Seminary. The content has been edited to adhere to MTC’s guidelines. For […]
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You may not want to hear this, but the fall semester is fast approaching. Most of the students I teach are freshmen, and their high school chemistry class was most likely spent sitting at home in front of a computer during COVID. In other words, they have learned next to nothing about chemistry. To help […]
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“Remove not the ancient landmark, which thy fathers have set.” – Proverbs 22:28 (KJV) In the latest row between conservative and liberal theologians over LGBT issues, conservative Anglican leaders said that “they could no longer recognize England’s archbishop of Canterbury as first among equals and called for an overhaul of how the global denomination is […]
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“God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain.” – C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain Every year, I teach a cohort of nursing students that has to pass through my chemistry class. They are almost all freshmen and almost all females. In the laboratory sections I […]
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“I think that you appreciate that there are extraordinary men and women and extraordinary moments when history leaps forward on the backs of these individuals, that what can be imagined can be achieved, that you must dare to dream, but that there’s no substitute for perseverance and hard work …” – FBI Special Agent Dana […]
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“It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out.” Proverbs 25:2 (ESV) In Europe, at the turn of the twentieth century, great advances were being made in atomic theory. In 1904, the British physicist and Nobel laureate Sir Joseph John Thomson, who had discovered the […]
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One of the laboratory procedures we teach to first-year general chemistry students involves measuring the wavelengths of the visible emission spectra of several elements including hydrogen, helium, neon, and mercury. I begin my class with a short, non-conventional lecture that includes the trailer from The Matrix. It is fitting to introduce the basic principles of […]
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I remember as a college freshman seeing a cartoon taped on the door of one of the physics labs in Cornelia Hall at Iona College. It showed a student complaining to his professor, saying, “I really understand the material, I just can’t do the problems.” It’s not rocket science to understand why GenZers are struggling […]
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In one of the laboratory classes I teach, students learn techniques to separate heterogenous mixtures of solids. One procedure involves the separation of sodium chloride from beach sand by mixing the solid mixture in water, filtering the resulting slurry to remove the sand and evaporating the water to recover the sodium chloride. In a second […]
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In an April 25, 2022 Chemical and Engineering News article, Holly Jean Buck, a “development sociologist,” expresses some peculiar views about fossil fuels that go beyond climate change. It is surprising to find them purveyed in a journal not of sociology or politics but of chemistry and engineering. For starters, Buck maintains, “achieving net-zero emissions […]
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