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COLUMNS
It’s not rocket science:
Finding the Truth in spite of ourselves
The Catholic Sun | June 17, 2010
When a major research university decides to hold a science conference, it’s a safe bet some top-notch speakers are going to be invited.
Such was the case with Arizona State University’s Consortium for Science, Policy and Outcomes last month in asking Msgr. Marcelo Sánchez Sorondo, the chancellor of the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy of Sciences, to deliver a keynote address.
Msgr. Sorondo presented a scholarly talk entitled “The Truth of Science for Justice and Peace.”
At the conclusion of his remarks, the microphone was turned over to the crowd for questions. That’s when Lawrence Krauss, an internationally known theoretical physicist who holds a doctorate from MIT and is the director of ASU’s Origins Project, stepped forward to shake things up a bit.
“The title of your talk is ‘The Truth of Science for Justice and Peace’ and I want to ask about how can you reconcile that with the organization for which you work? One with which you wouldn’t associate any of those qualities?” Krauss asked. “How can these philosophical notions you talked about be reconciled with the complete opposite behavior of the institution for which you work?”
He then went on to characterize the Church as an institution beset by rampant pedophilia, etc., etc.
So after taking a few deep breaths and reminding myself that Christ commands us to forgive, I checked out Krauss’s Origins Project.
Turns out the Origins Project is hoping to unlock the secrets of the universe. The website, origins.asu.edu, says the project addresses themes like how the universe began, how life arose and so on.
And lo and behold, who is on the external scientific advisory committee but the famously atheist Richard Dawkins, author of “The God Delusion.”
Urgent mission
The open hostility toward Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular is hardly novel in the modern university setting. Inviting a Vatican VIP to travel all the way from Rome to address a conference and then insulting him, while disconcerting, is not entirely unexpected. To be authentically Catholic is to be despised in many corners of academia.
Ah, for a bit of perspective. The university as we know it would not even exist but for the efforts of the Church to preserve it during medieval times. But I digress.
Some who dwell in the ivory tower of public universities, largely courtesy of the taxpayer, sometimes forget there is such a thing as metaphysics, literally, that which lies beyond the physical world. In other words, not everything in our universe can be weighed, measured and quantified.
The deep joy one experiences at the birth of a child? The courage of one who lays down his life for another? Mere physiological reactions, evolutionary adaptions with no transcendental cause or meaning? The beauty of a shooting star — a mere celestial appearance?
Or, for those who have attained wealth, status and power, the dogged question, “Is this all there is?” Truly, St. Augustine had it right: Our hearts are restless until they rest in Him.
In his recent visit to Portugal, Pope Benedict called for “a new missionary vigor” to counter the growing secularism of the West.
Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted wrote as much in his December 2009 pastoral letter, “Serving Truth in the University.” “This mission is urgent in our postmodern world, which suffers the grave effects of the rupture between faith and reason. In recent centuries, various philosophies have tended to impose severe limitations on reason, reducing human knowledge to that which is rationally or empirically verifiable.”
How great is the need for evangelization, how desperately our world thirsts for the truth! We must never cease to proclaim that the truth is a Person, not a thing. He is the One who set our universe in motion and without whom we would not exist. Every heartbeat, every breath of our frail humanity depends on His magnificent, magnanimous gift.
And you don’t need a string of initials behind your name to know that.
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