A post-script toStega Nona Meets Her Matchand Something From Nothing

“…new knowledge now leads to the recognition of the theory of evolution as more than just a hypothesis.”

John Paul II 1996

Both faith and science are concerned with knowing the truth, and since truth is one, … do not contradict one another.

… insists on the literal truth of all parts of the Bible, even when the Bible is making statements that involve scientific matters.

… the position that insists on the adequacy of the scientific method to answer all our human questions.

Four contemporary areas of tension between faith and science;

evolution, the existence of God, the scientific view of the world, miracles

We know that Earth is about 4.5 million years old.

Life forms vary from simple to complex. Species are not fixed and immutable.

All life shares a common ancestry.

Life developed from non-living matter as a result of natural causes.

The main interest of the two creation stories is in God as saviour and creator.

The sacred writings are concerned with how one goes to heaven, not how the heavens go.

Galileo

If anything exists there must be a cause or reason beyond that thing to explain its existence.

Our Knowledge of God

According to St Thomas Acquinas, we can come to know that God is, but we cannot know what God is.

Our Knowledge of GodAccording to St Thomas Acquinas, since what we mean by God is the cause of the world, it follows that God is not a part of our world, and therefore not a reality we can meet through our sense experience.

Our Knowledge of GodAccording to St Thomas Acquinas, there are five facts about our world that point to the existence of God.

Our Knowledge of God - Fact 1 All that undergoes movement or change does so because something moves or changes it. Ultimately there must be a primary source of movement or change that is not moved or changed by anything else.

Our Knowledge of God – Fact 2 All the agents we know are able to accomplish something because they are themselves being maintained in action. Ultimately there must be a primary cause that is not caused by anything else.

Our Knowledge of God – Fact 3 Every existing thing that we know is something that just happens to exist. There must be something that has to exist.

Our Knowledge of God – Fact 4 All things that we know are dependent beings. Beings that are dependent could not continue to exist if there is not some totally non-dependent being to account for them.

Our Knowledge of God – Fact 5Scientists study nature because they are convinced that nature acts in a way that makes sense. Nature seems to reflect intelligence. Ultimately this points to a supreme intelligence that is responsible for what is.

Our Knowledge of God – SummaryIf something exists now, then there must be something that has always existed, since nothing comes from nothing.

Our Knowledge of God – SummaryWhile we cannot experience God, we can experience God’s effects, to see if they can give us hints of what the Cause from which they came is like.

Our first reaction to theachievements of scienceshould be one of great respect for what has been accomplished, and also one of tribute to God who created the human mind, capable of such pursuits.

Science uses imaginative models of how we believe nature to be. Science is about “beliefs.” Haven’t we seen more than our fair share of outmoded scientific theories and models?

Is Science itself immune to corrupting forces?Who sponsors pharmaceutical, medical, agricultural and educational research?

A particular, unusual event may simply be something that science cannot presently explain, but may yet be able to explain sometime in the future.

We have nothing to fear from the truth.

What forces drive the search for truth?

Thank You