Vatican: Don't Knock Science

[Krell]

Associated Press
12:00 PM Nov. 04, 2005 PT


VATICAN CITY - A Vatican cardinal said Thursday the faithful should listen to what secular modern science has to offer, warning that religion risks turning into "fundamentalism" if it ignores scientific reason.

Cardinal Paul Poupard, who heads the Pontifical Council for Culture, made the comments at a news conference on a Vatican project to help end the "mutual prejudice" between religion and science that has long bedeviled the Roman Catholic Church and is part of the evolution debate in the United States.

The Vatican project was inspired by Pope John Paul II's 1992 declaration that the church's 17th-century denunciation of Galileo was an error resulting from "tragic mutual incomprehension." Galileo was condemned for supporting Nicolaus Copernicus' discovery that the Earth revolved around the sun; church teaching at the time placed Earth at the center of the universe.

"The permanent lesson that the Galileo case represents pushes us to keep alive the dialogue between the various disciplines, and in particular between theology and the natural sciences, if we want to prevent similar episodes from repeating themselves in the future," Poupard said.

But he said science, too, should listen to religion.

"We know where scientific reason can end up by itself: the atomic bomb and the possibility of cloning human beings are fruit of a reason that wants to free itself from every ethical or religious link," he said.

"But we also know the dangers of a religion that severs its links with reason and becomes prey to fundamentalism," he said.

"The faithful have the obligation to listen to that which secular modern science has to offer, just as we ask that knowledge of the faith be taken in consideration as an expert voice in humanity."

Poupard and others at the news conference were asked about the religion-science debate raging in the United States over evolution and "intelligent design."

Intelligent design's supporters argue that natural selection, an element of evolutionary theory, cannot fully explain the origin of life or the emergence of highly complex life forms.
Monsignor Gianfranco Basti, director of the Vatican project STOQ, or Science, Theology and Ontological Quest, reaffirmed John Paul's 1996 statement that evolution was "more than just a hypothesis."

"A hypothesis asks whether something is true or false," he said. "(Evolution) is more than a hypothesis because there is proof."

He was asked about comments made in July by Austrian Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn, who dismissed in a New York Times article the 1996 statement by John Paul as "rather vague and unimportant" and seemed to back intelligent design.

Basti concurred that John Paul's 1996 letter "is not a very clear expression from a definition point of view," but he said evolution was assuming ever more authority as scientific proof develops.

Poupard, for his part, stressed that what was important was that "the universe wasn't made by itself, but has a creator." But he added, "It's important for the faithful to know how science views things to understand better."

The Vatican project STOQ has organized academic courses and conferences on the relationship between science and religion and is hosting its first international conference on "the infinity in science, philosophy and theology," next week.



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[wonderboy2005]

While I don't want to knock those who value religion yet yeild to comon sense (I think I would fall into that group), I don't like how the author blames science with the burdens that are nuclear weapons and cloning. Nuclear reactions were not designed with weaponization in mind. Pure science was at the heart of the advancement, but a new engergy source was also key to its development. Blaming science for the the acts of others using said science is not logical. Its like blaming a gun company for the murder of an individual killed by some one using a hunting rifle. Secondly, cloning is undoubtably a no-no for religeous zealots due to the moral issue at its heart. However, I can't really think of any inherently bad examples of cloning gone wrong (though I don't claim to be an expert), and at the celular level, it offers numerous advancements. Ultimately it boils down to where you should draw the line between medical usefulness and unnecessary immoral acts. For some, that may be at no cloning at all, for others there may not be a line at all. I personally think that there should be a medium - that we shouldn't give up possibly huge advancements for the sake of a few cells here and there.

[fleecy]

i'm surprised that the vatican is conceding (although not completely) on evolution. geez, at this rate, there may be female priests in the year 3000 :)

[Sephiroth]

I thought the example with nuclear weapons was more about caution in the important of ethics in science, not really blaming anyone. He could have used a better example though to make it stand out clearly. Other than that I agree with the rest of your post wonderboy.

fleecy the orginal comments about evoluation was made by Pope John Paul II in 1996. This is pretty much a restatement of many of the same things from back then.

[fleecy]

haven't followed the doings of the church since i got old enough to realize that a guy who took a vow of celibacy is telling millions of women what to do/not do about birth control :)