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NewsThe Big Bang, Religion and Science
Published On November 12 , 2009
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By Anil Netto
One of the biggest debates in the United States is the rift between those who believe the world was created in seven days and those who believe it was created over billions of years.
This tension between religion and science is not something new. It has been ongoing for centuries.
In a sense, both religion and science share some common ground. Both are concerned about seeking the truth. Science asks how it happened or how it works while religion asks why it happened.
The strongest tension between religion and science occurred when scientists and astronomers showed that the earth was not the centre of the universe and the planets actually revolve around the sun. Some felt that this challenged the notion of earth and human beings being the centre of God’s Creation.
I watched a fascinating documentary last weekend about the origins of the universe and the scientific quest to understand how it took place. It showed how this quest took place over centuries from the time of Aristotle and Ptlomey.
What was fascinating was that although the Church was uneasy with some of the challenging scientific work, Catholics were among those in the forefront of pioneering a deeper understanding of the origins of the universe.
Among the illustrious astronomers and physicists who developed the scientific knowledge were Catholics such as Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543), Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) and Monsignor Georges Lemaître (1894-1966).
Copernicus, a mathematician, physician and Catholic canon among other things, was the first astronomer to formulate a cosmology which displaced the earth from the centre of the universe.
His book, On the Revolutions of the Celestial Orbs, published just before his death is regarded as the starting point of modern astronomy and ushered in the scientific revolution. His heliocentric model put the sun at the centre of the universe.
Galileo, a devout Catholic, championed Copernicus’ theory of a sun-centred universe at a time when many of his contemporaries still held that the earth was the centre of the universe. For that, he had to pay a heavy price for his beliefs though some assert that his problems with the church arose when he entered into the realm of theology and scriptural interpretation. He was condemned by the Holy Office as “violently suspected of heresy”.
Having improved the telescope and studied the planets and sunspots, Galileo is regarded as the father of modern observational astronomy, the father of modern physics and even the father of modern science.
In issuing an apology for the church’s condemnation of Galileo in 1992, Pope John Paul II was trying to heal the split between religion and science. The pope made it clear that Galileo’s freedom of scientific inquiry was violated by the church authorities of his time.
Other geniuses such as Isaac Newton and Einstein made great strides in discovering the laws of the universe. But despite Einstein’s brilliance in formulating the theory of relativity, he believed in a static, eternal and unchanging universe. It was left to the lesser known Catholic priest, Lemaitre, a Belgian professor of physics and astronomer at the Catholic University of Leuven, to develop “the hypothesis of the primeval atom”, better known as the Big Bang theory of the origin of the universe.
Today, the Big Bang theory, as it is now understood, holds that the Universe was created from a single primeval atom containing a fusion of pure energy from gravity, electromagnetics, strong nuclear forces and weak nuclear forces. The atom exploded creating the universe, gravity was separated from the other three forces, and until today, the universe is still expanding and growing.
I spoke to a Buddhist friend about this and I was told that Buddhism holds that everything is in a state of flux.
It took centuries for science to figure out the origins and laws of the universe, and how it works, with each astronomer or mathematician uncovering one or more layers of the truth, until a bigger and bigger picture was revealed.
Although the universe developed over different phases lasting billions of years, resulting in the creation of the planets and life on earth, this does not mean it is incompatible with the story of Genesis.
Scripture uses everyday language to communicate larger truths about the world and why we are here.
What about the seven-day version of Creation in Genesis? This should be read in the context of 2 Peter Chapter 3:8 “But there is one thing, my dear friends, that you must never forget: that with the Lord, a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.”
It was St Augustine who wrote: “One does not read in the Gospel that the Lord said: I will send you the Paraclete who will teach you about the course of the sun and moon. For He willed to make them Christians, not mathematicians.”
All the same, it is interesting to note that in 1215, the Fourth Lateran Council taught that the universe had a beginning in time, something that even Einstein could not acknowledge.
What the Big Bang theory from a single atom should tell us is that even though the earth may not be the centre of the universe, the universe itself had an origin from a single primeval atom. And in that sense, we are all interconnected, just as St Francis had sung, not only with one another but also with all that is in the universe, the sun, the moon, and the stars.
We should be in awe that we are interconnected — we have the same origins — as everything else in the universe. And the earth and its creatures and human beings, so far as we can tell, is still a very special place, even unique in our known universe.
How exactly was this first atom created and where did the energy within it come from?
That is perhaps a matter for both faith and science to continue to contemplate.
One of the biggest debates in the United States is the rift between those who believe the world was created in seven days and those who believe it was created over billions of years.
This tension between religion and science is not something new. It has been ongoing for centuries.
In a sense, both religion and science share some common ground. Both are concerned about seeking the truth. Science asks how it happened or how it works while religion asks why it happened.
The strongest tension between religion and science occurred when scientists and astronomers showed that the earth was not the centre of the universe and the planets actually revolve around the sun. Some felt that this challenged the notion of earth and human beings being the centre of God’s Creation.
I watched a fascinating documentary last weekend about the origins of the universe and the scientific quest to understand how it took place. It showed how this quest took place over centuries from the time of Aristotle and Ptlomey.
What was fascinating was that although the Church was uneasy with some of the challenging scientific work, Catholics were among those in the forefront of pioneering a deeper understanding of the origins of the universe.
Among the illustrious astronomers and physicists who developed the scientific knowledge were Catholics such as Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543), Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) and Monsignor Georges Lemaître (1894-1966).
Copernicus, a mathematician, physician and Catholic canon among other things, was the first astronomer to formulate a cosmology which displaced the earth from the centre of the universe.
His book, On the Revolutions of the Celestial Orbs, published just before his death is regarded as the starting point of modern astronomy and ushered in the scientific revolution. His heliocentric model put the sun at the centre of the universe.
Galileo, a devout Catholic, championed Copernicus’ theory of a sun-centred universe at a time when many of his contemporaries still held that the earth was the centre of the universe. For that, he had to pay a heavy price for his beliefs though some assert that his problems with the church arose when he entered into the realm of theology and scriptural interpretation. He was condemned by the Holy Office as “violently suspected of heresy”.
Having improved the telescope and studied the planets and sunspots, Galileo is regarded as the father of modern observational astronomy, the father of modern physics and even the father of modern science.
In issuing an apology for the church’s condemnation of Galileo in 1992, Pope John Paul II was trying to heal the split between religion and science. The pope made it clear that Galileo’s freedom of scientific inquiry was violated by the church authorities of his time.
Other geniuses such as Isaac Newton and Einstein made great strides in discovering the laws of the universe. But despite Einstein’s brilliance in formulating the theory of relativity, he believed in a static, eternal and unchanging universe. It was left to the lesser known Catholic priest, Lemaitre, a Belgian professor of physics and astronomer at the Catholic University of Leuven, to develop “the hypothesis of the primeval atom”, better known as the Big Bang theory of the origin of the universe.
Today, the Big Bang theory, as it is now understood, holds that the Universe was created from a single primeval atom containing a fusion of pure energy from gravity, electromagnetics, strong nuclear forces and weak nuclear forces. The atom exploded creating the universe, gravity was separated from the other three forces, and until today, the universe is still expanding and growing.
I spoke to a Buddhist friend about this and I was told that Buddhism holds that everything is in a state of flux.
It took centuries for science to figure out the origins and laws of the universe, and how it works, with each astronomer or mathematician uncovering one or more layers of the truth, until a bigger and bigger picture was revealed.
Although the universe developed over different phases lasting billions of years, resulting in the creation of the planets and life on earth, this does not mean it is incompatible with the story of Genesis.
Scripture uses everyday language to communicate larger truths about the world and why we are here.
What about the seven-day version of Creation in Genesis? This should be read in the context of 2 Peter Chapter 3:8 “But there is one thing, my dear friends, that you must never forget: that with the Lord, a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.”
It was St Augustine who wrote: “One does not read in the Gospel that the Lord said: I will send you the Paraclete who will teach you about the course of the sun and moon. For He willed to make them Christians, not mathematicians.”
All the same, it is interesting to note that in 1215, the Fourth Lateran Council taught that the universe had a beginning in time, something that even Einstein could not acknowledge.
What the Big Bang theory from a single atom should tell us is that even though the earth may not be the centre of the universe, the universe itself had an origin from a single primeval atom. And in that sense, we are all interconnected, just as St Francis had sung, not only with one another but also with all that is in the universe, the sun, the moon, and the stars.
We should be in awe that we are interconnected — we have the same origins — as everything else in the universe. And the earth and its creatures and human beings, so far as we can tell, is still a very special place, even unique in our known universe.
How exactly was this first atom created and where did the energy within it come from?
That is perhaps a matter for both faith and science to continue to contemplate.
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