Posted on 10/29/2010 4:34:18 PM PDT by NYer
Stephen Hawking is wrong, Pope Benedict XVI said Thursday - God did create the universe.
The pope didn't actually mention the world-famous scientist, who argues in a book published last month that the laws of physics show there is no need for a supreme being to have brought the world into existence.
In fact, Benedict specifically praised - and blessed - science and scientists in an address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences.
But he also made clear that part of the role of science is to reveal God in the universe.
"Scientists do not create the world; they learn about it and attempt to imitate it," he said.
"The scientist's experience as a human being is therefore that of perceiving a constant, a law ... that he has not created but that he has instead observed," the pope said.
That perception, in turn, "leads us to admit the existence of an all-powerful Reason, which is other than that of man, and which sustains the world," he said.
Hawking says in his book, "The Grand Design," that, given the existence of gravity, "the universe can and will create itself from nothing."
"Spontaneous creation is the reason why there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist," he writes in the introduction.
"It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper [fuse] and set the universe going," he writes.
Benedict was enthusiastic about science in his speech Thursday, even as he set the Catholic Church's marker firmly in place on the existence of God.
"The developments of science have been both uplifting, as when the complexity of nature and its phenomena were discovered, exceeding our expectations, and humbling, as when some theories we thought might have explained those phenomena once and for all proved only partial," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at religion.blogs.cnn.com ...
Most “scientists” these days believe that Obama created the world.
Related threads:
The Problem of Polygenism in Accepting the Theory of Evolution [Catholic Msgr. Charles Pope]
Radio Replies Second Volume - Creation and Evolution
A meeting of religion and science: Sister Frances Zajac sees no conflict in her callings
Atheist says that Church accepts darwinism [Catholic Caucus]
Let Science Be Science and Faith Be Faith
Creationists, Intelligent Design Advocates Blast Vatican for Not Inviting Them to Evo Conference
Catholics on Evolution (Ecumenical)
Vatican evolution congress to exclude creationism, intelligent design
Catholic universities plan scientific examination of evolutionary theory
God made pre-humans into people, Vatican newspaper says [Open]
How a Catholic priest gave us the Big Bang Theory
Evangelicals should follow Catholic example on evolution
Austrian cardinal says Darwinism should be studied as science
The Sense that it is True that Six-Day Creationism is Paganism
Creationist Defends Bible-Based Science Against Vatican Astronomer's Criticism
Vatican Paper Hits 'Intelligent Design'
Ping!
And, God created Stephen Hawking.
Swell list there, AM. I´ve got some reading to do. Thanks for posting it.
Science attempts to explain the “hows”.
Religion attempts to explain the “whys”.
Perhaps religion is more wise?
DUH!!!! Just the thought that GOD didn’t create the universe is ridiculous!!!
One does not have to be a MENSA member to see that those two options are not mutually exclusive.
Why do so many Catholics have a hard time believing that God created the world in 6 days and rested on the 7th as the bible clearly states? They would rather believe in intelligent design.
Hawking says in his book, “The Grand Design,” that, given the existence of gravity, “the universe can and will create itself from nothing.”
This may just be the Red Herring that is suggested in the early sentences of the post. Hawking cast his lifelong lot with a direction in theoretical physics that is drilling a dry hole.
The problem of gravity is one of the many reasons Hawking’s attempt to be the next Einstein has been lost to Witten.
The Pope’s enthusiasm need nothing to do with a brilliant mind which, for theoretical physicists, must often choose a path to devote a lifetime of work which may lead nowhere in the hope of something amazing.
As God created the material world, its obvious He created the laws that govern the universe and earth, the ones we are still discovering for ourselves. The ones we still have yet to figure out...?
True scientists do not rule God out. True scientists that today’s poli-scientists claim to revere mostly believed in God and their scientific studies helped confirm that fact for them.
Christ Himself used allegory and parable as didactic tools to make the complex understandable...When He spoke of the good Samaritan, the shepherd, the thief and the doorkeeper, or the Prodigal son, He was using examples that may or may not have been literal events. In any case, if they had been entirely fictional events the parables would not be any less clear or meaningful. By contrast, sometimes, the literal truth that Christ spoke was not readily discernable by those to whom he was speaking, such as when he declared that he would rebuild the temple in the three days...He chose to speak symbolically so that others would seek the deeper truth and meaning behind His words.
Is it not believeable that the Old Testament, or at least elements of it, were also communicated symbolically and allegorically in order to make some concepts more easily understood, and to prompt us to explore the deeper truths behind other concepts?
Stephen Hawking aside, I think that the discoveries of most intellectually honest and rigorously scientific physicists, geologists, biologists etc. tend to support and reinforce the existence of God, even if the terms they use to describe him are at some variance from the terms used in Genesis.
I´ve long felt blessed in my life that I understand the scientific method as facilitates my struggle with God.
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