Fostering dialogue between science and religion

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From the Christian Science Monitor: Author of 30 books in Polish and five in English, Fr. Heller, an ordained Roman Catholic priest and a professor of philosophy at the Pontifical Academy in Krakow, Poland, has made the fostering of dialogue between science and religion a priority.

“He’s one of the key contributors in the international scholarly community dedicated to the creative dialogue on science, theology, and philosophy,” says Robert John Russell, founder and director of the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences in Berkeley, Calif. “He’s a great example of someone who bridges these fields.”

For Heller, these seemingly distinct realms of human understanding actually depend on one another for stability. “Science gives us knowledge, but religion gives us meaning,” he says. “Science without religion is not meaningless, but lame…. And religion without science [slides] into fundamentalism,” he says. Heller draws on deep understanding of cosmology, religion, and philosophy to tackle questions such as, “Does the universe need to have a cause?” and “Why is there something rather than nothing?”

Those familiar with Heller’s work laud his rigor of thought. “In an era when serious scientists and serious religionists declare themselves at war with each other and claims of connections are often by superficial thinkers, Michael Heller is the exception,” says Philip Clayton, professor of philosophy and religion at Claremont Graduate University in Claremont, Calif. “Rigorous thinkers seem to have fled the no man’s land between the two warring factions.”

One of the more difficult things to evangelize is to refute the perversion of the relationship between science and religion that we find in atheistic scientism without falling into the wilder trap of Evangelical Protestantism with its biblical literalism. Fr Michael Heller here:

payingattentiontothesky.com/2009/11/03/fr-michael-heller/

and catholic theologian John Haught here

payingattentiontothesky.com/2009/08/05/the-atheist-delusion-an-interview-with-prof-john-haught/

are two gifts to us from the Church that help us navigate these difficult waters.

Hope you enjoy the posts

dj
 
djeter:

Thanks for the post. As a holder of Masters’ degrees in both science and Divinity I have always supported this kind of dialogue. Please keep posting and keep us informed.
 
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