Theology and Science Coexisting

This is another in a series of posts written pretty much to myself. I tend to think verbally, that is, I form my ideas as I communicate. In muddling about with St. Thomas Aquinas and then researching Cosmology, I'm forming my own philosophy reconciling science and theology. Feel free to use the "back" button on your browser. :-)

In reading my St. Thomas Aquinas and then following it up with some modest research into modern Cosmological theory, I've come across some quotes that intrigue me. Here are a few from Skyserver.com about the debate over whether the Universe is finite, infinite, expanding, contracting or whatever.

The expanding universe is finite in both time and space. The reason that the universe did not collapse, as Newton's and Einstein's equations said it might, is that it had been expanding from the moment of its creation.

There is some fascinating research going on about the history of the Universe and many unanswered questions. Following creation, the Universe coalesced out of mass and energy.

Measuring the evolution of the density variations in the universe still does not answer the most important question: why does the universe contain these differences in density in the first place?

Several things have struck me as I've read more.

First, we are all too critical of theologists and philosophers from the past. While Aquinas and Augustine and Plato and Aristotle and the authors of the Old Testament lacked bunsen burners, test tubes and particle accelerators, their minds were just as sharp as ours. Although they couldn't explore particle physics, they could explore the questions of existence and the source of all things. This they did with substantial intellectual rigor. Aquinas is particularly interesting because he did not scorn previous thinkers, even if they were not Catholic theologians like himself. He saw them as necessary steps in the evolution of thought and held them in high regard. His Summa Theologica is as much a tribute to them as it is a series of proofs in theology.

I've heard the early Jews mocked as simply being goatherders living in tents coming up with tall tales to explain what they saw all around them. This is a great injustice. The minds that wrestled with existential questions in 4000 BC were as wise as we are. In the intervening 6000 years, science has led us to the edges of understanding the history of Creation and that leads me to my next point.

The science of Cosmology should be one infused with joy. It should be filled with the joy of a child coming downstairs on Christmas morning to unwrap presents. Unexpected delights lie in every direction, provided by Someone Who Loves Us, just waiting for us to unwrap and play with. In fact, from this point of view, every science should be infused with joy for the same reason. Nothing that I've read in Cosmology runs counter to Aquinas and in fact provides him the basis he needed for his theological proofs.

I don't understand why anyone sees a conflict between science and religion. While science may correct errors in previously held belief, it doesn't change the foundations or general direction of religion. As a mathematician, I would model Man's understanding of Creation to be an asymptotic equation where each discovery gradually pushes us closer to enlightenment. Total enlightenment is something we would never achieve, but the delight of knowing that with this revelation or that we moved a hairsbreadth closer should be celebrated with good cheer.

If you went to the link I provided above and read it again you could change a few phrases like this.

When God formed the first atoms, the universe had slight variations in density, which grew into the density variations we see today - galaxies and clusters. These density variations should have led to slight variations in the temperature of the background radiation, and these variations should still be detectable today, fingerprints of the Creator.

That's a poor place to insert my changes, but to do it justice would have required a much larger quote and I didn't want to run this post too long. In any case, would the meaning be subtsantially different? Wouldn't it allow for both the theologian and the scientist to search for the same thing cooperatively?

Isn't the conflict between the two unnecessary?

For more existential thought, check out this week's Catholic Carnival.