Posted on 10/06/2005 12:32:21 PM PDT by NYer
A fellow Catholic is now being persecuted, in no small part, because of his religion.
You haven’t heard about it — nor are you likely to — precisely because it is just the kind of story the reigning media assiduously ignore. The powers-that-be are trying to round up scientist Richard Sternberg and hound him out of town (the town, in this instance being Washington, D.C.). All in the name of secularist ideology posing as science.
Before we turn to Sternberg’s interesting case, we should recall the recent clarifying words about evolutionary theory by Cardinal Archbishop of Vienna Christoph Schonborn in his now-famous New York Times op-ed, “Finding Design in Nature.”
“The Catholic Church, while leaving to science many details about the history of life on earth, proclaims that by the light of reason the human intellect can readily and clearly discern purpose and design in the natural world, including the world of living things. Evolution in the sense of common ancestry might be true, but evolution in the neo-Darwinian sense — an unguided, unplanned process of random variation and natural selection — is not. Any system of thought that denies or seeks to explain away the overwhelming evidence for design in biology is ideology, not science.” (emphasis added)
Sternberg is being driven out of his job as a Research Associate at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History by ideologues.
A little background: Rick Sternberg is extremely well qualified for his position. He has two Ph.D.s in evolutionary biology — one in molecular evolution and the other in systems theory and theoretical biology. He has published more than 30 very technical articles in respected biological journals.
Everyone was quite happy with his work, both as staff scientist with the National Center for Biotechnology Information and as a research associate at the Smithsonian.
All was well until Sternberg, as managing editor of the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington, allowed a technical paper critical of neo-Darwinism to be published: “The Origin of Biological Information and the Higher Taxonomic Categories,” written by Steven Meyer.
Meyer’s Ph.D. is in the history and philosophy of science from Cambridge University. He is an advocate of Intelligent Design.
Instead of engaging Meyer’s paper through argument, the powers-that-be simply dismissed it as religious tripe, and began attacking Sternberg with startlingly underhanded animus, doing anything they could to make his life miserable to indelibly soil his reputation and to drive him out the Smithsonian.
First, Smithsonian officials tried to remove him directly, charging that as managing editor he had violated the publication process. But Sternberg followed the procedure perfectly. He discussed publication with a fellow scientist at the Smithsonian, and before publication he had the article peer-reviewed by three molecular and evolutionary biologists — all with doctoral degrees.
Unable to trump up any legitimate charges, Smithsonian officials went after him indirectly, creating an intolerable work environment, smearing him with false allegations, pressuring the National Center for Biotechnology Information to fire him, and worst of all, investigating his personal religious and political beliefs behind the scenes.
The interesting thing in regard to this last skullduggery of prying into his religion is that Sternberg is not an advocate of Intelligent Design, but of the structuralist approach to biology. But the assumption of those “digging for dirt” was that, if he believed in God, then his skull was obviously soft enough to admit Meyer’s paper rather than reject it outright.
The U.S. Office of Special Counsel was called in to investigate. Its officials decided unambiguously in Sternberg’s favor, although officials at the Smithsonian have now stoutly refused to cooperate with the investigation. Small wonder, given their less-than-admirable methods of trying to destroy Sternberg.
Reading the Special Council’s report is an eye-opener. Before the Smithsonian stopped cooperating with the investigation, behind-the-scenes e-mail correspondence was gathered by investigators. It is clear from reading them that Smithsonian officials had little but contempt for religious believers:
“After spending 4.5 years in the Bible Belt,” said one,” I have learned how to carefully phrase things in order to avoid the least amount of negative repercussions for the kids. … The most fun we had by far was when my son refused to say the Pledge of Allegiance because of the ‘under dog’ part.”
Charming. The e-mails reveal what is truly behind the “careful phrasing” of these scientist-administrators. They are secularist ideologues with a barely suppressed disdain for believers.
“It is clear that I was targeted for retaliation and harassment explicitly because I failed in an unstated requirement in my role as editor of a scientific journal,” Sternberg contends. “I was supposed to be a gatekeeper turning away unpopular, controversial, or conceptually challenging explanations of puzzling natural phenomena. Instead I allowed a scientific article to be published critical of neo-Darwinism, and that was considered an unpardonable heresy.”
Interesting, isn’t it? Can you imagine a scientist of Sternberg’s stature being persecuted because he allowed a paper to be published that concluded evolution occurs as “an unguided, unplanned process of random variation and natural selection” and that consequently all notions of a Creator God are entirely groundless? Of course not. That’s orthodoxy. Or is it ideology masquerading as science?
One thing is for certain. Sternberg is still being persecuted behind the scenes for daring to allow science to question science.
The foolish guy was
too busy studying and
learning how things work . . .
The new priesthood will brook no heretic.
The church doesn't care whether someone believes in evolution or not. It does care whether the flock recognizes the authority of the shepherds. Your angry posts have already suggested you have a personal ax to grind and now you say the Church treated your mother badly. I'm sorry if that is so but those who enter should be informed that the Church does not hold to Biblical Literalism.
Too bad abortionists are allowed to flout the authority of the shepherds when creationists aren't.
And btw, the Church does interpret the "new testament" literally. It rejects the literal interpretation of the "old testament" for reasons of theological anti-Semitism.
I reiterate again: the true purpose of the bishops' statement is to attack Zionism. Genesis was thrown in as a fig leaf.
Excellent points, AG.
To cover their prejudice these folks say that the prohibition of any expression is neutral, so therefore they cannot be charged with promoting atheism.
The questions to ask would be,
(1) what would a tolerant-but-atheist (or stealth-atheist for that matter) environment look like, and how does that compare with what we see in our own environment?
(2) what would a "free speech" environment look like, (since ultimately "free religion" would be covered by free speech)....and how would that look different than a tolerant-but-atheist environment?
Since at least the Dark Ages, the priests of science have been both the curators and the arbiters of knowledge, displacing the ancient priests who spoke for the higher beings while soliciting agreement and goodwill.
Today's priesthood is far more imperious, there can be no general disagreement with the core foundation rooted in biology and cosmology.
For fellow or follower, any breach of consensus brings forth a storm of ostracization until the poor soul is silenced and the satisfied sun beams brightly on the benighted penitent.
Having rambled thus, I must confess I find no room for an omnipotent being blessing the universe to keep its balance but I hate zealots in whatever form or costume.
Actually anyone is "allowed" to flout the authority of the Church. You can reject Church authority, the problem comes in calling yourself Catholic. Lots of people do though and I think its scandalous that more Bishops don't distance themselves from the likes of Teddy Kennedy and Teresa Heinz.
As for your other contention, you are entitled to your opinion but it's not plausible to me.
Your two questions are very important! Seems to me, the free speech environment is what the framers had in mind.
IMHO, the key will be whether and in what circumstances the Supremes hold that atheism is a religion.
Oh, I'd expect such an environment would ultimately conduce to what we see in George Orwell's Animal Farm. There was a whole lot of lip service paid to tolerance and equality in those pages; but in the end, some animals were "more equal than others."
(2) what would a "free speech" environment look like, (since ultimately "free religion" would be covered by free speech)....and how would that look different than a tolerant-but-atheist environment?
I imagine it would look like a civilized society. Free speech, freedom of conscience (religious liberty) are essential to check the libido dominandi of would-be tyrants seeking to amass and consolidate sociopolitical power in their own hands.
FWIW. You ask such great questions, xzins!!! These would be my answers, off the top of my head. Other people's answers will likely differ.
Great answers, betty boop! Thank you for the mental images!
As we all don our tinfoil hats daily, all things have become Orwellian. Science has been redefined as the search for knowledge that reinforces all present presuppositions; medicine has been redefined as any poison that is approved by the FDA division of the pharmaceutical corporations; Emergency management has now been defined as support for corrupt state and local governments, and free speech is now only that speech which agrees with the above definitions.
How long before each congregation must be licensed by a government approved denominational conclave?
Or as a wise poster recently said "now what was it that the catholics and holly rollers do to get their way... Oh I remember, they pray." (your post 127)
The excellent fit between current socio/political conditions and Biblical prophecy should be cause for joy, but I can't help but be apprehensive. What might the flaws be in our reading of said prophecy? But yes, opportunity indeed.
Moral Absolutes Ping.
I thought I pung this out last night...my mistake. It's a good 'un. No heresy allowed, he's lucky he still has the use of all his limbs.
Freepmail me if you want on/off this pinglist.
Just love your tagline, editor-surveyor! In the Hebrew language, "fool" is translated as nabal. And as the Psalmist says, the man who "says in his heart" that "there is no God" is a nabal, a fool. To say as much is to take flight into a second reality, and indicates a profound pneumopathological (or spiritual) disorder. So this is not a "funny-ha-ha" type of fool: The reference is to a profoundly disturbed or disordered human being.
Cicero remarked on the same phenomenon, calling a man in such a flight insipiens -- likewise translated as "fool." But for Cicero, such a flight from divine reality is caused by aspernatio rationes, or "contempt for reason." And that is very much a spiritual disorder, too -- a disorder of the mind, where for the Psalmist, it was a disorder of the soul. Both are varieties of spiritual sickness....
Plato called this disease, nosos; Aristotle, nosemos. The great ancient thinkers knew all about this syndrome, though we moderns seem to have forgotten all about it. Its root is the flight from God, or divine reality which is, in turn, the root of both reason and the human soul.
Just a bunch of trivia I suppose. But such trivia is of interest to me.... Maybe it might be of interest to a Lurker or two as well.
Thank you so much for your observations!
The good news is the new heaven and new earth - the Omega completes the Alpha in One. That's what "all that there is" is all about from Genesis to Revelation.
Marantha, Jesus!
If you're the editor of a scientific journal and you publish crap papers, then you shouldn't be too suprised if your reputation takes a nose dive.
I find nothing at all trivial about your post. But for those interested in Bible trivia: nabal spelled backwards is Laban - Jacob's uncle and father-in-law.
As is anything but unquestioning belief in the Lord, and his inerrant word. The essence of this debate is the turning of reality on it's head.
That I have to make this sort of confession of scientific orthodoxy is evidence that this debate is not a disinterested pursuit for truth, but an attempt at browbeating. This only makes me more sympathetic towards Sternberg's eccentric theories, though I don't even know what they are.
What I do have a problem with in Darwinism is the blatant effort to paper over Darwin's muddled, and sometimes downright evil, philosophical claims that too often accompany his better-formed scientific speculations.
Instead, he was a respectable Victorian gentlemen who loved his wife and and gave to his church. There is no way to get from,
Darwin's cousin, "respectable Victorian gentleman" Francis Galton, was the founder of the eugenics movement. Darwin himself latched on to the execrable Herbert Spencer's term "survival of the fittest." Karl Marx actually asked Charles Darwin if he could dedicate Das Kapital to him, and Darwin only refused because he knew Marx's patent atheism would upset his wife. An honorable intention, I suppose, but it shows how screwed up he was philosophically, not to mention theologically.
Darwin himself was the first Social Darwinist, as well, but I won't take the time to plug in my sources. Check out Edward T. Oakes' book review of the sensationalistically-titled scholarly history "From Darwin to Hitler" in an upcoming issue of First Things magazine.
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