Michael Heller, 72, winner of this year’s prize. He says science and religion “are prerequisites of the decent existence.”
Posted on 03/14/2008 5:08:51 AM PDT by iowamark
The $1.6 million Templeton Prize, the richest award made to an individual by a philanthropic organization, was given Wednesday to Michael Heller, 72, a Roman Catholic priest, cosmologist and philosopher who has spent his life asking, and perhaps more impressively answering, questions like “Does the universe need to have a cause?”...
Much of Professor Heller’s career has been dedicated to reconciling the known scientific world with the unknowable dimensions of God.
In doing so, he has argued against a “God of the gaps” strategy for relating science and religion, a view that uses God to explain what science cannot.
Professor Heller said he believed, for example, that the religious objection to teaching evolution “is one of the greatest misunderstandings” because it “introduces a contradiction or opposition between God and chance.”
In a telephone interview, Professor Heller explained his affinity for the two fields: “I always wanted to do the most important things, and what can be more important than science and religion? Science gives us knowledge, and religion gives us meaning. Both are prerequisites of the decent existence.”
Professor Heller said he planned to use his prize to create a center for the study of science and theology at the Pontifical Academy of Theology, in Krakow, Poland, where he is a faculty member....
On returning years later to Poland, where Communist authorities sought to oppress intellectuals and priests, Professor Heller found shelter for his work in the Catholic Church. He was ordained at 23, but spent just one year ministering to a parish before he felt compelled to return to academia....
The prize will be officially awarded in London by Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, in a private ceremony on May 7 at Buckingham Palace.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Mark for later read.
One really needn't work too hard to find clues as to why NYT finds it useful to run such a story.
Separately, let's distinguish, please, between "the theory of evolution" as a cause for the existence of life or species, and "evolution," which is synomymous with "adaptation," as a natural occurance manifested in existing life and species.
Yeah, do you think we're smart enough to make that distinction, academia? Do you, NYT? If I can do it, you can do it. If you want to.
Yes, but most evolutionists are NOT smart enough to made that distinction - or at least they pretend not to be.
LOL, I thought it was Priest-cosmetologist and I was picturing this priest cutting hair and doing nails and my gaydar went crazy. LOL
Interesting God/science article ping...
Good for him. The problem with the epoche has still not been worked out and more should give it a try.
Thanks for the ping!
It seems to me that the entire universe exists in a tension between that which does not change (God's Will and Word) and that which does (i.e., "chance"). Ultimately, God is not "of the gaps"; He is the foundation of everything that exists, the ultimate source of the order of the changeable things....
I'm thrilled that Professor Heller has been honored with the Templeton Prize.
Thanks so much for the ping to this excellent article TXnMA, and to Iowahawk for posting it!
Professor Heller agrees with you. It's made very clear in the article. Why the hostility?
'pretend' is the operative word, I think.
God explains everything.
Science being able to offer its own non-God explanations for things doesn't mean that they are correct explanations, nor that we don't need God any more, nor that He isn't what's behind everything any way.
Following that line of reasoning, when we are finally able to explain everything, then God will not be relevant because He's not needed anymore to explain what we don't understand.
God is far more than a handy catch-all excuse to explain what we don't understand. People who think that have a very warped and incomplete view of who God is and what He's about.
[ a tension between that which does not change (God’s Will and Word) and that which does (i.e., “chance”). Ultimately, God is not “of the gaps”; ]
Things that are thingly and things that are not thingly dancing with each other. Amazing how magnetism, heat, and light and even conductance morph into electricity and electricity morphs into them.. I suspect these other scientific variations of “dance” have been considered also..
Charleston, bob*, boogie, boogie down*, bunny hop, caper, careen, cavort, conga, flit*, foot it*, foxtrot, frolic, gambol, get down*, hoof it*, hop, hustle, jig, jitter*, jitterbug, jive*, jump, leap, one-step, prance, promenade, rhumba, rock, sambo, shimmy, skip, spin, step, strut, sway, swing, tango, tap, tread, trip, truck, twist, two-step, waltz, whirl
Amazing what “matter”(whatever that is) can do ain’t it..
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html
Thanks for the ping! This is fascinating stuff!
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As a rule, the Templeton Prize winners are indeed deserving of the award, unlike the Nobel or the Pulitzer Prize winners, which have grown more and more politicized and perverse over the years.
The New York Times article doesn’t give a very clear explanation of his work, but that’s not really surprising. This is an area that the Times will never really understand.
Maybe we’ll read more about it in a future issue of First Things.
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