We should undertake a compilation of the “Essays of Betty Boop” found on the millions (?) of pages of threads of Free Republic past.
They would probably make an excellent sequel to her and Alamo’s “Timothy”.
It would take a considerable search engine to pull them all out. We’d have to seek assistance from the NSA. LOL.
The main point of our book, "Timothy," is that faith and reason — theology and science— are NOT mutually exclusive entities. Rather, they represent the fundamental complementarities of Nature itself.
We are not exactly getting rich from royalties on this book. But I don't care; and I strongly doubt that A-G cares about this, either.
We said what we wanted to say, thinking it important. The one reviewer at Amazon understood perfectly. I am so grateful to that person.
Anyhoot, the important thing is not to think that faith and reason are somehow at odds to each other, or contradict each other. Indeed, Christianity is replete with examples of the search of reason in faith — of the perennial fides quaerens intellectum.
I'm currently reading a great book, from which I have cited key passages on this thread. It was written by a Jesuit priest by the name of Robert J. Spitzer. It seems his entire mission in life is to show that faith and reason are completely reconcilable. He has created a website devoted to this proposition, the the Magis Center. I have found it a wonderful resource....
Not that I am in love with Jesuits per se. In my mind, so often in the past they have constructed modes of thinking/analysis that fall under the head of casuistry. Regarding which I do not find a dime's worth of difference from classical sophistry — recalling that it was with the Sophists that Socrates did battle in his own time. [And they judicially murdered him for it, in the end.]
Then again, I recall that one of the greatest innovations in modern science was the product of a Jesuit thinker. In particular, I would point out Georges LeMaitre, the father/founder of big bang/singularity cosmological theory....
Lots of great scientists were "men in orders." Indeed, the father of the science of genetics was an Augustinian monk — that is, Gregor Mendel....
Just some thoughts....
Thanks ever so much, dear brother in Christ, for your very kind words of support for A-G and me.