.. it is to the Catholic Church more than to any other institution that we owe so many of the treasures of Western civilization. .., scholars operated for two centuries under an Enlightenment prejudice that assumes all progress to come from religious skeptics, and that whatever the church touches is backward, superstitious, even barbaric.</p><p> Since the mid-20th century, this unscholarly prejudice has thankfully begun to melt away, and professors of a variety of religious backgrounds, or none at all, increasingly acknowledge the church's contributions.</p><p> ... modern historians of science freely acknowledge the church's contributions - both theoretical and material -...