Thus, Fr. Robinson saw an opening for a contribution to be made to the general conversation about the relation between religion and science. His book argues that epistemological realism is absolutely necessary to broker any peaceful co-existence of religion and science. The reason is that only realism is reasonable. And disagreements come when people are unreasonable. To be more specific, people and cultures of religion or science become unreasonable and come into conflict when they adopt non-realist worldviews.
Typically, religions have tended toward an idealism that devalues the material world and the empirical data that it provides, trumping that data by some a priori construct deriving from a false notion of God or a literalist reading of a sacred text. Typically, scientists have tended toward an empiricism that denies the existence or at least the intellectual worth of what is beyond the senses, thereby relegating religion to the realms of illusion or uselessness. If believers and scientists are realist, these unfortunate conflicts do not happen. On the contrary, by definition, they cannot happen.
The book is broken up into three sections, the first considering realist principles and the realist view of reality, the second considering religions going wrong without realism, and the third considering science going wrong without realism.
Fr Daniel Themann, rector of Holy Cross Seminary, read and censored the entire manuscript. He warmly recommends the book in the following words:
Many will be forgiven if the above is WAY ABOVE THEIR HEAD. It reads like few of us REALLY know much about the Catholic approach to FAITH AND SCIENCE so we better leave that to those who REALLY UNDERSTAND WHAT THEY ARE TALKING ABOUT. But don't fall for that.
When the M&M scientific experiment of 1887 showed the Earth does not travel through space as believed by churchmen and State, they needed to restore their once defined and declarted heresy for all to believe. For 17 years they could not come up with a solution. But then they spotted this EINSTEIN, who could fool everyone into thinking HE was SO INTELLIGENT that due to human PRIDE very few would challenge him. Yes, he was a SUPER-BRAIN and SUPER-BRAINS can reach heights between MAN AND GOD in knowing.
SO, what did EINSTEIN come up with? Well he first had to admit that man cannot prove geocentrism or heliocentrism. Here is the only FACT that Einstein confirmed.
Along came Fr Robinson's hero the Jesuit George Lemaitre (1894-1966). Now instead of looking for a BIG BANG, why didn't he NOTE THAT THIS MEANS THE CHURCH OF 1616 and 1633 was never proven wrong and MAKE THAT HIS CATHOLIC MISSION? He didn't, nor any other Catholic clergy on Earth.
Now there is the real mystery. But by then churchmen had been overcome by INTELLECTUAL PRIDE especially found in SCIENCE and especially in science that CANNOT BE UNDERSTOOD by your AVERAGE HUMAN BRAIN.
And that is why the Jesuits (Brainy priests like Pope Francis) Lemaitre and Fr Jaki are up there as HEROES OF SCIENCE. Now we have Fr Robinson SSPX trying to convert the few creationist traditional Catholics who hoped they would get tradition with the SSPX. Yes, all Catholics know today, to try to vindicate the Church of 1616 with their geocentric relativity would bring laughter from all quarters, so instead they defend that SCIENTIFIC NONSENSE that Fr Robinson callas EVIDENCE FOR A BIG BANG. Yes, who said Catholicism was not up to speed with science?
Incidentally, be aware that Fr Robinson's EVIDENCE is the Red-shifts was that found by Hubble, shifts he attributed to stars moving away from the earth, that is an expanding universe.
Totally unknown to Fr Robinson I would say, is that in Copernicus's book
De revolutionibus he states that if the universe is geocentric with all the stars swinging around the earth (which would be evidenve that the universe is not infinite), then we would find an expanding universe. Given also that all the stars are turning around the earth, these movements could also account for red-shifts. Yes, geocentrism could cause an expanding universe if it is expanding, which I doubt. Think about it, wouldn't rotating stars also have red-shifts as seen from Earth simply from their movements?
Finally, for many years now, since that U-turn on the geocentric revelation of Scripture making it read heliocentric, a new mysterious dogma has come into Catholic teaching, one used by Fr Robinson also, the 'Bible is not meant to teach science but how to get to heaven.' Attributed to Cardinal Baronius by Pope John Paul II it was in fact conjured up FIRST by the PROTESTANT Rheticus who helped get Copernicus with his
De Revolutionibus. This dogma was conjured up IN THE AFTERMATH BY CHURCHMEN AS A RESULT OF THEIR BELIEVING THE FATHERS GOT IT WRONG WHEN THEY ALL AGREED THE BIBLE REVEALS GEOCENTRISM. It was one way to worm their way out of their contradicting their predecessors.
But apart from this SCANDAL, it makes NO SENSE AT ALL. They teach every word of the bible is true, but if it says something 'SCIENTIFIC' Catholics are supposed to say, 'WELL IT DOESN'T TEACH US WHAT IT SAYS.' This is a JOKE, one that needs to be clarified.
Fat chance of that if one of the remaining traditional groups of Catholic priests are allowing this BIG BANG theology to get hold on their diminishingn flock. I fior one will fight it in ortder to try to correct them and save the flock.
Topic: Fr Robinson's new book "The Realist Guide to Religion and Science" (Read 9935 times)