Science Finds God
1905 John William Strutt determines the age of a rock: 2 billion years, officially disproving James Ussher's 1650 assertion that, according to Genesis, the universe was created on Oct. 22, 4004 B.C.
1916 Albert Einstein's groundbreaking theories of relativity reject Newton's carefully ordered universe. "Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind," he later says.
1925 John Scopes, a high-school teacher in Tennessee, is indicted for teaching evolutionary theory. Scopes--along with Darwinism itself--is put on trial and convicted.
1948 George Gamow coins the term "big bang" to describe the theory that the universe began in a primeval explosion. An instantaneous creation leaves open the idea of a creator.
1965 Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson find that space is filled with background radiation, a discovery supporting the big-bang model. In 1989, the COBE satellite makes an image of this radiation.
1992 Pope John Paul II apologizes for the Roman Catholic Church's condemnation of Galileo. Four years later, he endorses evolution as part of God's master plan.
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Posted By: jef4 @ 07/03/2008 9:45:54 PM
Comment: I found this article fascinating because it reflects my own experience. I was raised Catholic and attended Catholic grade school and University, both of which drove me to periods of atheism. It was science that solidified my belief in a Creator. The idea that the universe came from nothing and for no reason was rejected as far back as ancient Greece.
There must be a power, energy or force responsible for the Big Bang. Suggestions to the contrary remind me of "Mommy, the bowl fell off the table all by itself and broke itself."
The power that caused the universe is what most folks call God. I think it was Max Planck who said the though the universe might be "A matrix in the mind of God." That thought reappears in Thornton Wilder's play "Our Town." Stephen Hawking said that "It becomes increasingly difficult for me to believe that the Universe was created other than by a being who intended it to have an intelligence like us." Newton, despite his now discredited Clockwork Universe, was a religious man himself. And his idea of a universe that ran like a clock prompted the question ???Who wound up the clock????
Both scientists and theologians rely of both reason and faith. For example, scientists accept on faith that the laws of physics are uniform and theologians use reason when they study ancient secular scripts to supplement and/or confirm Holy Scriptures.
Congratulations on a well done article that many publications would have avoided.