Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Science & Creation: Thomas Keating & Thomas Merton




“It’s not up to science to prove the existence of God. But science call tell us so much about how things work—as far as science can work it out. We’re finding out all kinds of new things about how the brain works. We’re finding out how evolution works and how higher forms of life developed, culminating in human intelligence and freedom that makes the whole shebang conscious so we can be partners with God of the Creation of the world and the world’s preservation.
   
 So, science and religion both are about God. I think this was understood in past centuries, but without the tools to make it fully practicable. Think about what they said in the past: The teaching of some of the fathers was that there were two books of revelation—one was the Bible and one was Nature. But now we know that this second book—Nature—isn’t just about a beautiful sunset. It’s about quantum mechanics and infinitesimal particles.”  Father Thomas Keating, from an interview with David Crumm in Read the Spirit.

And Thomas Merton wrote, in Bread in the Wilderness, 1953, p.60: “Creation had been given to [man] as a clear window through which the light of God could shine into [their] souls. Sun and moon, night and day, rain, the sea the crops, the flowering tree, all these things were transparent…”.

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