An Unexpected Voice of Reason

Wow! That I lived to see the day that I would find myself in agreement with the Catholic Church. But as the debate over evolution vs. intelligent design flares ever hotter that ancient bastion of faith and hypocrisy joined the ranks of the well informed and denounced intelligent design. The Rev. George Coyne, the Jesuit director of the Vatican Observatory, said, "Intelligent design isn't science even though it pretends to be...If you want to teach it in schools, intelligent design should be taught when religion or cultural history is taught, not science."

The Tablet, a Catholic magazine in the U.K. quoted Rev. Coyne in its June issue. He goes on to say, "If they respect the results of modern science, and indeed the best of modern biblical research, religious believers must move away from the notion of a dictator God or a designer God, a Newtonian God who made the universe as a watch that ticks along regularly...God in his infinite freedom continuously creates a world that reflects that freedom at all levels of the evolutionary process to greater and greater complexity...He is not continually intervening, but rather allows, participates, loves."

This actually reflects my own beliefs. I feel that, if there is indeed a God, then it makes no sense for him/her to continuously meddle in the workings of his creation. I envision the multiverse as numerous experiments, set up with certain parameters, and running independently. While there may have been some tweaking here and there, overall the systems have been allowed to progress without much interference. I have no intrinsic problem with there being a creator, nor do I think that scientifically examining the universe we live in negates such a creator.

And now for something completely different: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. We saw it yesterday, and I have to say I think it's the best movie yet. It's fast paced, if a bit sketchy, and while it had to winnow out a lot of the story, it kept the flavor and main plot points. Our young'n promised us she could deal with the scary parts, but it did get to be too much for her at the end, but in her wonderfully ADD way she had completely forgotten it by the time the credits rolled. It's also quite a long film, so if your kids aren't too good at sitting still, you might want to wait for the DVD. I need to see it again to see if it holds up to a second viewing, which Prisoner of Azkhaban did not, but we'll have to wait until life settles down a bit more.

See ya!
Marius