Between Science and Religion: The Engagement of Catholic Intellectuals with Science and Technology in the Twentieth Century

Between Science and Religion

Between Science and Religion The Engagement of Catholic Intellectuals with Science and Technology in the Twentieth Century Phillip M. Thompson

LEXINGTON BOOKS A division of ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD PUBLISHERS, INC.

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Published by Lexington Books A division of Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. A wholly owned subsidiary of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 http://www.lexingtonbooks.com Estover Road, Plymouth PL6 7PY, United Kingdom Copyright © 2009 by Lexington Books All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Thompson, Phillip M., 1959– Between science and religion : the engagement of Catholic intellectuals with science and technology in the twentieth century / Phillip M. Thompson. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-7391-3080-3 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-7391-4020-8 (electronic) 1. Religion and science. 2. Catholic Church—Doctrines. 3. Catholics— Intellectual life. 4. Catholic learning and scholarship. 5. Modernism (Christian theology)—Catholic Church. I. Title. BX1795.S35T46 2009 261.5’5—dc22 2009014529

 ™ The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992. Printed in the United States of America

In honor of my wife, Mary Beth Thompson, for all of her love and sacrifices, and Marjorie Zibilich, my mother-in-law, for her encouragement

Hence all faithful Christians are forbidden to defend as the legitimate conclusions of science those opinions which are known to be contrary to the doctrine of faith, particularly if they have been condemned by the Church, and furthermore they are absolutely bound to hold them to be errors which wear the deceptive appearance of truth. First Vatican Council, Dei Filius, ch. 4 (9) (1870). May the faithful, therefore, live in very close union with the men of their time. . . . Let them blend modern science and its theories and the most recent understandings with Christian morality and doctrine. Thus their religious practice and morality can keep pace with their science and an ever advancing technology. Second Vatican Council, Gaudium et Spes, n. 62 (1965).

Contents

Preface

ix

Introduction

xv

1

The Legacy of the Modernist Crisis

1

2

Jacques Maritain’s Search for Wisdom (1882–1973)

31

3

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881–1955) and the Operation of the Divine in the Universe

57

4

Bernard Lonergan’s (1904–1984) Cognitive Project

83

5

Thomas Merton’s (1915–1968) Contemplative Critique

111

6

The Transformative Century

141

7

The Path of Critical Openness

181

Concluding Reflections

209

Bibliography

215

Index

243

About the Author

249

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D

on O’Leary, in his book, Roman Catholicism and Modern Science (2006), concludes that “historical studies on Roman Catholicism and science after the 1640s are relatively few and highly specialized.”1 His point is well taken and this book seeks to fill one of the gaps in this historical record by examining the role of Catholic intellectuals in the twentieth century in shaping the form and content of the Church’s engagement with science and technology. Specifically, I unpack the role of four very different Catholic intellectuals—Jacques Maritain (1882–1973), Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881–1955), Bernard Lonergan (1904–1984), and Thomas Merton (1915–1968)—in transforming the Church’s engagement with science and technology from a position of conflict to a dialogue labeled by Pope John Paul II as “critical openness.” In examining this period, I apply Ian Barbour’s famous categories for the relationship of religion and science: conflict, independence, dialogue, and integration. This book will focus primarily on the dialogue, conflict, and integration categories. Barbour’s fourth category of independence assumes that theology and science exist in sealed compartments with little or no contact. There seems to be insufficient historical evidence to justify this approach in regard to these intellectuals or their context.2 In the conflict paradigm, each side seeks hegemony beyond their disciplinary borders. Under duress from the claims of various forms of scientific materialism and other secular political and intellectual forces, the Catholic Church adopted a conflict position in the Modernist crisis of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The intellectuals in this book usually followed a different path that transcended the conflict position. ix

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While it is true that Maritain and Merton adopted in their younger years a conflict position, they eventually developed criteria that more subtly assessed the detrimental and beneficial aspects of science and technology. In general, Merton, Maritain, and Lonergan fit within Barbour’s category of dialogue that recognizes both distinct differences and points of congruence in method and substantive claims. I would supplement Barbour’s definition of dialogue with elements of theologian John Haught’s “contact” category. The contact position seeks a path of “interaction, and possible consonance” where any conclusions about the consonance of science and religion are always tentative. Let me tweak this definition just a bit more. Consonance as used by the scientist and theologian John Polkinghorne holds that science can constrain theology by the need for mutual congruence.3 This position has historical precedents in the Church. Augustine noted that carefully documented scientific claims that conflict with traditional interpretations of scripture should prompt a reconsideration of the traditional scriptural interpretation. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, in contrast to the other intellectuals studied in this book, adopts an integration approach that attempts a systematic synthesis of the content of science and theology. In his theology of nature, the doctrines of creation, providence, and human nature integrate with the findings of science. This synthesis delineates God’s immanent presence working through evolution toward a divine union of the physical and the spiritual in the “Omega Point.”4 The relevance of these intellectuals’ efforts at dialogue and integration for the contemporary engagement of Catholicism with science and technology is explored in the final chapters. The final two chapters discuss the progeny of the selected intellectuals and the conclusion outlines some key principles for a contemporary form of dialogue based on John Paul II’s call for “critical openness” with science and religion. Before examining other challenges inherent in my project, it seems prudent to define what I mean when I use the terms science, technology, and religion. By science, I am eluding to a methodology that systematically develops knowledge claims about natural phenomena through verification processes such as experimentation, observation, empirical verification, mathematical quantification, and theoretical development. This resulting knowledge is often applied in technologies to control, shape, and modify our environments. The term religion is a system for seeking consonance with and connection to a transcendent reality, God, who is all-powerful and all-knowing. Western religions, and certainly Catholicism, exhibit common features for connecting with and understanding God such as religious practice, faith, and theology. Religious practices in these traditions are the procedures and observances that allow a connection with God. Faith produces

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a set of commonly accepted beliefs within a religious tradition, like the Nicene Creed, resulting from accepting fundamental statements based on authority, tradition, and experience. Theology is a systematic intellectual practice that develops and explores knowledge claims flowing from faith commitments in order to provide an augmented understanding of our relationship to the divine, the natural world, and to one another. Having established key terms, let me address several potential challenges to my examination of religion and science. One challenge is that the book suffers from being interdisciplinary. Whatever deficits this might produce are hopefully offset by insights from diverse fields such as history, philosophy, theology, and law. I take my cue from the historian of culture, Johan Huizinga, who confessed that in cultural history, there is never enough training and one is “constantly obliged to take predatory incursions into provinces not sufficiently explored by the raider himself.”5 The scope and direction of my raids were subject to helpful critiques. When I conversed with other scholars about my project, the first question was often, “Why is Merton included?” The question reflects Merton’s notoriety as a spiritual or protest writer and the fact that he did not write systematically on science and technology. Piecing together his views from an immense body of work provides a body of insights from a contemplative perspective that more than justify his inclusion. There were other difficult decisions. I exclude a number of contemporaneous Catholic intellectuals such as Hans Urs von Balthasar and Karl Rahner who had a considerable interest in science. There are also many omissions within particular strains of Catholic thought. For example, in addition to Jacques Maritain, there were substantial and diverse contributions by other Thomists such as Charles de Koninck, the River Forest School, and Yves Simon. I based Maritain’s selection on the depth of his intellectual contribution and his influence and stature in both French and Catholic intellectual circles. As Brian Shanley, O.P., contends in The Thomist Tradition, “The breadth of Maritain’s achievement was unparalleled among Thomists,” and he was “perhaps the most widely-read preVatican II Thomist.”6 Ultimately, compromises were inevitable as breadth made concessions to depth. One of these compromises was to select figures primarily from the middle of the twentieth century. The book largely excludes many recent Catholic intellectuals including but not limited to Ernan McMullin, Josef Zycinski, Peter Hodgson, Jacques Arnould, Lisa Sowle Cahill, John Haught, Cynthia Crysdale, Elizabeth Johnson, Stanley Jaki, and David Tracy. In the process of sifting and weighing my choices, the issue of progeny was an important factor. Any judgment about the ultimate contributions of current scholars is inherently problematic, as only the

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judgment of time and sufficient critical assessment will provide a fair judgment of their works. Moreover, the diversity in Catholic scholarship after Vatican II ended a distinctive intellectual period. By the 1970s, as the historian Patrick Allitt notes, “the special qualities of Catholic scholarship were disappearing.”7 In negotiating between the Scylla and Charybdis of breadth or narrowness, the selection of only four seminal thinkers guarantees their careful examination within such a project. Moreover, to insure an adequate depth and focus, I narrow my scope to a single faith and a reasonably limited period, the twentieth century. If these choices are prudent, there remains the temptation of making excessive claims for the efforts of the selected intellectuals. This book asserts that the selected individuals influenced the Church, but it is consistent with my limited project that there were many other factors. A final issue among those advising me on this book was whether it should primarily be a historical analysis or should include some commentary about the current debates on science and religion. The book will primarily be a resource for those seeking to explore the changes in the Church in the twentieth century, but will also provide some insights for those currently engaged in the dialogue of religion and science.8 The novelist Walker Percy once observed that it is sometimes necessary for writers to be like the miners who took canaries into a coal mine. If a canary collapses, the miners back out of the mine and discuss what is happening. When Catholic intellectuals sense problems, they should pause and carefully assess them.9 My discussion of transhumanism is designed to be a contribution in accordance with this responsibility. Why transhumanism and not an issue of contemporary bioethics? Well, I choose transhumanism because it has been less discussed than issues like stem cell research and abortion, and it applies technologies that could have enormous implications for the Church and humanity. With transhumanism, we are discussing the possibility of permanently changing human nature. Having sketched the book’s objectives and challenges, I must thank those who assisted me in this journey including friends, colleagues, and family. This would include many helpful comments and insights from several of the best and the brightest at the University of Chicago including Martin Marty, David Tracy, and Robert Richards. I must also thank Lawrence Cunningham at Notre Dame and Philip Hefner at the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago for their careful reviews and critiques. Professor Cunningham deserves credit for the title. My research has also benefited from the insightful comments of Scott Appleby then at the Cushwa Center at Notre Dame; Theresa H. Sandok, OSM, and Paul Pearson at the Thomas Merton Center at Bellarmine College; Frederick Crowe, S.J., and Robert Croken, S.J., at the Lonergan Research Institute; and Ralph McInerney at the Jacques Maritain Center.

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In addition, I benefited from conversations and materials provided by many individuals. These individuals would include Phillip Sloan of the Liberal Studies Program at the University of Notre Dame and Jean Bethke Elshtain of the University of Chicago Divinity School. Special thanks to Donna Jurick, the Executive Vice President of St. Edward’s University, for her generous support and encouragement. My position at the Georgia Institute of Technology alerted me to some of the ethical challenges of those in science and engineering. My current position as the Executive Director of the Aquinas Center of Theology at Emory University has been a true blessing for this project, providing me the resources and support to complete this project. My family’s love made the book possible. My wife, Beth, and my son, William, are constant sources of inspiration and support. My parents, Roy and Virginia Thompson, who passed away several years ago were supportive, and my extended family deserves recognition, as do my in-laws. Several friends and colleagues deserve special recognition for their support and fellowship in this intellectual journey. These include Aine Donovan at the Dartmouth Center for Ethics, who invited me to participate in a stimulating summer program on the Human Genome Project, and professor Kevin Lee of the Campbell University School of Law, whom I met at the University of Chicago in a class on religion and law. I would also like to thank Celeste Hanson with Celestial Design for her help on my graphs, Richard Roesel, Tony Moleski, Joel Medina, Peter Watkins, Pauline Albert, Craig Martell, Anthony Moleski, Steve Crow, Chris Haley, Helen Smith, Robert Ouimet, Mary Alma Durret, Christa Jones, Allie Serrell, Raymond Abi-Rasheed, Trey Phillips, Jim Woody, Tim Green, Robert Baker, Pat Shrader, Mark Kato Elson, John Stein, Scott Hornaday, and Steven McSween for their personal and professional encouragement and advice. NOTES 1. Don O’Leary, Roman Catholicism and Modern Science (New York: Continuum, 2006), xi; another recent addition is Peter M. J. Hess and Paul L. Allen, Catholicism and Science (Westport: Greenwood Press, 2008). 2. Barbour, Religion in an Age of Science (San Franciso: HarperCollins, 1990), 27–28. 3. John Haught, Science and Religion: From Conflict to Conversation (New York: Paulist Press, 1995), 17–21; Barbour, Religion in an Age of Science, 17–21; John Polkinghorne, Science and the Trinity (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004), 1–2, 9; Ted Peters has extended Barbour’s paradigm to include the category of “ecclesiastical authoritarianism” displayed by the Vatican in the nineteenth century; Ted Peters, Science, Theology, and Ethics (Burlington: Ashland Publishing, 2003), 2.

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4. Augustine, The Literal Meaning of Genesis, Book I, ch. 19–21; Augustine, On Christian Doctrine, Book XVI. 5. Johan Huizinga, Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play Element in Culture (Boston: Beacon Press, 1944), x. 6. Josef Amato, Mounier and Maritain: A French Catholic Understanding of the World (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1975), 55–76; Brian J. Shanley, The Thomist Tradition (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2002), 6. 7. Patrick Allitt, Catholic Converts: British and American Intellectuals Turn to Rome (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997), 13; Philip Gleason, Keeping the Faith: American Catholicism Past and Present (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1987), 38–81, 82–96. 8. For an example of Catholic scholarship examining the changes in the Church during the twentieth century in the United States in the field of education, see Philip Gleason, Contending with Modernity: Catholic Higher Education in the Twentieth Century (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995). 9. Walker Percy, Message in the Bottle (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1987) 101.

Introduction

THE TRANSFORMATION

O

n July 3, 1907, more than a century of hostility between the Catholic Church and secular cultural and political forces in Europe provoked the Congregation of the Holy Office in the Vatican to issue a Syllabus of Errors (Lamentibili Sane) condemning sixty-five propositions. The Syllabus focused on the claims of the Modernists, a loose collection of Catholics sympathetic to aspects of secular culture and the reform of the Church.1 The Congregation declared that the Modernists had attempted to corrupt the faith. One of the corruptions was the assumption that the Church’s teachings should be subject to scientific scrutiny and revision. More specifically, the Syllabus condemned the following Modernist claims: 5. Since the Deposit of Faith contained only revealed truths, the Church had no right to pass judgment on the assertions of the human sciences. 58. Truth is no more immutable than man himself, since it evolved with him, in him, and through him. 64. Scientific progress demands that the concepts of Christian doctrine concerning God, creation, revelation, and the Person of the Incarnate Word be readjusted. 65. Modern Catholicism can be reconciled with true science only if it is transformed into a nondogmatic Christianity, that is to say, into a broad and liberal Protestantism.2 Two months after the release of the Syllabus, Pope Pius X issued an encyclical, Pascendi Dominici Gregis, warning of a Modernism that was “puffed up by the proud name of science.” Science must submit to the xv

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teaching authority of the Church’s magisterium since they had no authority over and little application to theology or morality. The decades following these pronouncements witnessed a purging of this latest heresy from the Church through diocesan vigilance committees, the screening of books before publication, and an oath by professors in seminaries to abjure from teaching Modernism.3 More than eighty years after Pius X’s counteroffensive against Modernism, John Paul II delivered a speech to an international research conference of scientists and theologians at the Vatican Observatory. The Pope observed that between religion and science, We have begun to search for a more thorough understanding of one another’s disciplines, with their competencies and their limitations, and especially for common ground. In doing so we have uncovered important questions which concern both of us, and which are vital to the larger human community we both serve. It is crucial that this common search based on critical openness and interchange should not only continue but also grow and deepen in its quality and scope.4

John Paul II’s address reflected the changes within the Church in the twentieth century. The defensiveness of Pius X toward secular culture and science had vanished along with the Index of Forbidden Books, Councils of Vigilance, and the persecution of Catholic intellectuals for their speculations on science and religion. Instead of raising the specter of a host of enemies, John Paul II carefully, but optimistically, hailed the unprecedented opportunity for religion and science to “enrich, nourish, and challenge the other to be more fully what it can be.”5 There was a positive response from the diverse audience to the Pope’s message of “critical openness.” The Protestant theologian John B. Cobb admitted that he knew of “no finer statement on the subject of theology and the natural sciences.” The message of openness was subsequently confirmed in conferences on religion and science, an apology for the persecution of Galileo, and a statement that evolutionary theories have more than a hypothetical basis. “Openness” and “interchange” for John Paul II did not imply, however, an imminent merger of science and theology or the conceding of any moral authority. The Church retained its duty to challenge science when it exceeds disciplinary boundaries and engaged in unwarranted philosophical or religious speculations.6 A comparison of the years between the pontificates of Pius X and John Paul II reveals a transformation, an evolution, but not a complete reversal in the Church’s perspective on science and technology. The objective of this book is to explore an aspect of this transformative period, the engagement of four Catholic intellectuals with science and technology. These lives are emblematic of the century. The historian Joseph Amato

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described the life of Jacques Maritain as being a “microcosm” for understanding “one part of the twentieth century Catholicism’s journey from reaction against the modern world to a cautious rapprochement with it.”7 Similarly, the theologian Mathias Trennert Helwig noted that the time between Teilhard’s birth and death falls between the first (1869/1870) and the second Vatican Council (1962–1965) and witnessed a serious tension. He concluded that, “Within these ninety years the Roman Catholic Church redefined its relationship to the world, especially to a scientific world view.”8

CHARTING A COURSE Having discovered a profound historical transformation in the twentieth century, I will map how this book will disclose the role of Catholic intellectuals in the journey from conflict to dialogue. In the wake of successive challenges from social and political upheaval, and a variety of hostile intellectual ideas, the first chapter will detail the Church’s conflict position at the beginning of the twentieth century toward the modern world, including science, and the actions designed to counter such tendencies. After some initial skirmishes, the Church expunged the Modernists and reasserted its Thomist epistemological heritage. The chapter will conclude by detailing how a number of intellectuals who were not a part of the Thomist revival such as Pierre Duhem and Maurice Blondel were able during and in the wake of the Modernist crisis to both creatively engage science and yet remain loyal to their faith commitments.9 A bookend to the first chapter, chapter 6 will outline new initiatives beginning with the pontificate of Pius XII and the role of the selected intellectuals in such changes. The subsequent call for a more constructive dialogue during and after Vatican II came to fruition, in part, because each side, as previously mentioned, was chastened by a century of unimaginable destruction and fury. In addition, certain advances in physics such as Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle and the critiques of the sociology of science challenged the absolutist claims of an objective science. By the ascension of John Paul II, the earlier paradigms of absolute opposition or separation between science and religion were beginning to yield to a more constructive model of dialogue. The final chapter will sketch some key principles for such a dialogue that draws from the intellectuals studied in this book and John Paul II’s ideal of critical openness.10 The central core of the book, chapters 2–5, will examine the historical issue of the path negotiated between religion and science by four Catholic intellectuals. Who would have predicted that an agnostic and secular intellectual trained in science would be one of the catalysts

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for such an opening? Indeed, Jacques Maritain’s distinguished family lineage was primarily secular and atheistic. He was the grandson of one of the icons of secular France, Julian Favre, one of the founders of the Third Republic. As a budding young scientist, he discovered that his secular education left a void that was eventually filled by spiritual possibilities through contact with intellectuals who illumined another path. After years of searching, he converted to Catholicism and began a lifelong mining of Aquinas to produce insights for many intellectual fields including science and religion. A central feature of his project was to distinguish the different levels of intellection. Science was valid in its independent realm of sequential or horizontal action in the natural world that was complemented by a divine participation or vertical creation through metaphysical causation.11 Confident that his Thomist project had much to gain from and offer in its contacts with science, Maritain regularly attended conferences on religion and science. The possibilities of respectful dialogue had limits, as he asserted that the Church could not accept the authority of science when it transgressed its disciplinary boundaries for unwarranted philosophical or theological speculations.12 Maritain dismissed fellow Catholics like the Jesuit Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, who sought to integrate religion and science in violation of the Thomist divisions of intellection. Like Maritain, Teilhard had an interest in science and operated in the wake of the Modernist crisis. His intellectual trajectory was in many ways, however, the reverse of his Thomist peer. Maritain’s intellectual journey had traversed from a scientific worldview to a religious one that must explain the role of science. Teilhard was from his earliest years wondering how his passionate conviction of the truths of evolutionary and other sciences could be reconciled with his equally strong faith commitments. In his synthesis, there was not a dominant partner as in the Thomism of Maritain. Instead, the two components of science and Catholicism must be integrated into a comprehensive vision. Hence, the Jesuit was more eclectic in his intellectual tastes and he had no desire to adopt Thomist metaphysics. He warily operated in an ambiguous zone of alternating implicit and explicit restraint from Rome because of his theology of nature that focused on God’s immediate presence in, and operation through, all of nature. This “panentheisim” was an eclectic mixture of Pauline theology, Sacred Heart devotion, Ignatian training, evolutionary theory, phenomenological philosophy, and Bergsonian vitalism.13 Teilhard synthesized these concepts to demonstrate the evolution of matter to higher levels of consciousness. In his rather complex formulation, matter operates at the level of life or the biosphere through a tangential or normal energy, and through a radial or psychic energy of an

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emerging consciousness. The tension between these energies gradually propelled matter toward the highest form of consciousness, a realm of pure thought or noosphere. To reach this telos, technical advances, the interdependence of nations, and the guidance of the Omega Point purified matter and encouraged a mystical union with the divine.14 While Teilhard discovered the operation of the divine in evolutionary processes, Lonergan’s point of contact for reconciling different forms of knowledge was in the cognitive processes of the human mind. After an introduction to the methods of science in logic classes, he detected a methodological correspondence between science and Platonic philosophy. The young Canadian’s subsequent flirtation with nominalism was initially discouraged by Jesuit superiors and then superseded by an interest in Newman’s illative sense, Christopher Dawson’s cultural anthropology, evolutionary theories, and pieces of Augustine’s Cassiciacum writings.15 After these wide-ranging intellectual forays, Lonergan studied Thomas Aquinas, but detected a fundamental distinction between the static conclusions of Thomism and the dynamic, predictive, and tentative cognitive processes of their progenitor. He also understood the challenge to Thomism posed by the idealist epistemologies of Kant and Hegel. The German idealists detected a layer of filters between Aristotle’s knower and natural phenomena. We only know natural phenomena through the filters of time, space, etc., which removed our direct connection to the natural world. In response to such challenges, Lonergan did not choose the traditional path like Maritain of Thomistic categories, but instead held that the “empirical sciences” should be “allowed to work out their basic terms and relations apart from any consideration of metaphysics.” New perspectives from the position of the knower could not be blocked and the Church must not seek a “dam to block the stream, but control of the river bed through which the stream must flow.” The riverbed was the “concrete” human subject as knower who preexisted knowledge or the Kantian categories.16 These cognitional issues were resolved when Lonergan’s intellectual journey culminated in the discovery of a pattern for discerning what is known and how it can be known. In this inquiry, the stages of the learning process rely on the questions posed by the findings of the prior level. The initial cognitional stage was surpassed by the epistemological stage and will eventually culminate in an ontological stage. At each level, the horizon of inquiry is circumscribed by the subjective stage of development of the observer, but remains open to advance through the recognition and exploration of the objective possibilities of meaning. The diverse insights of mathematicians, scientists, and other intellectuals are to be grasped within this common epistemology. Thus, Lonergan offered a bridge, “a

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single perspective” for a dialogue of the humanities and the sciences in and through the act of insight.17 In addition to the epistemological bridge, Lonergan realized that a dialogue with science and technology must include an ethical critique. The increasing indeterminacy of science manifested in quantum physics and the sociology of science suggested the limits of science for ethical insights. Metaphysics and theology were essential to developing a proper ethical stance. Hence, Lonergan rejected the philosophical materialism of many scientists. While Maritain and Lonergan sought a possible consonance between theology and science, Thomas Merton’s approach focused more on technology and its abuses. The initial forays of Merton into the field of technology were responses to the imposition of machinery at the monastery. He resented the invasion of technologies that fueled an activist orientation and undermined the contemplative life.18 Merton’s concerns changed by the mid-1950s, because of a recommitment to engaging the world. Spurred by writers like Jacques Ellul, Lewis Mumford, Rachel Carson, and Hyman Rickover, he formulated a more sophisticated dialogue with science and technology such as the role of machinery in economic development and the ecological impact of advances in the techno-scientific world.19 In his analysis, a technological mentality readily lapsed into an idolatry of process. This idolatry, abetted by fear and greed, often turned means into ends. Such idolatries isolated humanity from its source of divine sustenance. The contemporary world eliminated any sense of the mystery, wonder, and “hidden ground” of divine love supporting all life. The result was a worldview enclosed by a wall of immanence that was abetted by consumerism, excessive labor and an unchecked nationalism that employed technologies to promote a society of isolated individuals in a false “collectivity.” In a true “community,” science and technology would accept the benefit of spiritual resources such as contemplation and nature. 20 The distinctive paths of the four intellectuals cited in this dissertation would cross occasionally. Lonergan approved Teilhard’s intuition of the need to resolve the conflicts of religion and science while Merton admired Teilhard’s mystical tendencies, affinity for matter, and ecumenism, but was ambivalent as was Maritain about the application of evolutionary ideas to theology or his apparently unrestrained support of technology. Maritain found Teilhard’s approach completely misguided because it turned God into the cosmic soul of the universe and not a personal redeemer and he believed that Teilhard was confused about the degrees of knowledge. Merton and Maritain maintained a very cordial correspondence over many years and actually met at Gethsemane, although their intellectual paths were quite different.21

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In addition to some appreciation or criticism of each other, these intellectuals shared a desire, despite many obstacles, to explore the boundaries between faith and science. They operated in an epoch of Church authority that was neither completely flexible nor restrictive. There was a considerable cat-and-mouse aspect to the relations of Catholic officials with Merton and Teilhard and to a lesser degree Lonergan and Maritain. In response to such restrictions, the selected intellectuals developed stratagems to avoid notice or censorship. Why were these men called to such a task, with all of its attendant frustrations and difficulties? The Spanish philosopher Jose Ortega Y Gasset once described human beings as being “shipwrecked” in their personal circumstances and the surrounding culture. From their culture, each generation inherited fundamental beliefs or “creencias” expressed as a “mass of circumambient convictions” and a “network of ready-made solutions for our lives.” The generational experience of wrestling with a “common and inevitable repertory of problems” insured, to a degree, a common identity. Any dynamic response to these problems was restrained, however, by their specific historical context. Still, the individual and their ideas could evolve as their lives preserved “movement and a variation, a process and a change.”22 In a similar fashion, the specific individuals selected for examination operated within a hermeneutical framework that encompassed both specific internal capacities for change and devotion to the traditions of their cultures and faith. Maritain rejected the antireligious background of his family and the worldview of his scientific education. Merton, because of his unstructured childhood, initially had more flexibility in regard to cultural restraints than Lonergan and Teilhard, who were raised in staunchly Catholic families and communities. There were creative tensions inherent in a dialogue between the traditions of the Church and an exploration of new possibilities for this generation of Catholic intellectuals. If we apply the cultural framework of Ortega Y Gasset, the selected intellectuals should be evaluated according to several layers of influence. The quartet lived in specific and general milieus in which their ideas germinated. Formative factors in these environments included the influences of family, education, personal experience, and intellectual inspiration. They also operated within the rich tradition of their Catholic faith and general cultural and societal influences. Finally, in their mature and productive years, specific issues, events, and intellectual quandaries prompted their particular engagements with science and technology. Within these contextual constraints the resulting contributions confirm that a tradition may set boundaries, but also preserve a “movement and a variation, a process and a change.”

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NOTES 1. Gabriel Daly, “Catholicism and Modernity,” The Journal of the American Academy of Religion 58 (1985): 774–76. 2. Syllabus of Errors (1907), n. 5, 58, 64, 65. 3. Lester Kurtz, The Politics of Heresy (Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1986), 139–66. 4. John Paul II, “Message to George V. Coyne, S.J. Director of the Vatican Observatory” (June 1, 1988), in John Paul II on Religion and Science, ed. Robert J. Russell, William R. Stoeger, and George V. Coyne (Vatican City: Vatican Observatory Publications, 1990), M 4, 5. 5. John Paul II, “Message to George V. Coyne,” M7–M10. 6. John B. Cobb, Jr., “One Step Further,” in John Paul II on Religion and Science, 5; John Paul II, “Message to George V. Coyne,” M 13. 7. Josef Amato, Mounier and Maritain: A French Catholic Understanding of the World (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1975), 55. 8. Mathias Trennert-Helwig, “The Church as the Axis of Convergence in Teilhard’s Theology and Life,” Zygon 30 (March 1995): 73. 9. Marvin R. O’Connell, Critics on Trial (Washington, DC: Catholic University Press, 1994), 344. 10. The notion of paradigms employed here is based on the work of Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962), and Barbour, Religion in an Age of Science (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1990), 4–23; John Paul II, “The Collaboration of Science and Religion,” Origins 21 (October 10, 1991): 283, 284. 11. Jacques Maritain, “Le neo-vitalism en Allemagne et le Darwinisme,” Revue de Philosophie (1910): 417–41; Raissa Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, trans. Julie Kernan (New York: Image Books, 1961), 51, 64, 65; Stanley Jaki, “Maritain and Science,” The New Scholasticism 58 (Summer 1984): 270–274; Jacques Maritain, The Degrees of Knowledge (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1995), 23–37. 12. James Collins, “The Defense of Human Intelligence,” Commonweal 50 (June 1954): 246–49. 13. Madeleine Barthelemy-Madaule, Bergson et Teilhard de Chardin (Paris: Seuil, 1963); Ernan McMullin, “Teilhard as Philosopher,” Chicago Theological Seminary Register 60 (December 1964): 15–28; Robert Faricy, S.J., “The Heart of Christ in the Spirituality of Teilhard de Chardin,” Gregorianum 69 (1988): 261–77; Richard W. Kropf, Teilhard Scripture and Revelation: A Study of Teilhard’s Reinterpretation of Pauline Themes (Rutherford, NJ: Farleigh Dickinson University Press, 1980); Robert J. O’Connell, Teilhard’s Vision of the Past: The Making of a Method (New York: Fordham University Press, 1982). 14. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, The Phenomenon of Man (New York: Harper & Row, 1955), 254–73; Alfred P. Stiernotte, “An Interpretation of Teilhard as Reflected in Recent Literature,” Zygon 3 (December 1968): 377–419. 15. Bernard Lonergan, “Response,” in Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1967),

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257; Bernard Lonergan, “Insight Revisited,” in A Second Collection, ed. William F. J. Ryan and Bernard J. Tyrell (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1974), 263–78. 16. Bernard Lonergan, “Aquinas Today: Tradition and Innovation,” in Bernard Lonergan, A Third Collection, ed. Frederick Crowe (New York: Paulist Press, 1985), 35–54; Lonergan, “Insight Revisited,” 264, 274, 276; Bernard Lonergan, “The Future of Thomism” in Lonergan, A Second Collection, 43–53. 17. Lonergan, Insight (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1957), x–xxx, 2–10. 18. Thomas Merton, A Search for Solitude, ed. Lawrence Cunningham (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1993) (July 23, 1956), 54; Robert Daggy, “Introduction,” in Thomas Merton, Monks Pond (Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1988), ix. 19. Thomas Merton, “Technology,” in Merton Collected Essays, vol. 6 (Louisville: Thomas Merton Center, Bellarmine College), 53–59; William H. Shannon, “Can One Be a Contemplative in a Technological Society,” The Merton Seasonal 22 (Spring 1997): 12–20. 20. Thomas Merton, “Letter to Bernard Haring” (December 26, 1964), in The Hidden Ground of Love, ed. William H. Shannon (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1985), 383, 384; Thomas Merton, “Circular Letter (Lent, 1967),” in Thomas Merton, The Road to Joy, ed. Robert Daggy (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1989), 97–100; Thomas Merton, “Letter to Horomu Morishita” (March 8, 1965), in The Hidden Ground of Love, 459. 21. Bernard Lonergan, Method in Theology (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1971), 315; Thomas Merton, “Teilhard’s Gamble,” Commonweal (October 27, 1967): 53–55; Thomas M. King, “Thomas Merton on Pierre Teilhard de Chardin,” The Merton Seasonal 4 (Summer 1979): 2–4; Jacques Maritain, The Peasant of the Garonne (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1968), 264–69. 22. Jose Ortega Y Gasset, Man and Crisis (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1958), 26, 28, 40–41, 58–59, 79.

1 ✛

The Legacy of the Modernist Crisis

THE THREAT OF MODERNISM

F

rom 1880 to 1910, the Catholic Church was embroiled in the Modernist crisis that set the parameters for the subsequent relationship of Catholicism and science for more than half a century. Modernists rejected the increasingly antagonistic relationship of Catholicism with the broader culture since the Enlightenment and proposed a reconciliation of their faith with the methods and ideas of secular learning including science. In contrast, the Vatican contended that the Modernists wanted to trade eternal verities for a “synthesis of all heresies.”1 Although Modernism had adherents in several countries, this chapter concentrates on France because it was at the center of the controversy and the native land of two of the four intellectuals studied in this book. The United States and the heresy of “Americanism” are also briefly discussed in the treatment of a Notre Dame professor, John Zahm, by papal authorities. The case of professor Zahm highlights the complex and malleable forms of constraint on Catholic intellectuals concerned with issues of science, and, in his particular case, evolution.2 Finally, I review the diverse paths of Catholic intellectuals who were neither a part of the Modernist revolt, nor a part of the Thomist revival. Before turning to the specific issues and events of Modernism, a brief overview of the Church’s relationship to secular scholarship and politics will provide an historical framework. Modernism was the latest conflict between a rising tide of secular culture and Catholicism. Indeed, Christendom, the deep interlocking relationship of faith with culture, began to 1

2

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dissolve with the wars of religion spawned by the Reformation.3 During the Enlightenment, the sciences were increasingly promoted as an alternative source of knowledge that would supplant a discredited Christianity and guide the march of human progress. The historian of science, Mordechai Feingold, has noted that, “science was a minor partner in culture in 1600 and by 1800 it was the major part of culture.”4 The rise of science was assumed by some scientific enthusiasts to be the death knell of a reactionary Roman Catholic Church. In the late nineteenth century, widely popular books like John Draper’s The History of Conflict Between Religion and Science (1875) and Andrew Dickson White’s History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom (1896) portrayed scientists as heroes who battled against continuous persecutions from the Catholic Church as exemplified in the Galileo case. Despite numerous historical errors and distortions, Draper and White’s accounts deposited a number of false legends into our cultural memory that still distort contemporary discussions.5 Two concurrent phenomena also diminished the role of the Church by their opposite but equally destructive actions. An increasingly regnant individualism vitiated the Church’s role in communal formation. The philosopher Charles Taylor notes that the individualist tendency in Western culture prizes “autonomy,” “self-exploration,” “personal commitment,” and “self-expression.” Politically, the individualist society privileges the protection of individual rights to secure these values.6 This individualism relied on a radical Enlightenment notion of reason to provide an alternative to the Church as a source of moral reasoning. As Diderot declared in his Encyclopedie, the philosopher tramples “underfoot prejudice, tradition, venerability, universal assent, authority—in a word everything that overawes the crowd—dares to think for himself . . . to admit nothing save on the testimony of his own reason and experience.”7 The individualist strand in the West became increasingly liberal and capitalist in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Politically, a centralized form of monarchy opposed the drive to individualism in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The authoritarianism of monarchy was eventually replaced by the totalitarian modern state in the twentieth century in Germany and Russia, but both authoritarian and totalitarian forms of government shared a tendency to offer alternative sources of political and cultural authority. The Church suffered another blow to its political influence with the capture of the Papal States in 1870 and the making of Pius IX a virtual prisoner in the Vatican. At times, the opposition of secular politics and the Church reached a fever pitch. Upon the death of Pius IX in 1878, a cursing and stone-throwing Roman mob followed the funeral cortege and threatened to throw the pontiff’s body into the Tiber River.8

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French history over the last three centuries demonstrates the turbulent path leading to the loss of Church influence. The Church went from being the junior partner of the monarchy to being subjected to violence on an unprecedented scale during the French Revolution. In response to such revolutionary radicalism, the Church often allied itself with autocratic governments after the revolution, a strategy that fostered a loss of political and social influence with the advent of industrial democracies or revolutionary regimes.9 The plight of the Holy See in France was formalized in the Concordat of 1804 with Napoleon Bonaparte, which diminished the Church’s wealth, lands, and authority relative to its pre-revolutionary status. Still, the agreement insured that the Church was a central institution in France. The Charter of 1814 confirmed that Catholicism was the “Religion of the State” and subsequent statutes provided penalties up to and including death for the profanation of sacred objects, assured parochial school subsidies, and granted seats in the Parliament to members of the Church hierarchy. At the universities, students attended daily Mass and recited Catholic creeds before and after classes and meals. By the 1860s, a fifth of the boys and nearly half of the girls in primary and secondary education received their schooling in church-related schools. In addition, young men and women flooded the seminaries. For example, the number of religious males in France grew to 30,000 by 1886. The relationship of church and state was more functionally differentiated than before the Revolution and there was no longer a widely overlapping membership of the political and religious elites.10 The second half of the nineteenth century in France witnessed an intricate and intense political struggle between the traditionalists of the Church and secular democratic elements displaying an anticlerical antipathy dating back to the Revolution. With the Syllabus of Errors in 1864, Pope Pius IX explicitly condemned liberalism for its attacks on the authority of aristocracies, the promotion of secular schools, and the advocacy of religious tolerance. Intellectually, the writings of Joseph de Maistre and many of the ultramontanists sought to justify both monarchical and papal authority while the anticlericalists formed a loose alliance united primarily by their opposition to the influence of religion within French governmental institutions.11 The renouncement of Napoleon’s Concordat in 1905 by Premier Emile Combes was the final blow of anticlericalist campaigns that terminated any connection between church and state.12 Professor Marvin O’Connell delineates how a series of such political events pushed ordinary Catholics to condemn the Modernists. It is highly significant that events like these should have served as the backdrop to the intellectual crisis within Catholicism now approaching a climax

4

Chapter 1 of its own. French Catholics stood almost as one in opposing the end of the concordatory regime. Nine out of ten of them could have understood little of Loisy’s [a Modernist] writings. . . . But it was easy for them to assume that Catholic savants who were in conflict with the embattled church authority were somehow allies of Combes, that such thinkers were of a piece with the gendarmes who shut down the religious school and threw the nuns into the street or with the village atheist who mocked the Corpus Christi procession.13

There were other cultural factors poisoning the relationship of the institutional Church and secular culture. Charles Darwin’s The Origin of Species (1859) and The Descent of Man (1870) provided support for challenges to traditional creation accounts of Genesis and the distinctive role of humanity in a divine creation. Not surprisingly, the Catholic reception to evolution was one of deep suspicion, if not open hostility. In 1860 a Provincial Council of German Bishops declared their opposition to “those who go so far as to say that man, even as far as his body is concerned, was produced by the spontaneous transformation of the less perfect into the more perfect, successively, ultimately ending in the human.”14 Although leery of Darwin, the response of the Catholic hierarchy was generally more restrained in part because of the Galileo affair. The counterattack was indirect as anti-evolutionary theories were provided some degree of official sanction. Cardinal Wiseman in England established an anti-evolutionary review titled, Academia, while Dr. Constantine James’s anti-evolutionary book in 1877 prompted a personal letter of appreciation from Pius IX. The Revue de Questions Scientifiques in Brussels published Catholic anti-evolutionary tracts until the late 1890s. A newly established Pontifical Biblical Commission in 1909 reaffirmed the traditional and literal interpretation of the account of Adam and Eve.15 The Church’s confirmation of the Adam and Eve story touches upon another threat to Church authority from new concepts in biblical studies. The rise of historical criticism in the nineteenth century potentially jeopardized the uniqueness of the text as the inspired word of God, questioned the validity of certain portions of the text, and seemed to promote concepts like Ernest Renan’s view in Vie de Jesus (1863) that Jesus was just a man. The new forms of biblical scholarship appeared to be yet another form of secular rationalism, with its parallels in science and politics, that was divorced from divine inspiration.16 The struggle between the Church and anticlericalism after mid-century was most prominent in the field of education after the debacle in the Franco-Prussian War. The defeat was widely attributed to a deficient educational system and this assumption spurred the Third Republic to initiate a program of comprehensive secular education. All religious persons were removed from what became free and compulsory statesponsored education by 1880. This “laicization” sought a “loyal army of

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school teachers” who would spread the message of secular republicanism. The minister of education, Jules Ferry, like his mentor, Auguste Comte, believed that the positive sciences would control the next phase of history and society should be “without God and without a king.” In addition to these external cultural dangers, the Gallican and Febronian movements advocated national control of Catholic churches.17 By the latter half of the nineteenth century, the Church appeared encircled by a host of enemies including, but not necessarily limited to, nationalism, scientism, anticlericalism, liberalism, antipapism, radicalism, republicanism, immanentism, interconfessionalism, socialism, and individualism.18 Leo XIII in his 1879 apostolic letter, Aeterni Patris, conveyed the besieged status of the Church. It is at this time evident and manifest to all men in how horrible a tempest the Church is now tossed, and with what vast evils civil society is afflicted. For the Catholic Church, with it saving doctrine and venerable power, and the supreme authority of this Holy See, are by the bitterest enemies of God and man assailed and trampled down; all sacred things are held in contempt, ecclesiastical possession spoiled, and the ministers of holy things harassed in every way.19

Considering its embattled position, the Church did not desire an extensive debate about its theology or role in the world. Instead, the First Vatican Council proclaimed the Church as the sole repository of truth and salvation for all of humanity. This truth was to be expressed within and protected by the teaching office of the magisterium. As part of this process, the ex cathedra teachings of the pontificate on faith and morals were confirmed as infallible. These doctrines should be communicated through favored publications, papal edicts and encyclicals, and taught through reinvigorated forms of religious education.20 Throughout much of the nineteenth century, however, the Church suffered from a paucity of intellectual vitality. When John Henry Newman visited Rome in 1846, he decried the poor level of theological training where a manual-based scholasticism reduced Thomism to superficial and undirected teachings. Spurred in part by this intellectual challenge, Newman developed constructive paths for the Church to engage science in the nineteenth century. This is not surprising because Newman was always interested in science and related fields. He obtained a mathematics scholarship at Oxford where he studied physics, optics, geology, and anatomy. The range of his curiosity was remarkable and Wilfrid Ward observed, “He was interested in everything that was going on in science, in politics, in literature. Nothing was too large for him, nothing too small, if it threw light on the central question, what man really was and what was his destiny.”21

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Newman’s scientific focus continued when he organized a Catholic university in Ireland in the 1850s. He lobbied tirelessly for the proper funding of the natural sciences programs. These efforts produced a fully equipped medical school and Newman sought to establish schools of engineering, mineralogy, and agriculture. He also had plans for an astronomical observatory and centers to pursue original scientific research, but could not develop sufficient funding. The faculties at these research institutions were to be in close contact with university professors and there would be exchanges between the centers and the university.22 Newman’s interest in science and theology made him aware of the delicacy of the situation and the need to retain the possibility of dialogue between the disciplines. In this era of conflict, he proposed that the sciences had a right to disciplinary autonomy in the studying of natural phenomena. A scientist was entitled to a disciplinary liberty according to “the peculiarities of his science” in order to have the “elbow room” essential for new advances. The conclusions arrived at “according to the laws of that science are unquestionable.” This right to independence flowed in part from an inductive epistemology that advanced from experiments to theory. In contrast, religion advances from syllogistic deductions from principles delivered through revelation. The differences in epistemology reflected the differences in subject matter.23 Not only are the disciplines examining different subjects, but they advance at different rates. Mathematics advanced by induction and each proven proposition tended to remain uncontested as each advance builds on previous work. In contrast, theological propositions do not make quantum leaps over time as theology operates deductively from the first principles of revelation to reach its conclusions. Theology was not as reliant as science on a historical advance of cumulative knowledge. Newman declared that a “Christian of the fifth century with a Bible is neither better nor worse situated than a Christian of the nineteenth century with a bible, candor, and natural acuteness being of course supposed equal.” Still, religion would have to respect disciplinary boundaries because religious persons who knew only Augustine and Aquinas would know no more “than a peasant” about the “laws of motion or the wealth of nations.” For its part, science could not advise theology, however, on issues like the trinity, the doctrine of transubstantiation, or the nature of angels.24 Although granted disciplinary autonomy, the scientist must always be aware of and act consistently with Church dogma and authority, but was not required to submit to all sayings by all the doctors of the Church. Ultimately, freedom of research for the sciences would not be contradictory to the dogmas of the faith that accepted truth wherever it was developed in the quest for knowledge. These truths complement

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one another.25 Newman was also confident about there being no contradictions between religion and science because knowledge was unitary. Revealed religion supplements scientific knowledge by adding information that the sciences would never reach on their own. For example, revelation confirms that man is not capable of moral perfection, a point not necessarily conceded by moral philosophy. In another example of the limits of science, a physicist can discover the mechanisms of physical matter, but not its ultimate source or reason for existence. Science might be tempted to answer such questions, but in doing so it exceeds its disciplinary grasp in an effort to reach a new level of understanding.26 The solution to these boundary violations is to discover a point of unity that orders and limits all knowledge. All branches of knowledge connect “because the subject matter of knowledge is intimately united in itself, as being the acts and the world of the creator.” But doesn’t such a position make theology the unifying science among all the branches? This would only be true, if the particular methods of theology discovered the unity. Instead, we know of God through a form of moral knowledge—conscience—that is equally open to all. The moral obligations of conscience, however vague or ill formed, constituted part of the condition of the mind like memory, reasoning, or sensation. When we analyze this moral conscience, it suggests the idea of a judge, “of one who sees my heart” and who guides all things. Newman’s epistemology and its reliance on conscience in the Grammar of Assent suggested an alternative approach to that of the regnant Thomism. Indeed, he may be closer to Kant’s “moral proof” than to Aquinas. Of course Kant surmised that we are only justified in believing in God whereas Newman would hold that conscience provides actual proof of God’s existence.27 After Newman’s initial efforts, Leo XIII, spurred by the First Vatican’s Council call for a Thomist reconciliation of faith and reason, declared in Aeterni Patris an educational renaissance through a grounding of philosophy and theology in the original texts of the medieval theologian and philosopher Thomas Aquinas.28 The Thomist revival possessed distinct advantages since it was compatible with Vatican authority and opposed the internalizing and subjective tendencies of a post-Kantian philosophy. Moreover, Thomism allowed the Catholic hierarchy to meld authority and philosophy, because its categories and vertical structures of thought affirmed a deposit model of the truths of revelation that are “complete, unified, consistent, absolute and immutable” and guarded by the magisterium of the Church. The papacy would safeguard these truths and protect them from heresy.29 From the beginning of his papacy, Leo XIII recognized that educational reform required that the natural sciences be placed under the guidance of

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the Church. As he stated explicitly in his first encyclical, Inscrutabili, such harmony required that science be dependent on the proper philosophy. Thomism was his philosophy and it is no coincidence that he brought the Jesuit Giovanni Cornoldi, who was trained in the sciences and Thomistic philosophy, to Rome. Cornoldi presented a series of lectures shortly before the publication of Aeterni Patris, in which he declared that “in the Summa Theologica was to be found the key to all the difficulties of modern science.”30 Leo XIII, in Aeterni Patris, recognized the connection of Aquinas, Albertus Magnus, and other scholastic masters to the study of the natural sciences. Indeed, the Church and “many illustrious professors of the physical sciences openly testify” that there was “no conflict worthy of the name” between the natural sciences and scholasticism. The sciences will benefit by expanding their vision in terms of causality, metaphysics, etc., by studying Aquinas. Leo XII concluded, Nor will the physical sciences themselves, which are now in such great repute, and by the renown of so many inventions draw such universal admiration to themselves, suffer detriment, but find very great assistance in the restoration of the ancient philosophy. For, the investigation of facts and the contemplation of nature is not alone sufficient for their profitable exercise and advance; but, when facts have been established, it is necessary to rise and apply ourselves to the study of the nature of corporeal things, to inquire into the laws which govern them and the principles whence their order and varied unity and mutual attraction in diversity arise. To such investigations it is wonderful what force and light and aid the Scholastic philosophy, if judiciously taught, would bring.31

The importance of the encyclical in terms of its goal of harmonizing the Catholic faith is suggested by two purported drafters of the encyclical, Salvatore Talamo and Joseph Kleutgen, who were both very interested in the importance of reconciling science and Catholicism. Soon, new Thomist scholars like Desire Mercier, later Cardinal Mercier, the first occupant of the Thomistic chair at Louvain, began to enthusiastically explore the relationship of science with Thomism.32 The regnant role of science in secular academic endeavors was denounced by a series of Vatican proclamations. Vatican I’s Constitution, Dei Filius, mandated that science not contradict or question revealed doctrine. Science must rise above its limits in empiricism and rationalism and grasp a higher order through a scholastic philosophy. Neo-Thomism desired the strengthening of the comprehension of eternal verities and not the relative truth provided in those theories espousing the evolution of concepts over time.33

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THE CRISIS WITHIN THE CHURCH The Church not only decried the scientism in the broader culture, but recognized its presence within its own boundaries in Modernism. Catholic Modernism comprised a variety of ideas and the extent of the diversity prevents its complete explication in this book. Modernism was never a tightly orchestrated conspiracy with a narrowly defined theology or philosophy, but a loose alliance within the Church that desired to reform its intellectual course and did not share the recent enthusiasm for Thomism. They wrote for similar journals, exchanged correspondence, and sought counsel with each other when possible. Modernists were often incapable, however, of joint action because of their differences. For example, a group of Italian Modernists met for three days at a secret meeting after the denunciation of Modernism in Pius X’s encyclical, Pascendi Dominici Gregis. The participants could not formulate a joint statement or a common program of action.34 Operating between the scientism and anticlericalism of an increasingly secular culture and the revived scholasticism of the Church, Modernism wanted to reconcile biblical criticism, science, and other aspects of the modern world with Catholicism. In a typical comment, Baron Von Hügel, an English Modernist, argued that studies of “Astronomy, and Geology, of botany and Zoology, of human physiology and Psychology” led to “ethical, spiritually helpful results.”35 The Modernists also attempted to discover, often through novel scientific methods, the essence of religion. They recognized from the new historical methods that theology must devise innovative approaches for generating religious understanding. France was the nexus of competing interests spawned by the Modernist crisis. Its peculiar history had fueled both a fierce anticlericalism and a robust ultramontanism. The liberal Protestant Auguste Sabatier (1839–1901) confirmed that “it was in France that the conflict between the Catholic religious system and the modern spirit may best be studied.” More specifically, it was in France that the ideals of autonomy and secular reasoning sought to assert supremacy over the Catholic Church. For his part, Pope Pius X referred to Modernism as the “mal francese.”36 Not surprisingly, a French priest, Alfred Loisy, was a primary figure in the Modernism conflict. Born in rural France in 1857, Loisy was a pious seminarian with a relentless and keen intelligence. Eventually, he resented the education that he received in Church schools and seminaries that avoided any probing discussions of major Church intellectuals, much less secular thinkers. Experiencing an explanatory void, he began to question the dogmas and scholasticism of the Church.37 In searching for answers, however, he rejected scientism and its promoters.

10

Chapter 1 Theology and science . . . both have made the mistake of thinking their power was unlimited. Science has its limits, because it can only apply to the knowable, and the knowable in experience is determined, is relative. Theology has its limits because it deals with the unknowable, which it must not reduce to the proportions of the already known. . . . 38

Initially, Loisy learned the latest critical methods in order to prove that they were compatible with the Church. Soon, he realized that his intellectual endeavors had trapped him in the interstices between tradition and innovation. He eventually declared that the Church’s discipline was obsolete, that its liturgy did not entirely conform to the needs of the times, and that the literal sense of its theological formularies became each day less supportable. For its part, science required intellectual freedom from the Church, for if “science had waited to ask permission of theology before going ahead, it would not have taken a step beyond the Fifteenth century.”39 In 1903, Loisy published L’Evangile et L’Eglise, which espoused a “living faith” that threatened the legitimacy of the ruling hierarchy and its doctrinal formulations. The Vatican refused to accept that the teaching dimensions of the magisterium were “wholly external, even accessory” to the faith or that Catholicism must adapt to the “modern spirit.” In the end, Loisy desired nothing less than a reformulation of institutional authority by limiting Church authority through recognition of the autonomy of the individual conscience.40 Loisy actions did little to assuage concerns within the Vatican. In December of 1903, a decree of the Holy Office put five of Loisy’s books on the Index of Prohibited Books. In a letter to Pius X on February 28, 1904, he professed his adherence to the requirements of the Holy Office “as far as in me lies.” These and other statements seemed very carefully crafted to suggest a surface-level agreement that masked a deeper level of disagreement. Pius X was very frustrated by this kind of obfuscation that fueled his fears of secret Modernist efforts.41 The problems stemming from Loisy’s devotion to a reformulation of Church authority were exacerbated by his role in the volatile political maneuverings between the Vatican and the Third Republic. In 1902, France witnessed the election of a majority for Emile Combes, who campaigned on a program of secularization or laicization. Combes’s election made the appointment of bishops very problematic. The custom had been for the papal nuncio in France and the French minister of religious affairs to jointly submit candidates to the Vatican. Combes submitted candidates without even consulting the nuncio. The Vatican responded by vetoing the governmental choices, which resulted in there being no appointment to those bishoprics. At this delicate moment, Loisy sought an alliance in 1902 with Prince Albert of Monaco, an ally of the anticlerical parties in

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France, in order to have his name submitted as a candidate for bishop. Shortly after this nomination, Loisy also agreed to have his name submitted for a bishopric in France by the Combes’s government as part of the secularization program. The Church rejected these nominations. After the nomination problems, the French parliament in 1905 passed a law that abolished the governmental payment of clerical salaries and allowed the appropriation of Church properties. At this moment, Loisy explicitly stated that Catholicism was a threat to social and political autonomy and called for the complete separation of the Church from the state. The combination of an implicit program for reformulating the nature of Church authority and alliances with hostile secular authorities made Loisy a marked man. The Vatican demanded retractions and Loisy responded by asserting his intellectual freedom and moral autonomy. Not surprisingly, he was excommunicated by Pius X in 1908.42 Vatican concerns about science were further exacerbated by several international Catholic Congresses between the years 1888–1898 initiated by Modernist members of the Institut Catholique in Paris. These Congresses, according to their organizer, Maurice d’Hulst, sought to “determine the actual state of science relative to various questions which, because of their relationship to the Christian faith, have special interest for Catholics.” A common topic at the Congresses was evolution. The Church perceived that evolution threatened to reduce human creation to material developments. The historical and developmental methodology essential to accepting this theory raised questions about the deposit model of Catholic authority. In addition, there were technical problems because of uncertainty about the details of its mechanisms. The theory was also inextricably linked to the harsh social and political philosophies of Herbert Spencer and Thomas Huxley.43 The Church in the United States entered into conflicts about evolution and other aspects of modernity from a unique perspective. Here, the Church had suffered from and survived nativist persecutions. These persecutions had assured a strong alliance between the immigrant populations and their faith. Slowly, Catholic immigrants were achieving economic security and social acceptance. Some bishops were suggesting that the Church and democratic institutions were perfectly compatible. The desire to be both a loyal and patriotic national church and to maintain its faithfulness to Rome inevitably produced tensions.44 The American Church was divided between opposing ecclesiastical factions. One faction desired a forceful affirmation of traditional teaching, a staunch loyalty to the papacy, a tightening of ecclesiastical discipline, and a polemical campaign against dangerous secular forces. The liberals associated with Americanism in the United States, perhaps even more than their European peers, recognized the grave dangers of the modern world,

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but they accepted that there was much to be learned about freedom, and society from secular colleagues. Catholics should integrate the positive from the secular world into the Church’s evangelical mission. The opening of Catholic University in 1888 provoked some heated battles over Americanism. For example, Thomas Boquillon, who held a chair of moral theology at Catholic University, initiated a pamphlet war in the 1890s by contending that a secular state had a legitimate interest in and should assert a degree of control over education.45 The Americanism controversy eventually prompted a response from Rome. The 1899 letter from Leo XIII to the American Church hierarchy, Testem Benevolentiae, was general and warned against “any indulgence to modern popular theories and methods” that threatened the “doctrines in which the deposit of faith is contained.” The liberal clergy knew the intent of the message and retreated from their engagement between the Catholic religion and the national culture.46 Singed by the Americanism controversy, the Modernist movement, in the words of the historian, Philip Gleason, “did not amount to much in the United States.” The esoteric dimensions of the Modernist crisis did not impact but a handful of scholars at Catholic University and a few seminaries. By the time of the papal condemnations of 1907, the vast majority of United States bishops sided decisively with the pope against the European Modernists.47 At the very moment when the controversies surrounding secular culture were coming to a boil, the Church in the United States was confronted by the case of John Zahm. C.S.C. Zahm was a distinguished American Holy Cross priest and professor of chemistry and physics at the University of Notre Dame. The Congregation of the Holy Cross from its inception was open to engaging science on its own terms. Andre Moreau, who founded the Congregation of the Holy Cross, explicitly stated in his work, Christian Education (1856), that “even though we base our philosophy course on the data of faith, no one need fear that we shall confine our teaching within narrow and unscientific boundaries. No, we wish to accept science without prejudice, and in a manner adapted to the needs of our times.” Inheriting this tradition of a relatively open engagement with science through his order, Zahm became a prolific and popular public speaker on biology in the 1890s.48 Zahm was joined by a cautious but persistent minority of Catholic scholars in defending some form of evolution. In England, the scientist St. George Jackson Mivart accepted evolution but vigorously denied Darwin’s theory. In the United States, the Paulist Paul F. Hewitt held that evolution was consistent for lower species, but not for man because of the Genesis account of Adam and Eve. Reverend John Gmeiner pushed the issue to the edge of orthodoxy by asserting that science never contra-

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dicted “Divine Revelation” because papal authority, which was supreme in matters of faith and morals, should not decide scientific issues. Moreover, the evolutionary understanding of God held that divine creativity and providence extended throughout history, but Gmeiner equivocated at the end of his book on evolution and submitted that evolution was an unproven, but “bold hypothesis.”49 Following the lead of Hewitt and Gmeiner, Zahm desired to translate the theory of Darwin into terms that were understandable and at least partially acceptable to his American and European audiences. Zahm initially assumed a moderate position that cautiously explored and denied Darwin’s theory while espousing the possibility of a theistic evolution. He reiterated his unswerving loyalty to Church dogma and declared that “no liberalism in matters of doctrine can be tolerated. . . . What the Church teaches must be accepted as divine truth.” Despite his protestations of loyalty, he did state that there was latitude though on scientific issues that had nothing to do with faith and morals. The weight of scripture on scientific issues was open to interpretation except when the passages were essential to the revelation of divine truth.50 In a subsequent period from 1893–1896, Zahm expanded his defense of evolution. He declared that evolution provided a sound explanation of creation and he sought a new synthesis between evolution and traditional Roman Catholicism. The professor was buoyed at this juncture by his rising proficiency as a scientist, the interest of the laity in science and religion, and the awarding of an honorary Scientiae Doctor degree (1895) from the Vatican.51 The theological justification for Zahm stemmed partially from his interpretation of the Church fathers and scripture. Genesis allowed for the possibility of God’s proceeding from the creation of primary matter ex nihilo to more complex forms. After all, Gregory of Nyssa, Augustine, and Aquinas favored a theistic evolution or unfolding of creation. For example, Augustine’s successive creation allows for the development of all living things from the seeds of creation present at the first moment of existence.52 In a work that drew much negative attention, Evolution and Dogma (1896), Zahm sketched a reconciliation of evolution and Catholicism. Evolution allowed for divine action in the creation and ordering of the universe and in the creation of the human soul. He cautiously appealed to conservative authorities by arguing that his position was consistent with Augustine and Aquinas.53 Adopting an independence position in his methodology, Zahm’s analysis recognizes the epistemological separation of metaphysics and science. Naturalists and philosophers are continually intruding on each other’s territory. . . . For naturalists are very much given to making excursions into the

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Religion and science were thus prone to error from confusing their respective boundaries. Science provided irrefutable evidence that the biblical understanding of the creation of the earth and the extinction of the species was factually incorrect. The role of the Catholic intellectual was to locate truth, separate it from error, and reconcile these findings with other truths. Hence, the magisterial teachings on creation should be modified in light of these scientific findings.55 Despite a desire to avoid allegiance to any special evolutionary theory, the Church could not ignore the social and religious implications of these theories. Social Darwinism was lending credence to an array of problematic social and economic ideas. Zahm tried to assuage such concerns. He favored the approach of John Baptiste Lamarck that dispositions of a species could be inherited in subsequent generations. Humanity was capable of adopting and changing the course of history through our choices and we are therefore not the slave of a mechanical and randomly selective process. His interpretation of Lamarck allowed Zahm to conclude that the human body was derived from this evolutionary process, but the soul was an independent divine gift.56 There were a number of problems for Zahm in his view of evolution. His explicit argument that evolution was compatible with principles in Augustine and Aquinas angered a wide swath of Neo-Thomists who did not view these doctors of the Church as being capable of a seamless merger with modern conceptions of evolution. Moreover, Zahm argued that the human body was created from animals in evolution without a special divine intervention of any kind. The idea of some form of special divine act was held by his opponents to be more compatible with the “biblical story, the special dignity of the human being, and the special providence that God invests in man.”57 Zahm’s works also suffered because of his associations with the Americanism Movement and his citations of suspect authors in support of his positions, including some with Modernist tendencies. In the heat of the evolutionary controversy, Zahm also criticized the neo-scholastics who refused to acknowledge the high probability of evolutionary theory. In 1895, Zahm was labeled by another cleric as an “agnostic scientist.” The Notre Dame professor relished these controversies, and in a strategy reminiscent of Galileo, alternately concealed and revealed his opinions over the next few years.58

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The path of Church discipline in a case like Zahm’s in this period was not linear, but rather complex. After the publication of Evolution and Dogma, there were defenses of Zahm’s positions published in articles in Catholic journals like the Revues des Questions Scientifique and the Dublin Review. These favorable responses elicited pointed criticism in the influential Jesuit publication La Civilta Cattolica in 1897 that panned Zahm’s book as a “tissue of vulgar analogies, arbitrary suppositions . . . fantastic adages and subterfuges.” At the heart of this review was the suspicion that Zahm’s book was another excessive attempt at reconciling the Church with certain popular forms of secular thought. 59 After the La Civilta Catollica article, there was a series of additional twists and turns. On the date of the publication of the La Civilta Catollica article, the Congregation of the Holy Office began its inquiry into the case of Zahm and specifically Evolution and Dogma. The record indicates some requests for more information but the record abruptly ends on May 11, 1897, and there was no further action in the file. Archbishop Zardetti officially denounced the book before the Congregation of the Index in November of 1897. The Consulter of the case, Enrico Buonpensierre, was no friend of evolution and his report listed a number of flaws. Some were fair, such as Zahm’s faulty use of Aristotle, and some unfair, such as a dismissal of the extensive scientific arguments presented by the Holy Cross priest. Buonpensierre chastised Zahm for using science as authoritative in biblical exegesis and his failure to employ metaphysical arguments and proofs. In his analysis, the Consultor presented a classic conflict paradigm gambit, the delimiting of acceptable forms and proofs for knowledge.60 Zahm’s case went through the bureaucratic machinery of the Congregation of the Index and resulted in a condemnation of his book. Since Zahm was set to be the provincial of the Congregation of Holy Cross in the United States, the Superior General of the Holy Cross began a sustained lobbying effort on his behalf in the Vatican that led Leo XIII to instruct the Cardinal Prefect of the Congregation of the Index not to publish the condemnation. In the end Zahm may also have been spared any harsher discipline because there were no official pronouncements about evolution. There were individual theologians and some Church Councils who denounced evolution, but these are merely supportive evidence and are not determinative per se of a heretical position.61 Nonetheless, in the end, Zahm lost the battle on his views on evolution. He had irritated powerful interests, adopted too fully the theory of evolution, appeared to propose a personal and scientific form of scriptural interpretation, and freely associated with the leaders in Rome of Americanism. After the condemnation of his book, he withdrew from active scientific research and publication. Before he retired from public scrutiny, Zahm declared, “We shall win in the long war, for truth and justice are

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on our side; the intelligence of the world and the increasing might of America are with us . . . it is a fight for progress, for true Americanism for the Catholic University, a fight against Jesuitical tyranny, against obscurantism and medievalism.”62 Still, in the end, Zahm was content to withdraw under the pressure of Church discipline. Zahm’s fight for the validity of the theory of evolution was vindicated with the recognition of evolution as “more than a hypothesis” by John Paul II.

THE LEGACY OF MODERNISM The offensive against Modernism was another chapter in the Church’s struggle with the secular world in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Political and economic upheavals such as the revolutions of 1848, the rise of Italian nationalism, the industrial revolution, and the Third Republic in France tended to restrain any openings to secular culture. The variegated responses of several pontiffs stand witness to the complex currents influencing the papacy in this unsettled period. Pope Leo XIII’s pontificate (1846–1878) witnessed some openings to the new currents in the broader world. He demanded justice for the working classes in Rerum Novarum. In diplomatic affairs, he deftly managed the Kulturkampf crisis in Germany and attempted reconciliation, albeit only a brief one, with the French Republic. Despite such attempts at engagement, a series of documents and decisions confirmed the defensive position of the Church. The Syllabus of Errors (1864) condemned the idea that the Roman Pontiff “can and should reconcile himself to progress, liberalism, and modern civilization.” The First Vatican Council and the encyclical Aeterni Patris likewise confirmed the regnant orthodoxy and the role of the Church in resisting secular culture. An orthodox counteroffensive against the modern world was continued and even extended further with the papacy of Pius X (1903–1914). The predominant image of Pius X as a staunch opponent of Modernism is certainly justified. Indeed, upon his election to pope, Cardinal Giuseppe Sarto of Venice chose the title Pius X to honor the popes who had “fought with courage against the sects and the errors dominant in their time.” Still, Pius X is often, and I think incorrectly, reduced to an archaic opponent of Modernism and not much more. He was a pious and able cleric who came from humble roots with his father being a public official from a small town in Italy. He was different from his predecessors in several ways. Here was a pontiff who was not overly intellectual, had not held a diplomatic post, and spoke only two languages fluently. Moreover, he was warm hearted and had keen pastoral abilities. Pius X’s personal style was not ostentatious or ceremonial. He was not aristocratic either in

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his modest roots or in his personal inclinations. He disliked wearing the papal tiara or being carried around like a monarch, could not bear to have visitors on their knees, and refused to make his sisters countesses, as was the custom. Sympathizing with those who were exploited and marginalized, his encyclical Lacrimabili statu (1912), decried the mistreatment and exploitation of native peoples in South America. He was also a capable administrator and politician. One of his evident strengths was his ability to work with a diverse range of politicians in Italy. He also had administrative abilities and as pontiff he cut the Vatican bureaucracy in half, reorganized its finances, which were in disarray, began a reform of the canon law, and encouraged lay participation in religious instruction.63 This traditional and pastoral pope inherited a Catholic world deeply struggling with modernity including the intellectual ideas of Darwin, Freud, and Marx. There were calls for the end of certain forms of Church discipline, priestly celibacy, and for a liturgy in the vernacular. Protestant intellectuals were influencing their Catholic peers, especially on issues of biblical interpretation. Pius X thus inherited a Church confronted by the destabilizing reality of Modernism. In England, influential intellectuals like Lord Acton and Baron Von Hugel accepted new biblical approaches although they tended to avoid extreme positions regarding Church authority. Loisy in France challenged the Church’s position on dogma and authority. Italy witnessed the connecting of liberal religious thought and radical politics. Other Modernists in Italy wanted to restore a vibrant spiritual life that was more than adherence to external professions of faith.64 Pius X was frightened by the challenges from Modernism. His first encyclical, E Supremi Apostolatus, warned of a “deep rooted malady” that is dragging society to its “destruction.” The malady of the secular world is engaged in a “brazen effort to uproot and destroy all relations between man and divinity!” This infection seeks to invade the ranks of the clergy by “the insidious maneuvers of a certain new science that dons the mask of truth and from which one does not discern the fragrance of Jesus Christ.” With the rash of Modernist publications early in his pontificate, Pius X began to suspect that the virus of Modernism had spread throughout the Church, promoting a “new orientation of the Christian life, of new directions of the Church, new aspirations of the modern soul, new social vocation of the clergy, or a new Christian civilization.” The secular ideals associated with progress must be “radically removed with a firm hand” from the Church, especially the seminaries. New controls were placed on seminaries; for example, seminarians were forbidden to read all but the safest newspapers.65 A rash of encyclicals followed E Supremi Apostolatus and attacked disobedience to Church authority from rationalism and materialism, the marginalization of the Christian roots of Western Europe, activist priests,

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and those denying the authority of Thomism in the Church. He reaffirmed vigorous forms of Catholic education to fend off these negative trends. The concerns with Modernism were fully explored in the encyclical Pascendi Domnini Gregis, which followed the Syllabus of Errors in 1907. In Pascendi, he rejected “all novelties.” The underlying philosophy of the Modernists was deemed an unholy combination of “Kantian subjectivity,” Bergsonian Evolutionism, and Jamesian religious psychology. This synthetic heresy undermined belief in God, authentic revelation, objective morality, and Church authority. Pius X’s Anti-Modernist program included: • emphasis on the study of Thomism; • exclusion of Modernists from seminaries, achieved in part by an Anti-Modernist oath; • episcopal vigilance including diocesan vigilance committees; • episcopal censorship of local church publications including the requirements of an Imprimatur and Nihil Obstat; • the forbidding of congresses of priests; • a requirement of a report every three years by bishops on their efforts to battle Modernism.66 How justified was the fear of a Modernist revolt? It must have seemed as if Modernism was everywhere from the reports flowing into the Vatican. After the publication of Lamentibili and Pascendi, the positive response to the encyclical was widespread. Bishops and cardinals wrote of their support in large numbers. Within the alliance of major seminaries, 125 directors who were meeting in Paris declared their enthusiastic support for the pope’s actions. Only fifty clergy refused to take the AntiModernist oath. Nonetheless, the fears of Pius X and his supporters nurtured a culture of suspicion. Umberto Benigni, a confidant of Pius X and the Undersecretary of State in the Vatican, ran Sapiniere, a secret organization of informants that became a “sort of ecclesiastical secret police.” Sapiniere condemned Catholic political parties, Christian trade unions, bishops that were moderate in their attitude toward secular states, feminists, democrats, and “Jewish Masonic sects.” Benigni was removed from office by Benedict XV, a target of Sapiniere, lost his papal influence, and ended his life a fascist.67 While internal debates still raged, Pius X mobilized the Vatican hierarchy against the Modernists whose support for the claims of the world threatened to destroy the Church. In this counteroffensive, the Church campaigned on many levels. The English bishops issued a “Joint Pastoral Letter” that condemned the evils of “liberal Catholicism.” Journals such as the Jesuit review Civilta Cattolica opposed anything modern. Direct ad-

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ministrative measures resulted in a score of books that made the Index of Forbidden Books. Religious persons espousing improper views were transferred, forbidden to publish, or in a few cases excommunicated.68 Caution should be urged about adopting too facile a view of the Church discipline exercised in this period. Pius X was very firm in his disciplining of those guilty of Modernism, but he was not without the ability to mix mercy with his judgments. Applying his maxim, “we must combat error without injuring the persons concerned,” he provided financial assistance to a Modernist who had been excommunicated and was financially bereft. He could compromise a little to assist those who were trying to be loyal to their faith. He allowed a priest to take the Anti-Modernist oath with certain reservations about the Church’s positions on issues not related to dogmatic truths.69 Across the Atlantic, a number of the liberal bishops and priests in the Americanism crisis were promoted to higher positions. John J. Keane was named Archbishop of Dubuque in 1900 and Denis O’Connell was appointed the third rector of Catholic University in 1903. The severity of the discipline often corresponded to the response of the individual under scrutiny. Those who openly professed their legitimate aims, sought clarification, and professed loyalty to Church authority tended to avoid severe sanctions.70 From this complex picture, there gradually emerged a new reality. By 1910, the Modernist leadership was fractured and disheartened. George Tyrell was dead, Albert Loisy was excommunicated, and many more like Zahm were effectively silenced or converted to orthodoxy. The Catholic theologian, Jean Riviere, concludes that the taking of the Anti-Modernist Oath “ended the history of the doctrinal crisis which had raged for about ten years. From this moment, everything in fact justifies the view that Modernism had disappeared.”71 The ebb and flow of the intellectual life of the Church during and after the Modernist crisis also defies a simple labeling. The traditional approaches in philosophy and theology did not negate a concern for social causes. Indeed, the plight of workers prompted in this period a call for just wages, a right to association, and a concern for fewer working hours in the encyclicals Rerum Novarum (1891) and Quadragesimo Anno (1931). The range of social activism also included temperance, mutual aid societies, support for some labor unions, and the development of settlement houses. Laity influence was substantial at the Catholic Congresses in 1889 and 1893.72 Politically, the atmosphere changed in the succeeding generations. Pope Benedict XV earned an international reputation for his attempts to assuage the bloodshed of the First World War. Because of such actions, the number of nations with representatives at the Vatican doubled between 1913 and 1922. In the years following the First World War, the

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Vatican supported moderate Catholic political and social efforts, since the extreme left and far right were often anticlerical. The Vatican denounced the ultra nationalist movement Action Française in 1926. There were political successes. Catholic socialists governed Austria in the 1920s and 1930s and Catholic centrists before the reign of Adolph Hitler were quite influential in Germany. Progressive French Catholics would join Catholic Action in the 1930s and the Christian Democratic parties in the 1950s. These political and diplomatic changes removed much of the papal isolation extant at the end of the nineteenth century.73 The Church’s growing cultural independence allowed it to defy some of the threatening aspects of the modern world. The opposition to the “science” of eugenics and the scientific economics of Marxism seems prescient in light of the subsequent history. Catholics also retained their distinctive educational institutions in the first half of the twentieth century when many Protestant colleges and universities separated from their founding denominations.74 Still, the claim of intellectual atrophy persists. In the realm of the intellect, Philip Gleason observes that in the American context, “the consensus view” of many recent writers is that the Modernist crisis “cut off progressive tendencies in philosophy, theology, and biblical studies” and “placed a premium on intellectual caution.” The political scientist Richard Gelm goes further and declares that in this period a “fear of Rome killed any intellectual spirit that resided in seminaries and Catholic institutions of higher learning. American Catholicism entered a dark age of conservatism, and strict obedience to Rome overshadowed free intellectual inquiry.” This concern for intellectual freedom must be balanced with recognition that the funneling of intellectual energies into scholastic philosophy and theology did produce a Catholic intellectual renaissance that provided a coherent alternative to the culture of modernity. This renaissance witnessed a wide range of intellectual activity from Etienne Gilson, Romano Guardini, Josef Pieper, Flannery O’Connor, and many others. It also attracted many famous intellectual converts that included Jacques Maritain, Lord Acton, Eric Gill, John Henry Newman, Avery Dulles, Evelyn Waugh, Marshall McCluhan, Graham Greene, Walker Percy, Dorothy Day, Christopher Dawson, G. K. Chesterton, and Thomas Merton. New Catholic journals like Integrity, Commonweal, and Jubilee sprang into existence.75 In Catholic intellectual discourse, science as a study of material and biological causation was not a problem per se and many Catholic intellectuals were able to contribute to the sciences while remaining loyal to their faith in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. After all, the priest Georges Lemaître (1894–1966) published his findings in 1927, which demonstrated the rate of expansion of the universe and suggested the

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irreversibility of physical processes through the law of entropy. There were also vital Catholic contributions in biology and genetics including the work of the Bavarian monk Gregor Mendel (1822–1884). Mendel’s ground-breaking pea plant experiments discovered the inheritance of dominant and recessive characteristics in plants. Mendel’s work was ignored in his lifetime, but a Cambridge University zoologist, William Bateson, recognized their seminal importance when he read his articles with great interest in 1900. Armed with Mendel’s ideas, Bateson initiated the push for what became the science of genetics.76 One of the most productive Catholic scientists after the first Vatican Council was Pierre Duhem (1861–1916). Duhem was a marvel in the range of his abilities and as a student displayed talents in the humanities, the sciences, and mathematics. A compilation of his writings contains over 400 items including many multivolume works. The breadth of his scientific work included articles and lectures in the fields of hydrodynamics, elasticity, the mathematics of magnetism, and acoustics.77 This productivity is remarkable because Duhem confronted a host of personal difficulties. As a young man, his beloved wife perished in childbirth. Professionally, he had the bad fortune of living in an age of bitter anticlericalism in the French Academy. He would be punished for correctly challenging one of the leading and most institutionally influential scientists and secular intellectuals of his age, Marcelin Berthelot. His subsequent university assignments were at the fringes of French intellectual life.78 Duhem’s work and its religious approach irked some of his pious and profane opponents. Some Thomists decried his claim that “metaphysics was beyond human knowledge.” Some scientists had suspicions about his grounding of truth in the physical world in a religious metaphysics. For Duhem, scientific theory erred in providing a mathematical model of reality to produce an ontology that would be subject to the whims of scientific methods that will eventually falsify its own product. Science cannot disclose the truth of how things are in the world in global physical processes like mechanism. Moreover, the mathematical representation of experimental facts cannot be used to construct ontology. Hence, he concluded that metaphysics could not provide specific directions for scientific research, but neither could research produce metaphysical conclusions. Duhem was not given credit by many of his fellow scientists for allowing science its independence from metaphysics. He concluded that “no metaphysical system suffices in creating a physical theory.”79 In recognizing disciplinary autonomy, the professor thought that his faith did not conflict with his role as scientist and declared, “Of course, I believe with all my soul in the truths that God has revealed to us and that he has taught us through his Church.” The Church must confront,

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however, any teaching that “pretends to have established the irreducible antagonism between the scientific spirit and the spirit of Christianity.” Nonetheless, he had moments of frustrations with the Church’s approach, like when the Institut Catholic refused his request to set up programs to demonstrate the compatibility of positive science with religious truths and the historical sources of such truths in the work of Nicolas Oresme and John Buridan prior to the advances of the Renaissance.80 On a chance encounter with the works of Nemorarius, who did science immediately prior to Leonardo Da Vinci, Duhem discovered the possibility that there were significant scientific contributions from the Middle Ages. For example, the linear development of creation in a medieval philosophers like John Buridan opposed the circular cycles among the ancient Greeks and thus laid the foundation for the development of Newtonian physics. The idea that medieval Christianity was compatible with and the source of modern science was a shock to much of contemporary scholarship’s conviction of an epistemological abyss between the Renaissance and the Middle Ages. Over the years the reactions to Duhem have ranged from a reassertion of the paradigm shift located in the seventeenth century espoused by Alexander Koyré to the compromise position of Herbert Butterfield. On balance, many historians of science today disparage the expansive view of Duhem about the medieval contributions to the founding of modern science. The debate appears, however, far from over.81 Before his death, Duhem began a ten-volume study that was not completed before his death on the evolution of astronomy from Plato to Copernicus. These books contend that Newtonian physics had its origins in the medieval world and the doctrines of the Church. The contemporary Catholic physicist, historian, and philosopher of science Stanley Jaki described Duhem’s contribution as follows: He discovered the true origins of Newtonian physics. That those origins are steeped in culture, the Middle Ages, which for many is still the classic embodiment of obscurantism, could have but served as lèse majesté. But as if insult were to be added to injury, Duhem also spelled out the fact, with a vast and most original historical research these origins are intimately connected with Catholic dogmas, such as the creation out of nothing and the creation out of time.82

One lesson drawn from Duhem for the next generation of Catholic intellectuals is that a strict fidelity to Thomism in intellectual activity is not an inevitable requirement. Anyone testing the limits of science and religion within the Catholic Church would have to develop strategies, however, for straying from the preferred paths. Some were successful in these efforts. Roman thunderbolts did not strike all alleged Modernists. Wilfred Ward, the editor of The Dublin Review, catered to a wide range of

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views and thereby avoided any appearance of only advocating Modernism. Nonetheless, complaints flooded Rome about his journal. Ward’s balancing act prevailed in the end. Even the Vatican gatekeeper, Merry del Val, found such antics amusing and he remarked that the editor’s theology was “acrobatic” for “he attempts the feat of sitting between two stools—and occasionally comes down with a bump—[but] he quickly regains his balance and is able to assure everyone that he is all right again.”83 The submission of Ward and others to Vatican authority saved them from severe discipline. The finessing of Church authority required some elasticity, particularly in theological and philosophical speculation. Maurice Blondel’s philosophy of action survived despite its blatant opposition to scholasticism. Blondel found Thomism insufficiently holistic for it failed to account for the transcendent within human experience and action. His philosophy of “action” examined the interior realities of existence that suggested a dependence of the will on a “universal determinism” that could only be fully grasped by divine assistance. Hence, the realism of the scholastics and the positivism of the sciences dismissed the relevancy of such knowledge to individual human beings. Blondel’s philosophy drew mixed reactions from Church officials throughout his career. He assuaged many concerns because of his criticism of the sciences for focusing on the laws of nature that were a fiction.84 Blondel, unlike Loisy, avoided censure and excommunication. While Loisy protested a “tyranny” of Catholic dogma, Blondel proposed an autonomous philosophy which complied with the “most minute and rigorous demands of Catholicism.” In an editorial after Pascendi, Blondel repudiated agnosticism, naturalism, monism, fideism, rationalism, and immanentism. Blondel’s maneuvering was also assisted by his teaching at a Catholic institution far from the dangerous theological cross-currents of Paris.85 Moreover, he lacked the cynical demeanor of the Modernists that was often as disconcerting as their theories. Blondel said of the Modernist Edouard Le Roy: In pretending to raise a question he lays down an ultimatum and excludes in advance any rejoinders with which he does not agree. In so doing he sets aside the possibility of appeal [from his opinions] and hurls a kind of defiance at authority, which strikes me as an immediate and formidable danger. I don’t say this out of any sense of rivalry with him. . . . Whereas I have for some years advanced my ideas with prudence, folly of this sort puts such efforts at risk.86

Having separated himself from the confrontational style of Le Roy and the biblical criticism of Loisy, Blondel survived the Modernism crisis largely unscathed. He professed his orthodoxy and conceded some value

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in subsequent writings to Thomistic reasoning. Nonetheless, his subsequent writings still displayed his unique blend of mystical, Cartesian, and Platonic influences.87 What was the legacy bequeathed to the four intellectuals I will present in detail in the subsequent chapters? At a minimum, the Modernism crisis served as a reminder to succeeding generations of Catholic intellectuals of the dangers from worldly claims. Catholic scholars were required at times under Pascendi to choose between “the results of scientific research and the pronouncements of the Church.” The pronouncements of the Church hierarchy on certain issues, particularly the issue of scriptural interpretation, required unquestioning obedience.88 Hence, a vital instinct for intellectuals veering from accepted positions was an ability to discern debatable issues within the Church. Still, the form and nature of discipline on such issues defies a simple categorization. How one responded to questioning by Church authorities and the form and nature of concessions to the Church were important factors in determining the form and extent of discipline. The disciplinary efforts in the Modernist crisis left an important legacy of internal discipline and a mutual hostility between the Church and secular political and cultural institutions. Despite such tensions, the legacy of the previous century was a complex one and a keen observer might have noted that some seeds were already planted that would produce a remarkable harvest.

NOTES 1. Pius X, Pascendi Gregis, n. 3, 39. 2. In Italy, the focus of the response to Modernism was to deepen Catholicism rather than combat the dangers of Protestantism or liberalism. Roger Aubert, The Church in a Secularized Society (New York: Paulist Press, 1978), 194–97; Maurillo Guasco, i fatti, le idée, i personaggi (Milan: Edizione Paolini, 1995). As for Germany, see Otto Weiss, Der Modernisimus in Deutschland: Ein Beitrag zur Theologiegeschicte (Regnesburg: F. Pustet, 1995). The focus on France was also taken by the Roman Catholic Modernism Group of the American Academy of Religion, who decided to concentrate on England and France in their book on the subject. Darrell Jodock, “Introduction to Modernism I,” in Catholicism Contending with Modernity, ed. Darell Jodock (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 15–17. Professor Marvin R. O’Connell described Modernism as an “overwhelmingly French phenomena.” O’Connell, Critics on Trial (Washington, DC: Catholic University Press, 1994), 310. As for O’Connell’s assertion that Modernism was barely known in the United States, cf. Scott Appleby, Church and Age Unite (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1992). 3. Alec R. Vidler, The Modernist Movement in the Roman Church (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1934), 9–11.

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4. John Noble Wilford, “The Man Who Grasped the Heavens’ Gravitas,” New York Times, October 8, 2004, B 39. 5. John Draper, The History of Conflict Between Religion and Science (New York: D. Appleton, 1874); Andrew Dickson White, A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom (New York: D. Appleton, 1895). 6. Charles Taylor, Sources of the Self (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989), 305–9. 7. Arthur M. Wilson, Diderot (Oxford University Press, 1972), 210, 237. 8. Jacques Barzun, From Dawn to Decadence (New York: HarperCollins, 2000), 3; Timothy G. McCarthy, The Catholic Tradition (Chicago: Loyola University Press), 1998), 2–5. For a point of comparison with Pius IX’s death, think of John Paul II’s funeral that was assisted by the city authorities and was attended by millions. 9. From the bishops who were often at court to the parish priests who read aloud royal proclamations and announcements, there was an intimate connection between the crown and Church prior to the revolution. Adrien Dansette, Religious History of France, 2 vols. (London: Nelson, 1961), vol. 1, 7–16; Ralph Gibson, A Social History of French Catholicism (New York: Routledge, 1989), 51–55. 10. Alexis de Tocqueville, The Old Regime and the French Revolution, trans. Stuart Gilbert (Garden City: Doubleday Anchor, 1967 [1856]), 133; Adrien Dansette, Religious History of France, vol. 1, 190ff; O’Connell, Critics on Trial, 9, 10. 11. Dansette, Religious History of France, vol. 1, 121; Syllabus of Errors, n. 45–47, 63, 77–80; Gerald McCool, Catholic Theology in The Nineteenth Century (New York: Seabury, 1977), 37–43; Joseph de Maistre, “Selections From Maistre” in Anticlericalism, ed. J. S. Schapiro (Princeton: Van Nostrand, 1967), 121; Austin Gough, Paris and Rome: The Gallican Church and the Ultramontaine Campaign 1848–1853 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1986). 12. O’Connell, Critics on Trial, 309; Dansette, Religious History of France, vol. 1, 586–624; John McManners, Church and State in France, 2 vols. (New York: Harper & Row, 1972), vol. 1, 129–57. 13. O’Connell, Critics on Trial, 309–10. 14. E. Nemesszeghy and J. Russell, The Theology of Evolution (Notre Dame: Fides Press, 1971), 42, 43. 15. John Hedley Brooke, Science and Religion (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 298–99. 16. Gerald Fogarty, S.J., American Catholic Biblical Scholarship: A History from the Early Republic to Vatican II (San Francisco: Harper, 1989), xv–xvii, 96–119; Roger Aubert, Le Pontificat de Pie IX (Paris: Bloud et Gay, 1952), 213ff; Werner Georg Kummel, History of the Investigation of the New Testament, trans. S. M. Gilmour and H. C. Kee (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1972), 63, 75; Ernest Renan, Vie de Jesus (Paris: Calmann-Levy, rev. ed. 1965 [1863]), 12. 17. Dansette, Religious History of France, vol. 1, 405, vol. 2, 31–37, 44–48; John E. Talboth, The Politics of Educational Reform in France (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969), 23; J. Salwyn Schapiro, Anticlericalism: Conflict Between Church and State in France, Italy and Spain (Princeton: Van Nostrand, 1967), 61; “Gallicanism” was a term denoting the desire for local church control by national church bodies. It was initially coined in the document “The Gallican Liberties,” which denied the papacy any authority in civil affairs, affirmed the supremacy of the councils over

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the Pope, emphasized the role of national churches and declared that the consent of the church is necessary to make a papal document infallible. Febronianism is a form of Gallicanism espoused by Bishop von Hontheim (1701–1790), who called himself “Febronius.” 18. Emile Poulat, Intégrisme et catholicisme intégral: Un réseau secret internationale moderniste: La “Sapinière” (1909–1921) (Paris: Casterman, 1969), 121–23. 19. Leo XIII, Aeterni Patris (1879), in Jacques Maritain, The Angelic Doctor (New York: Dial Press, 1931), 88. 20. Vatican Council, Dogmatic Constitution on the Catholic Faith in Canon and Decrees (Rockford: Tan Books and Publishers, 1977), 216, 219–20, 229; Edward Cuthbert Butler, The Vatican Council: The Story Told from Inside in Bishop Ullathorne’s Letters, vol. 2 (London: Longmans, Green, 1936), 190. 21. Wilfrid Philip Ward, The Life of John Henry Cardinal Newman (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1912), 62. 22. Ker, John Henry Newman, 397–416. 23. John Henry Newman, “Christianity and the Physical Science: A Lecture in the School of Medicine” (1855), in John Henry Newman, The Idea of a University, ed. Martin J. Svaglic (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1982), 323–24, 332. 24. Newman, “Christianity and Physical Science,” 327–30. 25. Newman, The Idea of a University, 224–25. 26. Newman, The Idea of a University, 54–58, 225. For an excellent account of Newman and the sciences, see Michael Baur, “Newman on the Problem of the Partiality and Unity of the Sciences,” Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association 77 (2003): 111–27. 27. Newman, The Idea of a University, 76; John Henry Newman, The Argument From Conscience to the Existence of God, ed. Adrian J. Boekraad and Henry Tristram (Louvain: Editions Nauwelaerts, 1961), 103, 106–9; Baur, “Newman on the Partiality and the Unity of the Sciences,” 122. 28. O’Connell, Critics on Trial, 24–27, 34–39; The Vatican Council, Dogmatic Constitution Concerning the Catholic Faith, 216–29; Leo XIII, Aeterni Patris, 229–234. 29. Kurtz labels these practical advantages, “elective affinities.” Kurtz, The Politics of Heresy, 13–16. 30. Joseph Warren Dauben, Georg Cantor: His Mathematics and Philosophy of the Infinite (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), 142. 31. Aeterni Patris, n. 29, 30. 32. John Inglis, Spheres of Philosophical Inquiry and the Historiography of Medieval Philosophy (Brill, 1998), 156; Armand Augustine Maurer, Being and Knowing: Studies in Thomas Aquinas and Later Medieval Philosophers (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1990), 466. 33. Vatican I, Dei Filius, ch. 4., n. 9; McCool, Catholic Theology in the Nineteenth Century, 2, 86, 187, 202; Bernard M. G. Reardon, Liberalism and Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975), 175ff. 34. Some scholars denounce the term “Modernism” because it implies a nonexistent cohesion. A. R. Vidler, A Variety of Catholic Modernists (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), 15; Jodcock, “Introduction I: the Modernist Crisis,” 1–3; Yves Chiron, Saint Pius X Restorer of the Church (Kansas City: Angelus Press, 2002), 204.

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35. Maude D. Petre, Life of George Tyrell from 1884–1909, vol. 2 (London: Arnold, 1912), 353; Maude D. Petre, Modernism: Its Failures and Its Fruits (London: Jack, 1918), 77. 36. Auguste Sabatier, Religion and Modern Culture, trans. Victore Leuliette (New York: G.P. Putnam Sons, 1904), 181–82; The term “mal francese” was the Italian expression for a venereal disease. Carlo Sforza, Makers of Modern Europe (Freeport: Books for Library Press, 1969), 136. 37. O’Connell, Critics on Trial, 15–17; Loisy, My Duel With the Vatican, trans. R. W. Boynton (New York: Greenwood Press, 1968 [1913]), 87. 38. Although he was known as a champion of science, Loisy also commented about scientific dogmatism that a certain “narrowness of spirit must not be thought of as the monopoly of Catholic theologians.” Alfred Loisy, Memoires pour servir a l’histoire religieuse de notre temps, 3 vols. (Paris: Emille Nourry, 1930–1931), vol. 2, 32–33, vol. 3, 492; Loisy, My Duel with the Vatican, 183, 184. 39. Loisy, Memoires pour servir a l’histoire de notre temps, vol. 3, 98–99; O’Connell, Critics on Trial, 66; Harvey Hill, The Politics of Modernism (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2002), 12; Loisy, My Duel with the Vatican, 94, 180–81. 40. Vidler, The Modernist Movement in The Roman Church, 101; Alfred Loisy, The Gospel and the Church, trans. Christopher Home (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1903), 3, 8, 16, 166, 173–77, 276; Hill, The Politics of Modernism, 172. 41. Chiron, Saint Pius X, 195, 196. 42. Hill, The Politics of Modernism, 8–9, 177, 178, 185. 43. O’Connell, Critics on Trial, 114, 115; Vatican I, Dogmatic Constitution of the Catholic Faith, 232, 233; Orestes A. Brownson, The Works of Orestes A. Brownson, 20 vols., ed. Henry F. Brownson (Detroit: Thorndike House, 1884), vol. 9, 520–25; “Draper’s Conflict Between Religion and Science” Catholic World 21 (May 1875): 179; F. P. Garesche, Science and Religion: The Modern Controversy (Saint Louis: Benzinger Bros., 1876), 8–9. 44. Paula Kane, Separatism and Subculture Boston Catholicism 1900–1920 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1994), 8–11. 45. Gleason, Contending with Modernity, 7–9; See also Daniel F. Reilly, The School Controversy (1891–1893) (Washington, DC: Catholic University Press, 1943). 46. Gleason, Contending with Modernity, 10, 11. 47. Gleason. Contending with Modernity, 12–15; Kane, 268–69. 48. Basil Moreau, Christian Education (Lemans, 1856); Appleby, Church and Age Unite, 13, 14; At Notre Dame, Zahm chaired the science department and oversaw the building of a modern science building. Mariano Artigas, Thomas Glick, and Rafael A. Martinez, Negotiating Darwin: The Vatican Confronts Evolution 1877–1902 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 2006), 124–25. 49. St. George Mivart, The Genesis of Species (London: Macmillan, 1871); Augustine F. Hewitt, “Scriptural Questions,” Catholic World 44 (February 1887): 660; Rev. John Gmeiner, Modern Scientific Views and Christian Doctrines Compared (Milwaukee: J. H. Yewdale and Sons, 1884), 3–4, 15, 165–70, 259. 50. Appleby, Church and Age Unite, 27–29; John Zahm, Evolution and Dogma (Hicksville, NY: Regina Press, 1896), 388–90; John Zahm, Bible, Science and Faith

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(Baltimore: John Murphy & Co., 1897), 121–22. Newman made similar distinctions in scriptural exegesis between God who is a revealer of faith and morals and not history or geography in the bible, except as those matters “bear upon divine truth.” John Henry Newman, “An Essay on the Inspiration of Scripture,” Nineteenth Century 15 (February 1884): 185–99. 51. Appleby, Age and Faith Unite, 34, 35; Weber, Notre Dame’s John Zahm, 16–28. 52. John A. Zahm, Bible, Science and Faith, 60–69, 78–80; For an exploration of Augustine’s theory of creation see Ernan McMullen, “Introduction: Evolution and Creation,” in Evolution and Creation, ed. Ernan McMullen (Notre Dame University of Notre Dame Press, 1985), 11–21. 53. James R. Moore, The Post-Darwinian Controversies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979), 174, 196; Zahm, Evolution and Dogma, v, vii. 54. Zahm, Evolution and Dogma, xvii, 69, 70. 55. Zahm, Evolution and Dogma, 50–53, 83, 162–63. 56. Moore, Post Darwinian Controversies, 142; Peter Bowler, Evolution: The History of An Idea (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989), 106–9; Appleby, Church and Age Unite, 39–42; Zahm, Evolution and Dogma, 71, 416. 57. Artigas, et al., Negotiating Darwin, 132. 58. Appleby, Church and Age Unite, 45; Zahm, Evolution and Dogma, 141; “Mind in Action,” Ave Maria 63, February 9, 1946, 146; Artigas, et al., Negotiating Darwin, 132. 59. Marquis Jean-Francois-Albert du Pouget de Nadaillac, review of L’Evolution et le dogme, by John A. Zahm, Revue des Questions Scientifiques 40 (July 1896): 229–46; David Fleming, review of Evolution and Dogma, by John A. Zahm, Dublin Review 119 (July–October 1896): 245–55; Francesco Salis Seewis, “Evoluzione e Dogma pel Padre J. A. Zahm,” La Civilta Catollica 9 (1897): 201–4. 60. Artigas, et al., Negotiating Darwin, 144–51. 61. Artigas, et al., Negotiating Darwin, 144–51. 62. Appleby, Church and Age Unite, 45–48, 50–52; Weber, Notre Dame’s John Zahm, 93, 94, 107. 63. Owen Chadwick, A History of the Popes: 1830–1914 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998), 334–41; Joe Holland, Modern Catholic Social Teaching (New York: Paulist Press, 2003), 199, 239. 64. Maurilio Guasco, Modernismo. I fatti, le idée, i personaggi (Cinisello Balsamo: Edizioni San Paolo, 1995), 194. 65. Pius X, E Supremi Apostolatus (1903), n. 3, 5–10; Pius X, Pieni l’animo (1906), n. 2, 6, 12. 66. Pius X, Pascendi Dominici Gregis (1907), n. 3–19, 44–56. 67. Chiron, Saint Pius X, 200–206; Chadwick, A History of the Popes, 354–59; Pius X, E Supremi Apsotolatus (1903). 68. O’Connell, Critics on Trial, 91–92; Owen Chadwick, Catholicism and History: The Opening of the Vatican Archives (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978); Lester Kurtz, Scholarship and Scandal: Catholic Modernism at the Turn of the Century Ph.D. dissertation (University of Chicago, 1980), 154, 245–46. In an example of the complexity of such matters, another anti-Modernist journal, Sapinière, opposed the Jesuit magazine’s influence on the hierarchy. Poulat, Intégrisme et catholicisme intégral, 202, 364–66; Loisy, My Duel with the Vatican, 250–51. 69. Chiron, Saint Pius X, 238–40.

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70. Gleason, Contending with Modernity, 11, 14; as an example of measured discipline, see the case of Henry A. Poels, a Dutch priest and a scripture scholar at Catholic University. Fogarty, American Catholic Biblical Scholarship, 106–19. 71. Petre, Von Hugel and Tyrell, 173; Loisy, My Duel With the Vatican, 318; Jean Riviere, Le modernisme dans l’église (Paris: Letouzey et Ane, 1929), 538; “The AntiModernist Oath,” in Gabriel Daly, Transcendence and Immanence, A Study in Catholic Modernism and Integralism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980), 235–36. 72. Deidre M. Maloney, American Catholic Lay Groups and Transatlantic Social Reform in the Progressive Era (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 2002), 3–25. 73. Dansette, Religious History of France, vol. 2, 315–77; J. Derek Holmes, The Papacy in the Modern World (New York: Cross Road, 1981), 1–15, 67, 113–14. 74. William D. Miscamble, ed., Go Forth and Do Good, Memorable Notre Dame Commencement Addresses (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 2003), 11, 12; George M. Marsden, The Soul of the American University From Protestant Establishment to Established Disbelief (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994). 75. Richard J. Gelm, Religious Authority: American Catholics Since the Second Vatican Council (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1994), 21. One of the most famous condemnations of Catholic education in this period is John Tracy Ellis, “American Catholics and the Intellectual Life,” Thought 30 (Autumn 1955): 351–88; Gleason, Contending with Modernity, 16, 17; Allitt, Catholic Converts, 277–331. 76. Robin Marantz Henig, The Monk in the Garden (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2000), 1–9. 77. Stanley Jaki, Scientist and Catholic Pierre Duhem (Port Royal: Christendom University Press, 1991), 18–20, 53. 78. Stanley Jaki, Uneasy Genius (The Hague: Martinus Nijoff, 1984), 47–57, 96–98. 79. Pierre Duhem, “Physique et metaphysique,” Revue des questions scientifiques 34 (1893): 55–83; Sandra G. Harding, Can Theories be Refuted?: Essays on the DuhemQuine Thesis (Chicago: Springer, 1976), 184; Diane Elizabeth Davis Villemaire, E.A. Burtt, Historian and Philosopher: A Study of the Author of The Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Physical Science (Chicago: Springer, 2002), 100 80. Pierre Duhem, “Physics of a Believer,” in Jaki, Scientist and Catholic, 184, 235–40. 81. Pierre Duhem, Les Origines de la Statique, Les Sources des Theories Physiques, vol. 1 (Paris: A Hermann, 1905), 1, 4; Pierre Duhem, Le Système du Monde, histoire des doctrines cosmologique de Platon a Copernac (Paris: A. Hermann, 1913–1959 ), vol. 2, 390, vol. 8, 329–31. On the issue of Butterfield, Koyré, and current scholarship see Stephen P. Marrone, The Light of Thy Countenance: Science and the Knowledge of God in the Thirteenth Century (Boston: Brill, 2001), 7–13. Duhem has had some allies as well in Marie Dominique Chenu, La theologie au douzieme siècle (Paris: J. Vinn, 1957), 19–51, and Alistair Crombie, Robert Grosseteste and the Origins of Experimental Science 1100–1700 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971). 82. Jaki, Scientist and Catholic, 9. 83. Maisie Ward, The Wilfred Wards and the Transition, 2 vols. (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1937), vol. 2, 203, 217, 231–33. 84. O’Connell, Critics on Trial, 156–60; Rene Virgoulay, Blondel et le modernisme (Paris: Aubier, 1980), 35–36; Blondel, “Lettre,” in Les premiers ecrits de Maurice Blondel, ed. Felix Alcan (Paris: Presses Universitaires, 1956), 5–6, 13–14, 27–28, 38–70.

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85. Maurice Blondel, “La rédaction,” Annales de philosophie chrétienne 5 (1907– 1908): 5–9; O’Connell, Critics on Trial, 181; Maurice Blondel, “Lettre-Preface pour une réédition de l’Action,” in Etudes Blondéliennes 1 (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1951), 16–17. 86. O’Connell, Critics on Trial, 303. 87. O’Connell, Critics on Trial, 258–60, 288–90, 367, 368; Blondel, Histoire et Dogme in Les premiers ecrits de Maurice Blondel, 149–68, 205–16, 227. In regard to his desire to avoid exegetical issues except in order to clear his name, see Blondel, “Lettre-Preface pour une réédition de l’action,” in Les premiers ecrits de Maurice Blondel, ed. Alcan, 17–18. 88. A classic example here is the English scientist St. George Jackson Mivart, who provoked no discipline from his theistic evolutionary views but invoked severe criticism for his views of scriptural interpretation. O’Leary, Roman Catholicism and Modern Science, 88–93.

2 ✛

Jacques Maritain’s Search for Wisdom (1882–1973)

Of course—we have no intention of returning to the Middle Ages, and denying the huge and magnificent development of the sciences during the course of the last centuries. On the contrary, the peculiar problem of the age lying ahead of us will be to reconcile science and wisdom in a vital and spiritual harmony.1

A RELENTLESS QUEST

J

acques Maritain was born in an age of horse carriages and died when men were landing on the moon. In his lifetime scientific and technological advances were matched by unprecedented economic, political, and social transformations that tore at the cultural fabric of Europe. The Church sought an anchor in this transformative and turbulent period and turned to the medieval philosopher Thomas Aquinas as the focal point for an intellectual renewal beginning with the First Vatican Council. Maritain was an unlikely standard-bearer for Thomism. His grandfather was Julian Favre, the founder of the secular Third Republic. Jacques regretted that he inherited certain traits from his grandfather including “a certain detestable taste for quixotism and lost causes.” His Catholic father, Paul Maritain, was a part-time lawyer and full-time dilettante while his Protestant mother, Genevieve Favre, was an independent woman who preached “an idealistic love of the people, the republican spirit, and the political struggle for liberty.” Unfettered from the perceived constraints

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of religious dogma, her fervent idealism contained an almost missionary zeal for the future of humanity liberated by the spirit of liberty.2 Possessing an independent streak and political idealism like his mother, he was committed to humane reforms. A penetrating mind supported his idealism. At his lycée, one of his teachers observed that he was “an excellent student, with an adventurous though fine and distinguished mind, a searching spirit worthy indeed of esteem and sympathy.” There was also a hint of his future interests when he won the first prize in natural history. Although he wanted to change the world on behalf of the proletariat, somewhat paradoxically, he was also attracted to a form of symbolism that advocated a lonely quest for each person in a world without meaning. At school he rubbed elbows with the sons of prominent families, but hated their “shameful cynicism” and was soon overwhelmed by “the ocean of dissolute and ignoble ineptitude of capitalist dwarfs and daddy’s boys.”3 Beyond the walls of his school, there was a much grander and nobler cause, the birth of a new humanism. The enemy in this project was the Catholic Church because it was infected with a “clerical sickness” that supported the “long sleep of consciences.” On the decomposing husk of the Church, there must be constructed a free and humane society in which man’s only guide must be man himself.4 If man was the guide, it was not self-evident what would be his lodestar for truth and meaning. In the century’s first year, Maritain’s “searching spirit” sought new directions at the Sorbonne, where he enrolled in both the Faculté des Lettres and Faculté des Sciences. A parallel interest in the sciences and philosophy led to degrees in philosophy in 1902 and science in 1906 that included certificates in botany, physiology, and mineralogy. A young woman named Raissa Oumansov, a Jewish émigré from Czarist Russia, who would become his wife, encountered Maritain for the first time when he introduced himself and asked her to join a committee of students protesting the Czarist treatment of socialist dissidents in Russia. They were soon inseparable companions who missed meals as they ignored the “banalities of life.” In these discussions, she sensed her confidant’s singular qualities. He was even then overflowing with activity, with goodness and beauty. He was entirely without prejudice: His soul was as though brand new, and seemed to discover for itself its own laws. He was not in the least a respecter of persons. Because he had the greatest respect for his own conscience, he was very apt to put heat into any debate, whatever it might be—a habit for which he was reproached by the professor of philosophy at the lycée. He was always ready to take the initiative in a generous action if justice or truth were involved.5

Jacques and Raissa’s quest for truth and meaning led them to science, the queen of the disciplines at the university where students basked in

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the “unchallenged” glory of the Curies. Soon the couple were befriended by the scientist Felix Le Dantec, “the most appealing and brilliant” of their professors. Le Dantec declared that intelligence was just a “flabby material which functions at a temperature of thirty-eight degrees” and consciousness was merely “an epiphenomenon.” Their mentor encouraged his new acolytes to prove that life was nothing more than specific chemical combinations.6 The Maritains, not entirely beguiled by Le Dantec, pondered metaphysical issues that he either dismissed or covered in a cursory fashion. Ultimately, Le Dantec provided only a “formless and oversimplified metaphysics” and could not answer questions about the cause, essence, and end of being. The Maritains discovered in this contact that science had “traveled farther and farther away from the great needs of the human spirit.” The Maritains desperately searched for professors who could provide “an ordered view of the Universe, and put all things in their real place.”7 As they were discovering the limits of science, they turned to philosophy for guidance, but it produced a “kaleidoscopic procession” of propositions that supplanted and obliterated one another. The couple flirted with Spinoza but he produced “no real conviction” and Nietzsche nurtured an “aesthetic intoxication” that privileged pride and violence and disdain for the poor and weak. Ultimately, science and philosophy nurtured only an “integral relativism and intellectual skepticism.”8 The despair of the Maritains eventually prompted a solemn resolution one day in the Jardin des Plantes in Paris. Their search for truth appeared increasingly pointless. In their “metaphysical anguish,” they decided to pursue a desperate quest that would “extend credit to existence” in order to provide life one last chance to reveal its meaning. If they were not delivered from the “nightmare of a sinister and useless world,” then they would exit from existence if it were impossible to live according to the truth. After having made their pact, a good friend, the idealistic and uncompromising socialist writer, Charles Péguy, introduced them to Henri Bergson, who was lecturing at the College de France. Bergson was a spellbinding lecturer who scaled the dense walls of immanence erected by science and assured his young friends that the absolute was both real and intelligible.9 Bergson contended that the rationality employed by science blocked a complete picture of the truth. Change was not capable of being grasped by the spatial and qualitative means of science because external measurements cannot grasp the internal essence of a living being. To understand this essence, science must grasp the unity of beings that change over time (durée). This ability to internally grasp the development of a being in time including its progressive life force (l’élan vital) is the faculty of intuition. The insights of intuition reveal that certain psychic facts are not fully explicable by examining mechanical movements in the brain. Many young

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French intellectuals sensed in Bergson a path to transcend the intellectual sterility of either the forms of Plato or the mechanistic formulations of Darwin and Spencer.10 The liberating influence of Bergson allowed the Maritains to reject “the empty and colorless world of universal mechanism and move toward the universe of qualities, spiritual certainty, and personal liberty.” This turn to the transcendent was the first step in their pilgrimage. Christianity then entered into their considerations when they read Leon Bloy’s novel, La Femme Pauvre. When they met Bloy after offering him some financial assistance, they discovered an Old Testament prophet whose faith exuded an appealing simplicity and unshakeable conviction. He was not concerned with popularity, but solely with the truth of the faith as he railed against injustice and called for divine sanction against tyranny in its many forms. 11 Having dared life to present them evidence of the divine, the Maritains received the expansive intellectual vision of Bergson and a pure faith from Bloy. In the end, however, it was the example of Bloy’s life more than Bergson’s intellect that forced a reconsideration of the question of God because as Raissa noted, “he placed before us the fact of sanctity.” But how to reconcile the piety of Bloy with the modern world? He could assist their journey, but there were limits. As a “true man of the Middle Ages,” their mentor despised modern art and had a “medieval horror of the Jewish people.” In addition, he had “an absolute inability to give a place to modern science and its discoveries within the purely rational order (he always suspected something more or less diabolical in them).”12 Still, the encounter with Bloy initiated a period of spiritual probing that proceeded slowly and fitfully. Bloy and Bergson had their roles in slowly lifting the shadows of doubt, but so did the Cathedral at Chartres as a “master teacher of theology, of sacred history and of exegesis.” They also studied the “heroic Catholicism” of the trials, charity, and asceticism of the saints. Jacques Maritain soon turned to contemplation and prayed, “My God if you exist, and if You are the truth, make me know it.” During a short but severe illness of Raissa, Jacques felt his resistance to the faith collapse and was baptized with Raissa in 1906 to the chagrin of his family and many friends.13 The request for divine assistance from Jacques was in part the result of trying to think through his relation to science. Here again there was timely assistance. Jacques witnessed the relationship of a prominent scientist, the geologist Pierre Termier, with Leon Bloy in 1906. Termier was the Chief Engineer of Mines and a professor at the Ecole des mines who possessed a keen scientific mind, a humble piety, and a poetic sensibility. With the example of Termier and Bloy, they decided that the quest for truth was not dead. In 1906 Jacques traveled to Germany to study with the neo-vitalist Hans A. E. Driesch in Heidelberg for several years. These

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studies prompted an interest in the “immense richness and adaptability of organic life.” Driesch’s efforts to reintroduce the notion of an Aristotelian entelechy into biology appealed to the future Thomist.14 In the years at Heidelberg, Jacques was able to study biology, the scriptures, and the lives of saints and mystics. It was soon revealed, albeit through a glass darkly, that there remained the possibility of a true philosophy and a restitution of a higher order of reason. As Raissa recorded at this time, Little by little, the hierarchy of spiritual, intellectual, and scientific values was revealed to us, and we began to understand that they could not be inimical to each other. In varying degrees all participate in the mystery in which all science finally ends, all participate in the light from which descends all knowledge. And we saw clearly that the truth of one could not be the enemy of the truths of the others.15

In order to organize this nascent vision, there was a need for a philosophical foundation that could “demonstrate to the non-believer the contradictions of his non-belief and the compatibility of Christianity with truth and life.” In addition, Jacques needed a vehicle for convincing his fellow Catholics of the superiority of their orthodoxy over the secular world. He concluded that Thomism, a study and application of the philosophy and theology of St. Thomas Aquinas, was the best source for discovering the hierarchy of truth and reconciling faith and reason.16 Maritain contended that Thomism, properly formulated, was a trenchant instrument for analyzing the intellectual issues of the twentieth century because its principles were universal and therefore timeless. The challenge was how to apply these “ultramodern principles” to effect change “without detriment to fixity of principles.” The ultimate end of philosophy was not a substitution of theories, as is the case in the sciences of phenomena, but a “vital assimilation” resulting in a “deeper penetration” of reality. Modern Thomism would thus steer a course between a reactionary scholasticism and the rationalist heritage initiated by the Averroist movement. Hence, Maritain criticized both the relativists who understood truth to be momentary and contextual and conservatives who did not accept that truth is the nuanced reality of being and not a “ready made formula to be passively recorded, so as to have the mind closed and enclosed by them.”17 THE DESTRUCTION OF THE MEDIEVAL SYNTHESIS Having discovered Aquinas, the young scholar at the Institut Catholique in Paris pondered how to apply his ideas to the sciences that were often

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promoting positivist or evolutionary philosophies that were hostile to Thomism. The hylomorphism and realism of Aquinas clashed with the chance of natural selection in evolutionary theory, the requirement of verification by experience of the logical positivists, and Kant’s claim of a priori knowledge. Maritain claimed that these modern perspectives had deep historical roots. Reviewing the relevant intellectual history, he concluded that the West had discovered and then lost its way philosophically in the course of several thousand years. A useful starting point for critiquing this history was the Aristotelian and Thomistic distinctions in the various forms and levels of knowledge. In these traditions wisdom was the highest type of knowledge, a form of “knowing in a firm and stable way” that was capable of endless advancement because it was located in the highest regions of knowledge. Science in distinction to wisdom was located in the “less exalted regions of our understanding.” Biology or physics depended on the knowledge of details and “proximate or apparent causes.” The reliance on material and immediate causes rather than pure being made such sciences a form of perfection that was inferior to metaphysics or divine wisdom, just as one virtue was inferior to another.18 The realization of a hierarchy of knowledge had an important if incomplete start with the Ancient Greeks. The Greeks distinguished between speculative and practical philosophy and allowed the subordination of “the special sciences to the simplest and most universal science” which has “to do with being as such and the causes of being.” The Greeks ultimately failed, however, because their approach had an insufficient metaphysics, did not systematically employ the “physico-mathematical method” to examine nature, and ignored the importance of the details in existing things.19 The Judeo-Christian tradition avoided a complete reliance on unaided human reason to discover the dimensions of wisdom. This tradition recognized that spiritual wisdom is a divine gift to humanity through the incarnation. The supernatural wisdom is a wisdom which gives itself, which descends from the Author of Being in a torrent of generosity of being. The wisdom of salvation, the wisdom of holiness is not achieved by man but given by God. It proceeds essentially not from an ascending movement on the part of the creature but from a descent of the creative Spirit. And that is why it is essentially supraphilosophical, suprametaphysical, and really divine.20

Augustine would extend the scope of such wisdom so that grace and divine revelation subordinated the uti (technique) of science to frui (ends in themselves). Aquinas, employing Aristotelian categories, also understood how the incarnation operated to bring “divine plenitude”

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into the depths of our being through three levels of wisdom. The highest level of divine knowledge allows a contemplative union with the divine as grace operates directly in and through faith, charity, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Grace makes use of all sorts of human possibilities such as imagination, creative intuition, philosophy, and poetry. Theological wisdom is another form of divine knowledge that concentrates on an understanding of God. We learn of our ultimate objective, the eternal, through revelation.21 Metaphysical wisdom operates beneath divine and theological wisdom, pursues the intelligibility of being, and posits God as the source of all being. Such wisdom is entirely contained within natural and rational evidence and does not imply the supernatural descent of the Godhead. Indeed, this knowledge is “entirely contained within the order of the progressive movement of human reason towards the supreme truths which are accessible to it of themselves and by right.” The tripartite levels of wisdom are interactive and mutually enriching. They replace the competition of wisdoms in the ancient world with a new synthesis that was not a sterile “architectural arrangement,” but was a vital form of movement, life, inspiration, and most importantly love.22

Figure 1.1. The Medieval Forms of Wisdom

The Christian synthesis forged and refined in the Middle Ages began to dissolve before the onslaught of a variety of historical influences that would result in science becoming the highest form of wisdom. The fundamental problem was that the first movement of knowledge from the divine to man was forgotten and humanity’s ascent to the heavens was initiated sua sponte from the individual. How did this come to pass? Interestingly, Maritain does not absolve the Church from blame because the medieval Church in a spirit of intellectual imperialism “pressed its yoke too heavily on science—a mistake for which it was to pay dearly.” The resulting revolt of science would seek to overthrow and eliminate metaphysics and wisdom.23

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Three reformers, Luther, Rousseau, and Descartes, played a key role in the revolt of the “age moderne” against the worldview of the Middle Ages. They defended a view of consciousness that promoted a dangerous antinomy of individualism and collectivism. As a consequence, the contemporary period favored an inevitable march of human progress through individual will or the efforts of a collective autonomy in the state. These reformers laid the foundations for Marx, Freud, and Nietzsche to turn faith, reason, and truth into epiphenomenal froth by historicizing or internalizing human experience.24 In the first stage of this intellectual dissection, Martin Luther posited a “metaphysical egoism” that assumed because of our fallen natures. We are denied any capacity for reason or a fundamental human dignity. The only hope is a desperate syllogism of faith—we are sinners, Christ saved sinners, and therefore we are saved. In this “Pelagianism of despair,” we have only the options that derive from our individual experience and subjectivity. This turn to the self inexorably leads to discarding any religious framework due to our enslavement by our subjective passions, politics, and history.25 Luther’s autonomous self transformed our self-knowledge from that of a person who participates through our many faculties including reason in spiritual and moral orders into an individual enclosed by subjectivity and individual experience in a terrible separation, isolation, and finitude. Rousseau took Luther’s interior turn one step further by addressing his despair not from a religious, but from a purely individual perspective. Thus, Rousseau prepared the way for a “total egotism.” The subjective elements of feeling and inspiration replaced earlier notions of conscience as the “intensity and abundance of man’s feelings were made the measure of his holiness and sincerity; and holiness and sincerity in their turn, became the deities of self-worship.” In contrast to Luther, man as a subjective and feeling being was naturally good, but had been corrupted by society when it attempted to limit human freedom. The fundamental error of Rousseau was his Pelagian view of an intrinsically perfect human nature, Rousseau contended that political life could assure man’s natural freedom and liberty through a social contract that posits all our rights in the state which then returns them in a higher unity of collective selves— the general will. Ironically, the human desire for true freedom resulted in tyrannical governments because the state is not an “immanent social God,” but a flawed human invention premised on a false anthropology and historical analysis.26 Like Luther and Rousseau, Descartes contributed to the development of the autonomous self, but his efforts would have even more direct implications for the relationship of religion and science. Descartes, employing an Averroist division of philosophy and theology, started not from

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the synergy of the three forms of wisdom, but from the “angelic” point of epistemology, working downward toward matter in order to allow humanity to become “masters and owners of nature.” In this “angelism,” metaphysics mistakenly became the starting point for the downward descent and replaced theology in a “heaven of pure intelligibility.” Each individual became an isolated mind that perceived nature as no more than a set of essences conforming to reason. Outside of the reasoning function, features such as the body, senses, and God’s creation were contracted in an anthropology of the mind. In the subsequent evolution of Cartesian thought, knowledge subjugated nature and allowed each person to be the creator and end of creation.27 The consequence of the path from Luther through Rousseau and Descartes was an “anthropocentrism” in which each individual is the source of knowledge. From this anthropocentric perspective, knowledge became a form of power employed to subjugate nature, society, and religion. In a final step, the German philosopher Immanuel Kant separated science from metaphysics.28

A PHILOSOPHY OF NATURE With the modern mind operating in a state of separation from wisdom, the prospects for an engagement of science and Catholicism appeared bleak. There were some signs, however, of hope in the speculations of Bergson and others who were challenging a strict materialist and immanent explanation of phenomena. The key was to formulate a more complete picture through recognition of the levels of knowledge. The condition of such a work is in my opinion the establishment of the critique of knowledge in an entirely new spirit, in a truly realist and metaphysical spirit. With such an approach it will be possible to distinguish, in the depths of the spirit, the specifically and hierarchically distinct degrees of knowledge, and show that they correspond to definitive types of explanation which can not be substituted one for another. It will become apparent that one selfsame urge, which, though it is transformed on one plane and another, is never other than the urge of the spirit in quest of Being, [as it] traverses these heterogeneous zones of knowledge, from the humblest laboratory experiment to the speculations of the metaphysician and the theologian—and even further, to the supra-rational experience and the grace-endowed wisdom of the mystics.29

The historical problem of philosophy in its understanding of nature, particularly in the rationalists and the empiricists, was a failure to grasp the differences in these levels of knowledge. For example, the ancients

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and medieval thinkers often conflated the levels of the universal and specific dimensions of being and philosophy with that of phenomena. Ontological analyses absorbed empirical knowledge instead of conceding the presence of a distinct science. 30 The error of the modern age was a volte face from the medievals that dissolved the philosophy of nature and metaphysics into the natural sciences. The first stage of this reversal was Descartes’ separation of metaphysics from the higher wisdoms of the sensible world.31 Next, Kant claimed that the levels of phenomena and the ideal were two independent realms. Scientists could not discover the ontological reality of things in themselves. Conversely, the experimental sciences could not transcend their limits and reach the level of metaphysics. After the Kantian critique, science with the passing of the centuries became more aware of its own procedures and realized that it was not a philosophy, but a study of phenomena. In a final stage, mathematics freed from metaphysical claims explained the processes of phenomena at this empiriological level. The price paid for this switch was that empiriological methods assumed an exclusive claim to any knowledge of phenomena. Thus, there was no longer a philosophy of nature but only the sciences of phenomena.32 The antidote for these errors was to concoct a new formulation that would avoid the medieval and modern mistakes. Aristotle’s degrees of knowledge, from the sensible to the mathematical to the metaphysical, were the keys to connect the metaphysical and the sensible. A knowledge of the sensible was required to reach “immaterial realities” just as the rules of metaphysics guided the human mind to the wisdoms or the higher spheres. Why not remain content with knowledge in the sphere of the phenomenal? In an echo of Newman, Maritain declared that the sciences have an ontological itch that they can not quite scratch with their own epistemology. The sciences “aim at being (as real) and they mistrust it (as intelligible) and fall back on sensible phenomena. . . . ” The sciences must accept the limits of their objectives and accept the degrees of knowledge at the other levels.33 At the summit of human knowledge are the suprarational forms of knowledge in theology and mysticism. God at these levels is experienced or revealed, but not completely revealed, because this is only possible at the beatitude. Mystical experience is the highest level of knowledge where the soul rises through many transformative stages until it can experience “the life of God.” Theology as the science of “revealed mysteries” is a form of reason illumined by faith. Theology passes beyond the analogical knowledge of metaphysics and is a direct if limited knowledge of the divine.34 Descending to the level of metaphysics we can discover the intelligible in being, but there is no direct apprehension or experience of the divine.

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Figure 1.2. Maritain’s Levels of Knowledge

This metaphysical knowledge underlies all of our acts of intelligence, but it only becomes knowable when we exclude all the sensible and material aspects of reality that mask the ontological essence of metaphysical being. The epistemology of metaphysics can be distinguished from the realm of the natural sciences in several ways. Science advances by substitution, in which problems involving sensible properties can be made verifiable or deniable by empirical evidence. This scientific approach can always falsify a previous theory and substitute a new one by the discovery of new data. There is no continuing truth at this level of wisdom.35 In contrast to knowledge from the natural sciences, metaphysical knowledge is universal because it applies to all of being, that which exists or can exist. Knowledge in this realm is unchanging, unlike the natural sciences and yet is progressive. How can this be? Metaphysical knowledge progresses in wisdom through the deepening penetration of the

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mystery of being. Such a mystery does not lend itself to a solution; it is not an equation to be completed, a puzzle that is resolved by discovering all of the pieces. At the level of the divine, the mystery of being is “too pregnant with intelligibility” for our intellect and at the metaphysical level it appears impenetrable because of the element of nonbeing in it.36 The approach to this mystery, therefore, cannot employ the epistemology of the natural sciences because the study of the natural sciences uncovers the particular being of everyday experiences, not the universal being of the metaphysical. Maritain makes clear that the being he will explore at this level is also not the being of the logician or the “pseudo beings” classified in the hierarchy of categories or genera. No, he is searching for “being as such” through the intuition of being.37 In his intuition of being at the metaphysical level, we see a departure in Maritain from standard Thomistic epistemology. For Maritain, the intuition of being is a spontaneous response to the initiative of reality itself. This intuitive grasp is a nod in the direction of Bergson but it results in concepts of being that would not have differed significantly from traditional Thomists like Garrigou Lagrange. It is not the result of a rational or logical process although it can occur in conjunction with a logical analysis that can rise through the levels of natural knowledge and the philosophy of nature to the threshold of the intuition of being. But, the actual apprehension of being is “a revelation,” a form of “intellectual shock” that reveals the “unforgettable transobjective fact” of existence. Language has difficulty describing this moment of “spiritual conflagration” providing a moment of “illuminating contact.” The metaphysician cannot force this moment, but she or he can prepare the scene of the contact through an “intellectual purification” that makes us receptive to this reality because we have “become sufficiently disengaged, sufficiently empty to hear what all things whisper.” In this state, we can receive as a gift that which shines through the act of existing in things. The act of existing is a “glory to be recognized” and allows the implications of being to come from its recognition. In this way we can push beyond the grasp of essence to the “super intelligible datum” of the formality of existence.38 Maritain has been criticized for claiming too much from the judgment of existence (esse) in physical bodies. It is often conceded that existence in such physical bodies reveals being (ens) in them and does not rule out a form of being that is not a body, but can Maritain’s intuition of being in existence reveal the metaphysical realities of nonbodily entities. The transphysical commonality of beings that is their essence presupposes in some instances the knowledge of an immaterial being and this is outside the scope of Maritain’s approach. In the words of the philosopher John F. Knasas, Maritain in his judgment of esse “draws an object too great for the

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data to bear.” Indeed, the “apprehension of a transphysical commanality presupposes some knowledge of an immaterial being.”39 Pretermitting such concerns, the intuition of being is most importantly a habit of mind in which the encounter with being is fully appreciated in a vision or “enraptured contemplation.” This encounter with being can produce an “eidetic intuition” that produces a conceptualization of being that in the mind can become increasingly pure and immaterial and that reveals “the conditions of its existence one and universal, and existence of intelligibility in act.”40 This primary visualization is not a denial, but is consistent with the identity of being or existence in concrete objects with specific essences or natures. From the principle of identity are developed a number of first principles such as the principle of noncontradiction, sufficient reason, efficient causality, and finality. These concepts are part of a rational confirmatory analysis that can review a metaphysical truth and either confirm or deny the intuition, but it does not replace such an intuition or vision. So reason can lead us to the edge of the intuition of being and can confirm the intuition of being even if it cannot provide the intuition of being.41 A key point for Maritain is that reason and for that matter the natural sciences and mathematics ultimately aspire to metaphysical knowledge. Hence, the habit of mind derived from metaphysics is critical for natural philosophy, the natural sciences, mathematics, and all forms of study. Maritain’s metaphysics, in the words of John Hittinger, provides the “stable habitual center of the intellectual life.”42 Beneath metaphysics in the degrees of wisdom, the level of mathematics is also naturally abstractive and not related to sensible objects. Mathematics seeks the imaginable and is distinguishable in that it can look to subjects that do not exist, but when mathematics examines subjects that can exist they exist in matter. Moreover, mathematics is derived from matter in that it expresses in a set of signs the “field of experience and observable phenomena.” Mathematics can be freed from experience, however, and develop through logical or ideal being new systems that make sense only to the mathematician and deal with entities existing only within the mind. The result of this mathematical abstraction of sense experience is that modern science has its “hands” on the earth collecting facts and its head in a mathematical “heaven” that is populated with “various crowds of signs and merely ideal and not even intuitively thinkable entities.”43 Despite its abstractive nature, mathematics, unlike metaphysics, is still connected however tenuously to the sensible. The philosophy of nature is the lowest of the levels in the ascension of wisdom and “an indispensable mediator which reconciles the world of the particular sciences (which is inferior to it) with the world of metaphysical wisdom, which it obeys.” More specifically, its proper object is being which “imbues all generic

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and specific diversifications” in material objects. It is not being qua being in its own “intelligible mystery” which is the object of the metaphysician. Rather it is being in the “mystery of its becoming and mutability.” The philosophy of nature stands in relation to experimental science like the soul stands to the body. The philosophy of nature supplies directing principles orienting the thought and research of the experimental sciences without entering into the structures of the sciences itself. The concepts of a philosophy of nature are derived from the sensible and detected by the senses. There are distinct modes of knowledge that separate the sciences and the philosophy of nature. The former relies on the observable while the latter relies instead on the differences in being which it can decipher while aiming at intelligible nature but without sacrificing sense data in the world of ontological mutability. 44 Maritain begins with the assumption that the object or level of knowledge would be the same for the philosophy of nature and the natural sciences, but that their ends and hence their methods for organizing knowledge would be considerably different. The philosophy of nature seeks to explore the operation of being in material objects employing proofs through philosophical concepts like the principle of noncontradiction. By contrast, the natural sciences probe sequential causation and the nature of material objects. The natural sciences fall under the category of empiriological knowledge, which is divided into empiriometric sciences like physics that are explained by mathematical models applied to the physical world and empirioschematic sciences like evolution, which relies on physical schemata.45 The forms of intellection necessary to proceed at this level can further distinguish the epistemological differences between the philosophy of nature and emperiological knowledge. There are two relevant capacities for ordering knowledge here—dianoetic and perinoetic intellection. In dianoetic intellection, the terms are known by the repeated experience of concrete and particular things. It is through the perception of an object’s sensible properties or behavior that we can arrive at its essential being. Dianoetic causation can then reveal a causal relation in itself by “resolution to truths known from an understanding of their terms.”46 Turning from the natures of objects obtained by dianoetic intellection in a philosophy of nature, knowledge that is the object of scientific study is obtained by perinoetic intellection. Perinoetical intellection is “grasped by the mind inside a system of phenomenal regularities.” These phenomenal regularities provide emperiological truths, truths about objects that can be measured. The natures of objects at this level have given way to signs, measurable results.47 This critical realist approach offers a holistic approach to the material world since dianoetic intellection can reveal the causal relationships of

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being while perenoetic intellection can ascertain specific differences in material objects. For example, an emperiological analysis can describe an object that is moving from nonmotion to a state of motion. The critical realist can describe this action as two forms of existence, that of the object and of motion. The inclusion of an ontological analysis reveals necessary causal relationships such as dispositions, induction, and simplicity in the causal relations. The analytical limitations of logical positivism stem from the inability to recognize that ontological principles such as causality exist at the level of the emperiological sciences. Positivists attempt to maintain a “purely legal science” without causation, but “the spontaneous development of the positive sciences has constantly given the lie to this ideal limit of positivism.”48 The philosophy of nature is in an unusual position in regards to its future development. It applies a philosophical analysis to the natural developments of science but since science continually develops its range of knowledge, a philosophy of nature must “submit to a certain law of aging and renewal.” This renewal requires a revision of concepts and terminology to deal with new developments.49 Having dealt with the issue of dianoetic intellection and perinoetic intellection, it is worth observing that there are two other forms of knowing, ananoetic intellection and connatural knowledge. In ananoetic intellection, we can use analogy of sensible things to obtain knowledge of higher-order objects like God. Purposive and intelligible structures in the material world suggest by analogy the nature of the divine such as perfect intelligence in the divine. Connatural knowledge is a kind of knowledge demonstrated in areas like aesthetic experience or morality that is based on inclination from our appetites, emotions, will, etc., and not from rational demonstration or conceptual connections. For example, the good in the natural law is the grasping of the primary rules of the good, such as the preservation of life, that derive from the spontaneous inclinations of the human person. Reason can then reflect on these rules to develop a moral philosophy.50 In the range of intellection uncovered by Maritain, the danger of modern approaches is revealed in their limited perspectives. Because of this problem, Maritain spent considerable intellectual capital combating the rationalism of Descartes and the empiricism of other scientists as being dangerous in their misleading formulations of natural phenomena. In the former, there is the danger of subjectivism and idealism; Cartesianism may trap human experience in the mind, where it seeks only clear and distinct ideas formulated by reason. In this form of “angelism,” the experience of the senses is excluded, unlike in Maritain’s forms of intellection. The internal mental search of Descartes for pure and clear ideas leads inevitably to mathematical criteria that can accommodate such a search.51

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Ironically, the Cartesians under attack from the empiricists yield to their critics and concede at times that the clear and distinct ideas they seek are found in the sensible data of their critics. The empiricists have their own problems, however, as they too readily abet scientism. The reduction of knowledge to sensation by the empiricists errs by denying the power of the human intellect to know by forms of intellection denied by an excessively data-driven methodology.52 In his approach to the possibilities of human knowledge, Maritain allows for a unified approach that seeks to avoid the reductionisms and narrow perspectives of other systems like the rationalists or the empiricists. The philosophy of Maritain is expansive and seeks to provide a complex and multilayered methodology for understanding phenomena from the electron to the divine. In this expansive vision, the role of the natural sciences is important and it is provided its own role and processes. This role and these processes produce valuable knowledge that helps to fill in a part, but only a part, of the full range of realities emanating from divine creation. His objective is captured well by the philosopher and Maritain scholar, Raymond Dennehy, Maritain seeks to vindicate the capacity of the human intellect to know by unfolding the expanse of human knowledge. In doing so he reveals that the various levels are hierarchically ordered: science for example is subordinate to metaphysics in virtue of the latter’s more comprehensively ontological view of being. The hierarchy allows for diversity in knowledge without conflict. Unlike rationalism which excludes important aspects of human experience and knowledge by virtue of demanding too much of the human intellect, and unlike irrationalism, which in order to protect what is valuable among these excluded things, rejects, root and branch, the validity of rational knowledge, the intellectualism advocated by Maritain is capable of sheltering under the canopy of reason the full expanse of reality and human experience.53

SCIENCE AND SOCIETY After seeking the answers to life’s ultimate questions in science, Maritain fervently embraced Catholicism and harshly criticized his former secular faith. As I just outlined, Maritain claimed that science erred in excluding forms of knowledge beyond the level of phenomena. For science epistemology was limited to “that which can be observed and measured, and the ways through which observation and measurement are to be achieved, and the more or less unified mathematical reconstruction of such data.” This mistake was compounded by trying to make this very limited frame of knowledge, the science of phenomena, coextensive with all knowledge. This was the error of scientism. Those wedded to scientism did not desire

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the freedom of reason, but the freedom to control all knowledge in their own image to “se tromper comme ils veulent, autant qu’ils veulent, partout ils veulent, sans autre controle qu’eux memes” (Deceive themselves as they want, as much as they want, anywhere they want, without any check other than themselves). For those enslaved by such a scientism, they expect “from science the solution to every problem, and to mistake the progress of science for the advent of a new metaphysics or religion.”54 While the currents of scientism were strong in the twentieth century, there were contrapuntal intellectual tides that questioned the techno-scientific dominance. The French writer Anatole France had a protagonist declare, “I hate science for having loved it too much after the manner of voluptuaries who reproach women with not having come up to the dream they formed of them.” There were hopeful signs of resistance in the writings of Husserl, Whitehead, Santayana, and Weil and in the stream of intellectuals visiting Maritain in Meudon.55 As he reinforced the barricades of anti-Modernism in the 1920s, the new Thomist philosopher would be changed by the Action Française controversy. Action Française was a movement formed in 1899 after the Dreyfus affair that became a rallying point for French nationalism, reactionary politics, and conservative Catholicism. The leader of Action Française, Charles Maurras, manipulated traditional Catholic fears by attacking the Republic and its anti-clerical legislation. Maritain was drawn to Action Française because it rejected the decadence of the current order, opposed contemporary notions of equality and progress, and opposed collectivism and individualism. He encouraged friends to join Action Française and was the philosophical editor of their Revue Universelle.56 The flirtation with ultranationalism ended in 1926 with Pius XI’s condemnation of Action Française and Maurras’ stinging reply, “Non Possumus.” The Church denounced the organization as more classicist and royalist than Catholic. The young Thomist initially sought reconciliation, but compromise was impossible. The condemnation highlighted the inherent strains in Maritain’s apocalyptic, reactionary, and reformist tendencies. Josef Amato, author of Mounier and Maritain, describes Maritain’s transformation as follows: By destroying much of the conservative and reactionary underpinning of Maritain’s thought, the Condemnation both allowed and forced him to envision more fully the pressing realities of contemporary Europe, and to admit more readily and more humbly the existence of problems and crises in Europe which could not be intellectually dispelled. From the Condemnation of the Action Francaise, it is possible to date Maritain’s willingness to explore more sympathetically the possibility of a more positive relation between Catholicism and contemporary democracy and to begin for the first time a sincere exploration of the conditions of man in his time.57

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As Maritain turned to engage contemporary culture in a dialogue, he conceded “in the realm of culture, science now holds sway over human civilization.” His perspective could have been a non sequitur as many of the regnant cultural voices of science would disapprove of his Thomism. For example, the philosopher Alfred Stern in an article in Engineering and Science condemned Maritain’s philosophical efforts as nothing more than a defense in contemporary philosophical language of old church dogmas and superstitions such as angels, devils, and an antipathy to modern science. Maritain’s metaphysical sophistry was reminiscent of the Holy Roman Office’s denial of the Copernican heliocentric system.58 Despite such challenges, Maritain believed he had chosen a propitious moment for dialogue because “liberal” scientists like Einstein, Heisenberg, and Oppenheimer were slowly admitting that atheism did not inexorably follow from their science. The liberals sensed that there could be a rational understanding of things beyond phenomena. There might be a reconciliation through a kind of extension of Neils Bohr’s principle of complementarity between different forms of phenomena. Hence, chemical brain activity and the soul are different objects existing in a single phenomenon of the mind. The conflict paradigm was also dissolving because many scientists were yielding to either a “vague religiosity or toward definite religious faith.”59 In era of new possibilities, Maritain consciously adopted the role of a mediator between religion and science and embarked on an ambitious program for reconciling the gains of modern science in practical knowledge with the wisdom apparent in the medieval synthesis. Given the cultural supremacy of science and a history of its sometimes hostile relations with the Church, any explanation of the boundaries of religion and science “demands a rather delicate sometimes complicated analysis.” The Church for its part must not fall prey to a “practical Manichaeism,” which propitiated a completely negative attitude to the world. This Manichaeism would produce a “disfigured Christianity” and would nurture an enormous amount of frustration and disillusionment because of the separation of the world and the faith.60 The possibility of a constructive dialogue was aided by fissures in the intellectual dominance of the sciences that were experiencing a period of “fecund trouble and self-examination.” Maritain described the fall of science in these terms: Scientists have to face the problem of over-specialization, and a general condition of permanent crisis which stems from an extraordinarily fast swarming of discoveries and theoretical renewals, and perhaps from the very approach peculiar to modern science. They have, in general, got rid of the idea that it is up to science to organize human life and society, and to su-

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persede ethics and religion by providing men with the standards and values on which their destiny depends.61

Because of this fall, it was a propitious moment to seek a greater harmonization with science, particularly with “liberal” scientists. His philosophy of nature was one avenue for assisting “liberal” scientists to avoid errors as they reached beyond the material world. Another area for dialogue was on technological dangers like the atomic bomb. The atomic bomb was an example of how too often science passively offered additional powers for exercising man’s almost limitless capacity for inhumanity. The individual scientist had moral obligations and the duty to advocate for the appropriate utilization of science and technology as citizens of the greater human community. Maritain claimed that as a result of the impact of the applications of science on the destiny of mankind, the scientist can no longer be entirely satisfied with his purely scientific work. He is reminded that he is both a scientist and a man, with responsibilities as a man. He will probably be brought to acknowledge that science provides us only with means—the use for which, for good or evil, depends on the moral rectitude of our will and our appreciation of the ends of human life.62

The ends for which science should be used are ontological categories that are within the purview of theology and philosophy and not science. The inability to recognize right ends resulted in an unchecked destruction of humanity and the environment. Thomism must direct the “technological structure of western civilization” since it could ascertain the “values, norms, and ends which make human life simply good or bad.”63 Scientists are understandably uneasy about social or moral constraints from sources like the Church that they believed have historically abetted an oppressive intellectual atmosphere. These qualms must yield to the recognition of the stakes in ignoring the potential human consequences from the advances in science and technology that were often abused by governments. Appropriate responses to unethical pressures might include a scientist resigning their position or developing associative unions of like-minded professionals to alert the public of possible dangers.64 Given the stakes for humanity in such issues, Maritain championed an open and respectful dialogue of scientists, philosophers, and theologians. While attending the Conference of Science, Philosophy, and Religion in 1940, he wrote an article for the New York Times on the necessity for innovative forms of academic cooperation. He noted that the sciences had artificially circumscribed their intellectual horizons by not engaging in interdisciplinary exchanges of ideas. Such a discourse confronted significant problems. At the aforementioned Conference of Science,

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Philosophy and Religion in 1940, there were strong differences and tensions. The Conference explored the source and direction of science and technology for contemporary culture. The aegis of the conference was Rabbi Louis Finkelstein of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. He had initiated a series of lectures in the 1930s on science and religion at the Institute of Interdenominational Studies. He then decided to develop a series of conferences to resolve the issues of knowledge and faith that were essential to a vibrant democracy by inviting a dialogue of philosophers, theologians, and scientists. The role of Maritain in the conference of 1940 was at times controversial. In part this was the result of a lingering anti-Catholicism by some of the scientists and philosophers. With his espousing a hierarchy of natural philosophy, metaphysics and theology above science, Maritain’s views at the Conference were also rejected by those who defended an equality of the disciplines. Despite some heated exchanges, the Conference did agree to the acceptance of an important and foundational Judeo-Christian tradition and recognized its crucial role in modern science and democracy.65 Maritain’s capacity to confront science continued at a MIT panel discussion in 1949 on “Science, Materialism and the Human Spirit.” He urged a submission of science to wisdom in regards to ethical issues. Human beings could misuse science because of a “mythmaking suggestibility,” a desire for facile explanations, and “greed and the will to power.”66 These types of exchanges confirmed for Maritain certain insights. All parties in a dialogue must be mutually respectful. In order to lessen the defensiveness of all parties, he advocated a limited set of aims. The key ground rule for this dialogue was professional civility. Since his years at Meudon, Maritain sought diverse intellectual exchanges. At his home the conversation was quite fluid with the topics ranging from the fugues of Bach to Freudian psychology to the passive resistance concepts of Mahatma Gandhi.67 The diversity of this intellectual activity prepared Maritain for a dialogue with science that would not seek conversion or denunciation but a mutual education to secure a more refined understanding of the boundaries between their fields of knowledge. By lowering their rhetorical defenses, each discipline could reduce embedded prejudices and recognize insights that were consistent with their fundamental principles. As a youthful convert, Maritain complained that science would rather accept ten errors before accepting one truth from God. An older and more measured Maritain saw possibilities. For example, religious intellectuals should recognize in the psychological unconscious another dimension of the free will. For their part, scientists should not scoff at the compatibility of modern physics and theological conceptions of creation.68

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Maritain also welcomed a constructive dialogue between religion and science because of the serious stakes for human life without these discussions. Nonetheless, there would be deep tensions and differences about the problems and their solutions. Science through the advances of technology could be used “to manipulate the masses.” Maritain believed that the reconstituting of ontology in philosophy, a point of contention with many scientists, was “the crucial question of our age of culture.” This ontology was essential because a loss of a connection to being among people in general, not just philosophers or scientists, reduced the world to a nexus of material manipulation.69

A POSTSCRIPT ON EVOLUTION The reign of scientism seemed to be fading by the second half of the twentieth century. Current theories of material development of the universe were no longer purely mechanistic ones strictly guided by Newtonian laws. The positivists had to deal with the additional complexities of Einsteinian relativity and quantum physics, which depicted a universe that was a mixture of organization and chance. Material mechanisms were “elusive, imperfectly knowable.”70 The trajectory of developments in the biological sciences such as evolutionary theories, however, was more problematic. This controversial topic would reveal important aspects of Maritain’s engagement with science including a Thomistic approach to knowledge, a qualified openness to science, and a concern for the direction of the Church. Evolution was in some ways very compatible with Christianity and “correctly understood offer us a spectacle whose greatness and universality make the activating omnipresence of God only more tellingly sensed by our minds.” After all, evolution had an entelechy that was singular and avoided the errors of the cyclical view of time among pagan thinkers. Evolution demonstrated an emerging complexity of superior forms of life that eventually resulted in its finest accomplishment—man.71 In one of his final essays, “Toward a Thomist Idea of Evolution,” Maritain outlined and qualified his view of the meaning of the theory of evolution for human development. As with his degrees of knowledge, he believed that evolutionary theory lacked a proper philosophical basis. His philosophical exploration of the Aristotelian-Thomistic notion of the degrees of knowledge could by an analogous application demonstrate how there was a hierarchy of nature in all aspects of existence from plant life through human beings. Each stage in this hierarchy has an immanent “tendentiality” to rise to the next level. Following Aquinas, Maritain recognized an “ascending perfection of forms and the movement of generation, or of

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substantial transformation.” There was also an aspiration in this evolutionary tendency to seek a higher metaphysical level and direct itself in the “final analysis toward the ultimate form.”72 While conceding the stages of physical development, Maritain was cautious about theories of evolution. He condemned the notion that human development was solely the result of a spontaneous process of chance. While conceding the “dynamism of nature” and its upward movement, he did not hold that nature could pass by its own initiative to the spiritual state, that is, to the level of the soul. Indeed, animal intelligence could not gradually progress to the level of human intellect, for this would be as absurd as suggesting that “an architect will one day reach the moon by building higher and higher towers.” The creation of the intellective soul required divine intervention.73 The hypothesis of Maritain was that when primate evolution reached a very advanced state these primates were at the summit of evolution, but remained at the level of the subhuman. These creatures strained toward human intellect, but this aspiration could only be completed by the freely creative act of the divine. Evolution was thus on its own incapable of creating a perfect system. Indeed, it was not only limited concerning ensoulment, but tended to a “degradation” revealed in the “implacable voracity” of destruction and death. Psychology and anthropology demonstrated that man was invaded by a host of “warping forces” that made homo sapiens the “most unfortunate of animals.”74 While Maritain conceded much to evolution, he believed that Teilhard’s evolutionary program was part of a new Modernism that held that the telos of the divine was acting primarily in and through the processes of nature. The personal God of Christianity became, in Teilhard’s formulation of a new Gnosticism, the “soul of the world”. The cosmic Christ was not the redeemer, but the key to evolution. For Maritain, the “tendentiality” of each person to seek the divine was not a result of nature but was supernatural, that is, “superior to the entire order of nature.” Moreover, and this is a crucial point, nature had to be “completed by God’s divinely free and gratuitous creativity.”75 Maritain distinguished Thomism and Teilhardism by declaring that for St. Thomas there were substantial transmutations causing a true passage from one nature to another, whereas in the case of Teilhard (the thought of this great poet of Evolution lacked the evolutionary concept par excellence, the concept of the change of being), for him everything was in everything, and what he called evolution (as was the case with many evolutionists who were not sufficiently metaphysicians) was no more than a kind of unwrapping. On the other hand, for a St. Thomas who would have had no idea of Evolution, it is not a generalized Incarnation, an encosmized Christ who is the mover in this process; it is God, the creating and sovereignty transcen-

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dent Intellect, directing all things toward their end and elevating life toward its higher forms.76

The issue of evolution demonstrated the difficulty of balancing religion and science for Maritain. He must account for the advances of science and reconcile these with his Thomist philosophy. This difficult task was heightened by the battles within the Church. The currents in the Church at the end of the Second Vatican Council were so contradictory and ill formed that he was not optimistic about its results. In his last major work, The Peasant of the Garonne, he lamented the mish mash of ill-formed and confusing perspectives that coalesced in the wake of the Council. One faction, “the Ruminators of the Holy Alliance,” always battened the hatches against all real or imagined external dangers while the liberals or the “sheep of Panurge” reflexively followed the lead of the secular culture. In the end these camps presented him with the unedifying choice between watching a “truth that is dear to me disregarded and abused . . . or to see it invoked and betrayed.” Between these camps lie the majority of Christians who sense that “something great is in the offing and they do not know how to participate.” They ultimately seek a disclosing of the essential truths of the faith. A failure to provide the proper path to these essential truths would result in a “serious disillusionment” of the faithful.77 In the wake of this predicament, how should Catholics proceed with the dialogue of religion and science? Scientific issues, including but not limited to evolution and a philosophy of nature, must be studied and engaged from the perspective of Thomism. The issues of the sciences “press hard” and Christians must study scientific issues carefully and “confront, reduce or assimilate” scientific results. In the end, the Catholic philosopher must steer between this antinomy in the uncomfortable role of a mediator between heaven and earth and live “the painful paradox of an absolute fidelity to the eternal joined to the most diligent understanding of the anguishes of our time.”78

NOTES 1. Jacques Maritain, Science and Wisdom, trans. Bernard Wall (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1940), 32. 2. Raissa Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, trans. Julie Kernan (New York: Image Books, 1961) 48–50. In later years, he would repudiate any connection to his family and its secular dreams and expectations. Jacques Maritain, Carnet de Notes (Paris: Desclee de Brouwer, 1965), 9, 10. Jacques did not want even a connection to Pierre Favre, one of the founders of the Jesuits and a gentle opponent of the Reformation. Jean-Luc Barre, Jacques and Raissa Maritain: Beggars for Heaven, trans. Bernard E. Doering (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2004), 8–13.

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3. William J. Nottingham, Christian Faith and Secular Action: An Introduction to the Life and Thought of Jacques Maritain (Saint Louis: The Bethany Press, 1968), 26; Maritain, Carnet de Notes, 10, 16–25, 58; Stanley Jaki, “Maritain and Science,” The New Scholasticism 58 (1984): 270–72; Barre, Jacques and Raissa Maritain, 37. 4. Barre, Jacques and Raissa Maritain, 38. 5. R. Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, 42. 6. R. Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, 64, 65. 7. R. Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, 38–40, 66–72. 8. R. Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, 66–72. 9. R. Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, 72–92. 10. Henri Bergson, An Introduction to Metaphysics, trans. T. E. Hulme (New York: Putnam, 1912), 81–92; Henri Bergson, Creative Evolution, trans. Arthur Mitchell (New York: Henry Holt & Co., 1944), 204–5; Maritain, Carnet de Notes, 42, 43. 11. R. Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, 94. 12. R. Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, 120–25, 150–52. 13. R. Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, 145–48. 14. Jaki, “Maritain and Science,” 274; Jacques Maritain, “Le Neo-Vitalism en Allemagne et le Darwinisme” Revue de Philosophie (1910): 417–41. 15. Raissa Maritain, We Have Been Friends Together, 149. 16. Amato, Mounier and Maritain, 57–59. 17. Jacques Maritain, Preface to Metaphysics (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1943), 9, 20; Jacques Maritain, “Religion and the Intellectuals,” Partisan Review 17 (April 1950), 324; Jacques Maritain, Bergsonian Philosophy and Thomism, trans. Mabelle L. Andison (New York: Philosophical Library, 1955), 11; Jacques Maritain, Education at the Crossroads (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1943), 12. 18. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 4–6. 19. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 8–13. 20. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 16, 17. 21. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 18–22. 22. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 17–24. 23. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 20, 26. 24. Jacques Maritain, Three Reformers: Luther, Descartes, Rousseau (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1929), 4. 25. Maritain, Three Reformers, 18–20. 26. Maritain, Three Reformers, 95–133; Amato, Maritain and Mounier, 64. 27. Maritain, The Three Reformers, 79–81, 86; Jacques Maritain, Dream of Descartes (New York: Philosophical Library, 1944), 33–57, 61–103. 28. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 32. 29. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 33. 30. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 36–40. 31. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 28–30. 32. Jacques Maritain, Philosophy of Nature (New York: Philosophical Library, 1951), 46–47. 33. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 48–52. 34. Maritain, The Degrees of Knowledge, 263–306; Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, I.85.1; Thomas Aquinas, Boethii de Trinitate, V.1.

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35. Maritain, Preface to Metaphysics, 9–19. 36. Maritain, Preface to Metaphysics, 12–13. 37. Maritain, Preface to Metaphysics, 28–38. 38. Jacques Maritain, Existence and the Existent, trans. Lewis Galantiere and Gerald Phelan (New York: Pantheon Books, 1948), 17–21. Maritain, Preface to Metaphysics, 46–51. 39. John F. X. Knasas, “How Thomistic is the Intuition of Being?” in Jacques Maritain: The Man and His Metaphysics, ed. John F. X. Knasas (Mishawaka, IN: The American Maritain Association, 1988), 83–93. 40. Maritain, Preface to Metaphysics, 61. 41. Maritain, Preface to Metaphysics, 91–94. 42. Maritain, Preface to Metaphysics, 45–48; John Hittinger, “The Intuition of Being: Metaphysics or Poetry?” in Jacques Maritain: The Man and His Metaphysics, ed. John F. X. Knasas (Mishawaka, IN: The American Maritain Association, 1988), 74–75. 43. Jacques Maritain, “God and Science,” in On the Use of Philosophy Three Essays (New York: Atheneum, 1965), 47–48. 44. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 54–69; Maritain, Philosophy of Nature, 2. 45. Maritain, Science and Wisdom, 62–63; Maritain, A Preface to Metaphysics, 107–25. 46. Maritain, The Degrees of Knowledge, 207–19. 47. Maritain, The Degrees of Knowledge, 214–19; Jacques Maritain, Reflexions sur l’intelligence et sa vie propre (Paris: Librarie Nationale, 1924), 179; Maritain, Existence and the Existent, 31. 48. Maritain, The Degrees of Knowledge, 215–24. 49. Yves Simon, “Maritain’s Philosophy of the Sciences” in Jacques Maritain, Philosophy of Science (New York: Philosophical Library, 1951), 173. 50. Jacques Maritain, The Range of Reason (New York: Scribner’s, 1952), 22–24. 51. Maritain, The Dream of Descartes, 37–41. 52. Jacques Maritain, “The Cultural Impact of Empiricsm,” in An Abundant Spring, the Walter Farrell Memorial Edition of the Thomist (New York: Thomist Press, 1952), 448–66. 53. Raymond Dennehy, “Maritain’s ‘Intellectual Existentialism,’” in Understanding Maritain Philosopher and Friend, ed. Deal W. Hudson and Matthew J. Mancini (Macon: Mercer University Press, 1987), 229. 54. Jacques Maritain, Antimoderne (Paris: Revue des Jeunes, 1922), 32–45; The first use of the word “scientism” is attributed to Le Dantec in 1911. Dictionaire alphabetique et analogique de la langue française (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1951–1970), 358. However, Maritain had already used the term “scientism.” Jacques Maritain, “La Science moderne et la raison,” Revue de philosophic 16 (1910): 575–603. Jacques Maritain, “Science and Ontology,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 5 (June–July 1949): 199; Maritain, “God and Science,” 45, 47. 55. Anatole France, The Opinions of Jerome Coignard, trans. W. Jackson, in The Works of Anatole France, 4 vols. (New York: Gabriel Wells, 1924), vol. 4, 114; Simone Weil, Oppression and Liberty, trans. Arthur Wills and John Petrie (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1955), 37, 38, 47–56; Emmanuel Mounier, Personalism (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1952), 14, 72, 73; Amato, Mounier and Maritain, 57–59.

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56. Henry Massis, Maurras et Notre Temps, vol. 1 (Paris: La Palantiere, 1951), 156–77; Maritain, Carnet des Notes, 179; Henry Bars, Maritain en notre temps (Paris: Grasset, 1959), 373. 57. Amato, Mounier and Maritain, 76. 58. Maritain, “God and Science,” 44, 49, 50; Alfred Stern, “Neo-Thomism and Modern Science,” Engineering and Science (March 1951): 12–14. 59. Maritain, “God and Science,” 46–50, 54. 60. Maritain, The Peasant of the Garonne, 48–49. 61. Maritain, “God and Science,” 44. 62. Jacques Maritain, “The Scientist and the Community” Bulletin of Atomic Scientists 4 (1948): 367. 63. Maritain, “Science and Ontology,” 199–200; Maritain, “God and Science,” 44. 64. Maritain, “The Scientist and the Community,” 367. 65. James Gilbert, Redeeming Culture: American Religion in an Age of Science. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997), 76–81. 66. Jacques Maritain, “Good Will in Science,” New York Times, August 4, 1940, Sec. IV, 7. Maritain was the honorary chairman for a Conference on Science and Freedom in 1953 sponsored by the Congress for Cultural Freedom. The Congress for Cultural Freedom, Science and Freedom (London: Martin, Secker & Warburg, Ltd, 1955); “Morals,” Time Magazine, April 11, 1949. 67. Barre, Jacques and Raissa Maritain, 291. 68. Maritain, “Good Will in Science,” sec IV, 7. 69. Maritain, “Science and God,” 56; Barre, Jacques and Raissa Maritain, 424. 70. Maritain, “Science and God,” 69. 71. Maritain, “Science and God,” 69, 70. 72. Jacques Maritain, “Toward a Thomist Idea of Evolution,” 86–89; Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentes, III., 22. 73. Maritain, “Toward a Thomist Idea of Evolution,” 148. 74. Maritain, “God and Science,” 70, 71. 75. Maritain, The Peasant of the Garonne, 53–63, 118–19, 264–69. 76. Maritain, “Toward a Thomist Idea of Evolution,” 91, 95. It is for similar reasons that he disagrees with Karl Rahner’s excessive reliance on secondary causes to create the human soul, an act that is not possible through secondary causes. 77. Maritain, Peasant of the Garonne, 24–27. 78. Barre, Jacques and Raissa Maritain, 296–97.

3 ✛

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881–1955) and the Operation of the Divine in the Universe Personally, I am convinced that there is no more substantial nourishment for the religious life than contact with scientific realities, if they are properly understood. The man who habitually lives in the society of the elements of the world, who personally experiences the overwhelming immensity of things . . . becomes more acutely conscious than anyone of the tremendous need for unity that continually drives the world ahead and of the fantastic future that awaits it.1

THE QUEST FOR THE ABSOLUTE

U

nlike Jacques Maritain and other Thomist intellectuals, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin believed that modern science must be reconciled with Christianity because the divine operates within and through the evolution of matter. This novel theological vision was a synthesis of Sacred Heart spirituality, Pauline theology, Bergsonian vitalism, evolutionary theory and a cosmic Christology. The objective of this vision was to reconcile the truths of modern science about the physical evolution of the universe with the teachings of the Catholic Church. The path to this novel vision began when Teilhard, at the age of five, witnessed a lock of his hair drift into a fire. The resulting recognition of life’s fragility prompted early and frequent geological investigations of the nearby mountains for indestructible rocks. The failure to discover an unchanging physical substance prompted other searches for the eternal and incorruptible behind the flux of observable matter. The “queen of 57

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substances” must be an object “in which the Essence of Things could be found concentrated.” Instead of focusing on a material substance, the young man, like the ancient Miletian philosophers, searched for a “universal root or matrix of being.”2 The quest for the absolute behind matter was channeled through the very specific circumstances of family, education, region, and religious affiliation. Teilhard confessed, “My self is given to me far more than it is formed by me.” The emotional and spiritual foundation of his large and happy family centered on his formidable parents. His father, Emmanuel, was a man of many interests. He managed the family estate while also serving as the secretary of the Acadamie des Sciences, Belles Lettres et Arts of the twin towns of Clermont-Ferrand. Even in his capacity as an amateur scholar, he balanced interests in biology (ornithology) with being an antiquarian. Thus, as was the case for his son, living and insensate matter were both sources of interest.3 Emmanuel supervised the family routine of attending mass and saying evening prayers with the workers on their estate. Religion was not merely a matter of routine and family unity for Berthe, the devout family matriarch who walked to mass every morning before dawn and personally taught her children the catechism while seated between an oleograph of the Sacred Heart and a statue of the baby Jesus. Teilhard was dedicated at birth by his mother to the Sacred Heart and this devotion became an integral part of his spiritual life. The devotion of the Sacred Heart is a form of special connection to Jesus that centers on an intimate and intense devotion to and recognition of his love for every person.4 Supported by a loving, religious, and intelligent family, Teilhard relentlessly pursued the absolute. From the ages of ten to thirty, the quest shifted several times, from incorruptible matter toward elementary matter, to the currents of physical energy, and finally to the totality of the universe.5 These explorations advanced steadily, regularly discovering new vistas in an emerging vision. Thus, between the ages of ten and thirty, at the heart of my absorbing interests and my secret delights lay a continued and increased contact with the Cosmic “in the solid state.” Already, however, in a semi-subordinate way, there was the newly emerged attraction towards vegetal and animal Nature; and, initiation into the less tangible—but how stimulating!—magnitudes disclosed by the investigation of Physics. On either side of Matter stood Life and Energy: the three columns that supported my interior visions and felicity.6

The search was also guided by his formal education. At age eleven, he was sent for six years to the Jesuit College at Notre Dame de Mongre at Villefranche-sur Saone. Here he was taught that science was to be sanctified by religion and religion was to be served by science. Teilhard’s Jesuit

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education also re-enforced his desire to obtain perfection in a moral and spiritual order that eluded him in the physical world. The Jesuits assisted this objective since they were rigorous, academic, and oriented toward perfecting the best talents of any member.7 Forced from France by a wave of anticlericalism during his juniorate at Laval in 1901, Teilhard resettled on the Isle of Jersey. He struggled with how to reconcile an internal bifurcation between an attraction to nature and the teachings in the Imitation of Christ. He was advised by his novice master that sanctification and intellectual pursuits were compatible. The spiritual anxiety abated and he renewed his interest in geological researches as well as physics and chemistry, the subjects that he would teach in his next assignment at the Holy Family, the Jesuit college in Cairo (1905–1908).8 During his stay in Egypt, Teilhard taught classes in pre-quantum physics while developing a heightened interest in atomic particles. After a subsequent sojourn in England from 1908 to 1911, Teilhard reconsidered some of the issues in the relationship of science and religion.9 His theological studies were “maturing” his reflections on the idea of the pleroma of Paul and Sacred Heart devotions. The idea of the pleroma or fullness of God encompasses the gathering of souls into the mystical body of Christ. Some years later, Teilhard, who would expand the traditional definition, described the concept of pleroma this way: What is the supreme and complex reality for which the divine operation moulds us? It is revealed to us by St. Paul and St. John. It is the quantitative repletion and the qualitative consummation of all things: it is the mysterious Pleroma, in which the substantial one and the created many fuse without confusion in a whole which, without adding anything essential to God, will nevertheless be a sort of triumph and generalization of being.10

The most unusual and ambiguous period in the life of Teilhard was the years before the First World War. He was intellectually adrift and the evidence of the development of his thought in this period is slight and enigmatic. We do know that he read the works of Henri Bergson and evolution “haunted” him like a “an unsatisfied hunger” or “a summons to be answered.”11 The tension between the truths of faith and science are visible in his 1911 article on “l”Homme” in the Dictionaire apologetique de la foi Catholique. It was not obvious who was presenting this article, the loyal servant and representative of the Church or a champion of evolutionary thought. Throughout the article dogmatic and scientific positions were compared, contrasted, and where possible reconciled. The attachment to the dictates of dogma slipped a little when the discussion turned to the relationship of human beings with one another. Still, Modernism as a “religion of progress” was rejected since it merged individuals into a

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collective. This caveat should not prevent the Church from discovering some utility and even providential signs in the improvement of human society, because “peu a peu l’homme se situe mieux dans le monde et l’asservit” (Little by Little man situates himself better in the world and serves it). Perhaps sensing that he was deviating from his mission as a writer on behalf of the entire Church, Teilhard quickly swerved back onto the orthodox track. Human beings were descended from a single couple who committed an original sin.12 If Teilhard’s intellectual and personal trajectory in the years 1911–1914 was ambiguous, the First World War and his service as a stretcher-bearer in the 8th Moroccan Regiment provoked a remarkable transformation. His confidant for many years, Marguerite Teilhard de Chardin, described the impact of the conflict on her cousin. Of the outside events in Pierre Teilhard’s life the war was probably the most decisive of all. It had a profound effect on his whole being. It would not be too much to say . . . that it enabled him to see himself. In any case, it hastened an interior development that would have occurred less rapidly and, maybe, less inexorably, had it not been for circumstances that increased his experience of men, that provided him with an intellectual impetus, and gave a fine temper to his personality.13

He entered the war from a sense of obligation for full and active participation in a momentous event. While most men trembled before the bloody and interminable trench warfare, Teilhard was free of excessive fear and anxiety. He earned two citations, the medaille militaire, and after the war at the request of his old regiment, the Chevalier of the Legion d’Honneur. A caring companion, he shared packages, carried his own pack, and refused any special treatment with the constant refrain of “like the others.”14 The war also advanced Teilhard’s intellectual life. In extended periods of solitude spent in the rear, he reflected on and was exposed to a variety of important literary influences. The impact of Bergson was no longer sub terra. Life “in the Age of Bergson” was not mistaken; it developed in the direction of the good while the poetry of Charles Peguy championed the role of the “earthly cradle of Christ.” His mystical impulses were most inspired by Dante. Here, the divine was anchored in the earthly within a poetic vision. There was also a sense of kinship with Cardinal Newman. The Cardinal was correct in holding that the destiny of the whole world was present in each person. Thus, the primacy of salvation saved a soul in “all its fullness, as far reaching as the universe.” The English prelate’s reconciliation of a love of God with a love of the natural world inspired his imagination.15 While the war nurtured his intellectual and spiritual development, it was also instructive for the general development of humanity. Ener-

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gies beyond the control or grasp of quotidian concerns released and directed each individual soldier toward higher ends in an “almost heart-rending effort toward light and consciousness.” Divine charity insured that human nature was still advancing in the midst of apparent chaos from multiplicity to unity. The war was “mixing and welding together the peoples of the earth in a way that nothing else, perhaps, could have done.”16 The end of the war presented difficulties because the “burning light” of the conflict would soon be extinguished. Human activity would inevitably “become more oppressive and more uninteresting.” The transcending of the commonplace and the conventional would be replaced by “melancholy” and “trivialities.” Still, the forces unleashed by the war might be fulfilled in a peacetime mentality guided by an “intense interior life and vision.”17 After experiencing cycles of unspeakable carnage and profound boredom during the war and the relief and disillusionment of post-war Europe, Teilhard embarked upon a period of exploration and relative freedom of expression. His essay “The Great Monad” was a tentative first step in trying to determine the relationship of matter, particularly in its sentient forms, with the absolute, with God. This vision proceeded from a fervent experience of “the contact and fusion of beings” and ended with the purification and concentration of all matter in “God’s innermost self.” The ultimate direction of this vision was unclear and there were varying explanations for the transformations of matter.18 However uneasily the relationship of the universe and the divine were depicted, their symbiosis was imperative since the natural world and the divine were interactive and mutually supportive dimensions of life. This paradigm operated within theoretical constraints, which held that: 1) natural progress, as well as the supernatural, underlies individual work and renunciation; 2) natural development is subordinated to the kingdom of God; 3) the centre of gravity of human effort gradually shifts toward the concerns of heaven as certain fields of lower activity are left behind or exhausted (it is thus that virginity tends to replace the marital state).19 In this mystical vision, Christ participates in a natural and supernatural consummation of activity. For these reasons, evolution was holy, the consummation of creation. The human body was not, as in some Church formulations, a juridical formulation, but was also a physical and biological unity. The “exclusive task” of the world was the “physical incorporation of the faithful in Christ.” Christ was the end in which all matter was created, vivified, and sanctified.20

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THE MATURE VISION The transition of matter through a critical point and other aspects of the Teilhardian vision remained incomplete in the wake of the war. Soon, the article “The Mass for the World” and the book The Divine Milieu presented a more unified vision. In the month of his death, Teilhard reflected on the importance of these writings for the course of his subsequent thought. It is a long time now since in “La Messe sur le Monde” and Le Milieu Divin, I tried to put into words the admiration and wonder I felt as I confronted perspectives as yet hardly formulated within me. Today, after forty years of constant reflection, it is still exactly the same fundamental vision which I feel the need to set forth and to share, in its mature form, for the last time. With less exuberance and freshness of expression, perhaps, than at my first encounter with it, but still with the same wonder and the same passion.21

In these writings Teilhard distinguished between his views and those of certain Christians and many scientists. There was a desire not to dissolve like the “monist” pantheist into matter or to listen like the scientists only to the “voices of the earth,” but he also rejected a “quietist” Christianity that honored God with prayers and asceticism while it rejected the world. This Christian approach had some merit, but the proper spiritual attitude was not passivity, but constant exertion. Moreover, the doctrines of Christianity should be “interpreted so as to embrace all that is best in the aspirations of our time.”22 The point of integration for religion and science was the divine milieu that inhabited “the abysses of space and time.” This divine milieu is as pervasive as the air.23 The first aspect of the divine milieu encompassed both human action and the pressing of the divine upon the world. A healthy love of God and nature were simultaneously possible. At the heart of our universe, each soul exists for God, in our Lord. But all reality, even material reality, around each one of us, exists for our souls. Hence, all sensible reality, around each one of us, exists, through our souls for God.24

The first part of this syllogism was the least controversial, being a restatement of the Pauline notion of a pleroma or divine outpouring in which there was a “communion of persons” in God. In this process each soul, connected with and operating through sensible realities, was dedicated to Christ and resided within him. The passage of the soul was

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not isolated, but was the recipient of an array of cosmic influences.25 The soul’s path was part of a vast “ontogenesis” (a vast becoming what it is) in which the development of each soul, assisted by the perceptible realities on which it depends, is but a diminished harmonic. Beneath our efforts to put spiritual form into our own lives, the world slowly accumulates, starting with the whole of matter, that which will make of it the Heavenly Jerusalem or the New Earth.26

In the end, one source directed the individual and the collective and thus formed a “single whole.” This evolution did not aim at the salvation of all matter, but only that part of each object that expressed a “spiritual import” into human souls and in the cosmic Christ. Teilhard scripturally and doctrinally justified his acts in terms that might be understood by his religious audience. The force of being and becoming was the Johannine “Word.” The “Word” was a “Power” that was intelligent and breathed its spirit into the “fragile film of matter” that covered the earth. The resultant becoming was not the dream of the pantheists but was “immeasurably lovelier and more desirable than that destructive fusion of which all the pantheists dream.” Indeed, the Word was the power of creation and evolution that was renewing and redeeming all life.27 The entire world, to the extent that it was “subject to Christ’s drawing power in the process of consummation,” became the “instrument” and the “living extension” of God. This joint effort of humanity and the divine “sur-animates” existence and introduced a “higher principle of unity” into life. Matter provided the occasion for the divine realization and was “the common, universal, tangible setting, infinitely shifting and varied, in which we live.” Objects were only “transparencies” in which the divine was mirrored. These objects were thus to be loved, used, and absorbed, but their loss at any moment was not a disconnection from the ultimate reality, because “everything is God to me and everything is dust to me.”28 The process of creation operating through matter is assisted by the eternal feminine, the principle of wisdom active in the world. The eternal feminine is an inner principle within matter that is an alluring force that joins disparate things. It also is a force for developing the beauty within this joining process. The Virgin Mary is an exemplar of this principle operating in the world and a lure to God to dwell in his creation.29 In this process of creation, there was in matter a paradox. Matter was a zone of “material and carnal sense” that made us “heavy” and paralyzed” since it led to death, but the zone of matter also provided a “spiritual sense” through “physical exuberance, ennobling contact, virile effort and the joy of growth.” Teilhard observed that God was “at the tip of my pen,

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my spade, my brush, my needle-of my heart and of my thought” because there was a divine pressing of things to their “ultimate natural finish.” The passage between the physical and spiritual dimensions was fluid and shifting, depending on the particular context of the individual.30 The spiritual dimension of matter was advanced by the rituals of Catholicism. On the bloody fields of France and the isolated steppes of China, the Catholic mass was reinterpreted as the “symbols” of bread and wine in the mass were offered upon the altar of the earth for “all the labours and sufferings of the world.” The blood of the mass represented the death and diminishment that was essential to “the growth of the world borne ever onwards in the stream of universal becoming.” The Eucharist not only sanctified matter, but extended a divine influence over the “ambience” of the faithful by plunging them into the divine milieu.31 Assisted by the Church and its rituals, human activities and the processes of matter cooperated in an evolution toward an “ideal of higher spiritual content” beyond our quotidian concerns. The more nobly a man wills and acts, the more avid he becomes for great avenues to pursue. He will no longer be content with family, country and the remunerative aspect of his work. He will want wider organizations to create, new paths to blaze, causes to uphold, truths to discover, an ideal to cherish and defend. So, gradually, the worker no longer belongs to himself. Little by little, the great breath of the universe has insinuated itself into him through the fissure of his humble, but faithful action, has broadened him, raised him up, borne him on.32

What was the proper human response to the movement of matter and the divine? The first was to pray for greater recognition of the divine in these acts. The inspiration of this transcendent reality was not to be stifled or distorted by human actions. Moreover, no opportunity at “the level of the spirit” was to be lost. “Inward development” and “outward success” were united in order to reach “the exact point where the whole sum of the forces of the universe meet together in a person to achieve the effect which God desires.”33 These human actions were subject to certain forces of passivity. The “passivities of growth” imposed certain gratuitous, mysterious, and largely unfathomable experiences on conscious human existence. In the mystery of these life experiences, one divine hand grasped the mind tightly in order to merge humanity with the sources of life and the other divine hand embraced the whole of the universe and its creative evolution. The “passivities of diminishment” were experiences of ill fortune that invaded each life. Internal diminishments resulted from our weaknesses and limitations that became “lodged in the very heart of our lives.” These misfortunes often resulted in the loss of external objects, but this

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loss was not particularly frightening since each person could imagine regaining these entities. 34 More seriously, the passage of time resulted in the most inexorable of evils, death. It spreads the evil of disorder, which can be reversed, however, by and through Christ who divinized the end of life. The diminishment of death was also necessary because God needed to “hollow” us in order to occupy us. From our perspective, the spending of all human energy in this world allows us to accept the final will of God. There were also moral diminishments and these diminishments, like the rest of the physical universe, were redeemable because “everything is capable of being good.”35 Like an artist who is able to make use of a fault or an impurity in the stone he is sculpting or the bronze he is casting so as to produce more exquisite lines or a more beautiful tone, God, without sparing us the partial deaths, nor the final death, which forms an integral part of our lives, transfigures them by integrating them in a better plan—provided we lovingly trust in him. Not only our unavoidable ills but our faults, even our most deliberate ones, can be embraced in that transformation, provided always we repent of them.36

While struggling with the passivities, each person must seek to connect the internal of their being with the external of the universe. The internal and external were not connected by a soul, because the soul was immaterial and independent of matter. The connecting factor for matter and life was energy. There was a “tangential energy” which linked an object with all the other objects of the same order and a “radial energy” that drew an object “towards ever greater complexity and centricity” (i.e., toward the internal and the spiritual). The two forms of energy supported and complemented one another. Tangential energy allowed an object to attain greater material complexity that in turn augmented its radial energy. This increase of the tangential only became appreciable in human beings where there were heightened levels of radial energy. The connection of these forms of energy was essential to achieve the ultimate end of the development of life. This process began in the epoch of pre-life, the interaction of radial and tangential energies over enormous stretches of time that transformed matter into crystals and then into more complex polymers. Tangential energy was primary and radial energy was a junior partner in this period. Nonetheless, the forces of synthesis in matter were present as the “tension of internal freedoms begins to rise.”37 The internal and the external forms of energy thus formed a single reality in a Spiritual perfection (“centreity”) and material synthesis (“complexity”) and were but “two aspects or connected parts of one and the same phenomenon.” They advanced symbiotically with the passage of a Bergsonian duration toward ever-greater complexification, and the greater the complexity of the material form, then the higher the level of consciousness.

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This complexification process occurred in a “special envelope” on the surface of the earth.38 Human life was a final stage of this “complexification” that began when molecules were reconfigured into living cells. The development of the cell in protoplasm was a decisive and unique moment of germination that initiated a biosphere, the transformation from pre-life to life. The surface of the planet was eventually teeming with organisms. Life then rapidly spread in a “pluralization of form and matter.” This multiplication of forms was possible because the cells were “diffracted” and variegated through reproduction and association.39 In the vertical growth of organisms, there were dimensions supplied to the existing forms of life through an “addivity.” With these additions, the forms continued to rise toward ever more complex and improbable types of life. This “orthogenesis” insured an ascent of life producing a “profusion,” a “struggle for life.” The resulting multiplicity of forms increased the chances for survival and for progress through “directed chance” that aimed at higher levels of association that ended with human life.40 At the apex of this process, the “within” in the form of consciousness was beginning to dominate the human form. Anatomically, our differences with other animals was slight, but the within in our species developed a consciousness that opened a large gulf between homo sapiens and our closest relatives, other primates. The differences in the tangential energy in the refined nervous systems of the human being allowed a radical increase in radial energy. The resulting rise in consciousness placed humanity at the forefront of evolution. A person not only knew, but he or she knew that they knew. Consciousness in its human form thus turned in upon itself and worked in conjunction with the other physical refinements of the human body such as the prehensile hands, being a biped, etc., to maximize “cerebralization.”41 Hominids through cerebralization could pass on traditions, as well as systems of thought and culture, through countless generations. This transmission was a hominization, the “leap from instinct to thought.” Hominization incorporated the advances of human civilization which spiritualized “all the forces contained in the animal world.” This advance in knowledge pushed the layers of geogenesis and biogenesis toward “noogenesis,” a sphere of thought. Sparks flew as the glow of conscious reflection inundated the globe. Noogenesis reached its peak in the West, because it was here that reason was harnessed to facts and religion to action.42 Teilhard’s schemata provided a different meaning for evolution. The traditional explanations held that either evolution aimed at a “super soul above our souls” or it was the “stifled, still-born product” of an “absurd universe.” The former view of so many traditional religious formulations

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did not end the difficulties of human choice. Collective or individual isolation could be seductive and it prevented the necessary “psychic interpenetrability” that resulted in “bundles” of “radial energies” that were necessary for a cosmogenesis.43 In the alternative, hominization might have adopted scientific positions that were indifferent or antagonistic to any transcendent possibilities as it sought knowledge for its own sake and, more importantly, for action. Humanity, through genetic research, was at the point of “grasping the very mainspring of evolution, seizing the tiller of the world.” Science could not grasp how to value each element “by grouping them in the unity of an organized ringwhole.” If there was no telos, then humanity was merely plunged back into matter by a “modern pantheism.” Alternatively, human beings might redirect the superabundance of mind toward producing only matter as in the totalitarian states.44 In rejecting the futile avenues of materialism, the metaphysics of evolution directed humanity through energy and consciousness toward the world’s Omega point. The Omega point was a vital and immanent presence of the divine that drew the world toward its appropriate end. It was immanent for otherwise humanity would not know of its existence until the moment of unification.45 The impulse to reach the Omega point might have appeared as an impersonal process. The truth, however, was only reached by a “hyperpersonalization,” a reflection of a being upon itself. This movement of the psychic centering of the universe on itself was marked in the human heart by love. In this centering, the reflective dimension of humanity associated the personal with the universal. Consciousness became not merely the concentration of an object on itself, but was also the concentration of a center with all other centers around it. The result was that the “Universal and the Personal (that is to say the centered) grew in the same direction and culminated simultaneously in each other.” In the unification of the universal and the personal through the attraction of the Omega Point, a series of evolutionary stages concluded in a final eschaton. Humanity transcended the bonds of matter and even death as the radial energy escaped from the tangential energy. Through the “synthesizing action of a personalizing union,” the noosphere reached its point of final convergence in the Omega point.46

CULTURAL CHALLENGES The path to the Omega point would integrate religion and science and would transform the world, but there were potential problems. What would be the relationship of the Teilhardian vision to other cultures?

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The traveling priest was aware of the diversity of the human aspiration for unity, but his early reflections on other cultures were not particularly sympathetic. The West was the most advanced in its drive to unity while the Muslim denial of rights to women must “be swept away.” Hindus practiced a “numbing” and “deadening religion.” In general, the “Eastern option” foreclosed “constructive activity” in the world. When traveling to China in 1923, he described the Chinese with adjectives such as “turbid,” “vague,” or “materialistic.” By 1926, the Chinese were perceived as having possibilities, as being “unrisen dough” capable of advancement. In 1929, he invited Chinese scientists into all aspects of his scientific researches.47 Still, “the Eastern option” as late as 1932 was described as a threat to the advancement of the consciousness of humanity, because Eastern religions rejected the material world and the concept of temporal progress. These ideas had infiltrated the West and were sapping its vitality. Ultimately, the Eastern path offered only negation and the “total death of constructive activity.”48 In an article in 1947, “The Spiritual Contribution of the Far East,” Teilhard wrote a much more nuanced appraisal. He no longer perceived the Eastern perspective as monolithic. India expressed a metaphysical sense of the divine while China focused on the naturalistic and practical sense of the human and Japan displayed a heroic sense of the collective. These varied positions were pieces of a complex mosaic that was necessary for the evolution of man. They had not converged into a viable whole, however, and the West must guide the East on the proper path to unification. Hence, other cultures should modify and adopt the humanism of the West, which, although “badly formulated in theory,” was “young, original and forceful.”49 All cultures, East and West, would have to engage a tide of technological advancement. Human beings, with their dramatic increases in consciousness, had contributed to the technical complexification of the world and provided an “almost unlimited power of disposition over matter.” Humanity would reconstruct the very “fabric” of the universe. With a prescient insight, Teilhard suspected that this rewriting would be biological, perhaps through the manipulation of chromosomes. Humanity also contributed through industrial technologies to a rise in the consciousness of the species. Machines represented more than “a mechanical deadweight on our shoulders, but rather the sum of processes combined reflectively in such a way as to preserve in men the state of consciousness.”50 Teilhard’s opinion on factory labor contrasted with most twentiethcentury cultural observers, like Simone Weil, who viewed the advance of the industrial world as often deadening the possibilities of human reflection. Teilhard was sympathetic to the plight of factory workers for he had once ministered to them. Nonetheless, productivity provided human

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society with more leisure and the additional time for leisure promoted an advance in psychic energies, and therefore, there were long-term benefits from industrial technologies.51 Technological advances also annealed an increasing complexification in the world. The drive for discovery was innate because human beings were possessed by the “demon of discovery.” Technologies were but one manifestation of this internal drive. Novel inventions allowed for an incarnation of the mind in the world that is communicated to other human beings. Such technologies required, however, a careful stewardship. There must be principles to guide this capacity, because materialism and spirituality battled for control. For example, Marxism presented a false materialism as a guide and promoted an excessive reliance on organization at the expense of the spiritual dimension of the individual.52 In contrast to Marxism, the spirit of Christianity focused human consciousness on the divine center that did not disorder human priorities by excessively privileging organization. The question for the spiritual life was how to permit the evolution of humanity from “manual work to the work of the heart.” It was not self-evident how to achieve this transformation. The priesthood must accept a role in a process of reorienting humanity to psychic renewal and growth. Support for priests in this human transformation was to be generated by family, friends, and other advocates of “the progress of earthly reality.” The latter group included those who were employed in “office, laboratory and factory.” Together, they would employ technology to expand human consciousness in the push toward the Omega point.53 In this transformation, the “old tumble-down huts” of local cultures must yield to global forms of industrial organization. To this end money and resources must also be directed to pure scientific research that would yield to a global form of organization, that of cosmogenesis. In order to fund this process, governments must reduce wasteful military expenditures as governmental resources are redirected toward “giant telescopes and atom smashers,” which “would absorb more money and excite more spontaneous admiration than all the bombs and cannons put together.”54 This phase of culture would reveal how, why, where, and when the age of noogenesis was coming to fruition. This new age of scientific research and the development of the “ultra-human” would explore the development of political, economic, intellectual and social concentrations that were essential to the refining of human life. In the end, humanity would revise its objectives and institutional arrangements in view of the interconnected and global aspects of the quest for unity. This cultural unity was not the consequence of coercion, for coercion would only yield a “superficial pseudo-unity.” Unification was only effective if it is the result of a voluntary unanimity, because voluntarism was essential to transforming

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a person and extending the “psychogenesis” of the species. In the end, humanity would revise its objectives and institutional arrangements in view of the interconnected and global aspects of the quest for unity.55 The protection of the individual personality in this process of unanimity highlighted the advantage of democratic political systems with a “common vision,” a mutually accepted body of knowledge. The universality of this body of knowledge was assisted by educational reforms directed toward the sharpening of reflection, increased consciousness, and the rapid transmission of forms of knowledge. The teaching of a common vision and action, however, were insufficient in themselves. This unity was too objective and detached to be matched to the needs of the human soul. A final unity required the “centres” of humanity be connected through a “universal, mutual love” in a “single, super-centre common to all.”56 A fundamental unity inspired by a divine love guiding human evolution had profound implications for cultural processes. Universal love, in the proper form of unanimity, favored directing human energy toward peaceful research advancing consciousness. This love allowed the world to transcend the “boredom” resulting from the leisure flowing from heightened human capacities. Human beings, with too much time on their hands, were often prone to pursue selfish or prurient ends.57 In this technological vision of culture, change was also an intrinsic feature of religious doctrines. The spiritual dimensions of the Teilhardian vision sought to integrate Christian thought with science and particularly evolutionary theory. Revelation was “reconsidered” in the context of additional data about the natural world from the scientific disciplines. Old theological concepts would be reformulated as Christology, salvation, the fall of man, and original sin are conceived as part of an evolutionary progression toward a human unification with the divine on the level of consciousness.58

THE PROBLEM OF BEING BETWEEN RELIGION AND SCIENCE Despite his protestations of orthodoxy in The Divine Milieu and The Phenomenon of Man, Teilhard’s reformulating of traditional concepts in an evolutionary theology was very different from most of Catholic theology between the Vatican Councils. His critics asserted that there was less of a direct connection with Thomas Aquinas, like Lonergan or Maritain, or allegiance to less favored, but nonetheless traditional frameworks, such as the contemplation of Thomas Merton. His apologists like Henri de Lubac and Christopher Mooney who have highlighted his roots in the Catholic theological tradition have countered the claims of the critics. De Lubac, his most famous defender, observed

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that Teilhard had an inner vision that combined his scientific perspective with an inner mystical connection. He was always attempting to reconcile this vision with the external teachings, dogmas, and institutional structures of the Church. The tradition of the Church was the rich soil in which his vision could grow and be fruitful. De Lubac observed, “If this bold Christian (Teilhard de Chardin), as has been said, came close to the edge of the precipice, it was his roots in tradition held firmly in place by his choice of unswerving fidelity, that saved him from a fall.”59 A revised theology also had implications for ecclesiology. Teilhard’s ecclesiology adopted controversial positions about the mission and authority of the Catholic Church and its relationship to other churches and the broader world. Employing a conflict analysis based on the historical consensus of his age, Teilhard dated the separation of the Church and the secular world to the Renaissance when the patronage of the sciences began to separate from the Church. The fault lies primarily with the Church for this separation because of “all the infantile maledictions pronounced by Churchmen against new ideas!” The Church’s reluctance to accept the advance of the sciences reflects an erroneous approach that did not fully engage the world as an instrument for the salvation of all. Fundamentally, the Church must stop viewing the world as a negative reality, a destructor of the golden age of Christendom. His new approach was not the half-hearted efforts at a tepid tolerance demonstrated by others in the Church that aimed at protecting an institutional identity. Instead, the Church should adopt a mission of reconciliation to and acceptance of the world. For its part, the world needed the Church because otherwise its aspirations at transcendence would remain distressingly “vague and aimless.” The Church must take these vague aspirations of the world and consciously direct them toward their ultimate ends.60 The failure of fully engaging the world and its aspirations is a denial of the incarnation’s role in the Church. The Church must, like Christ, enter the world, die to its collective self, and sanctify worldly needs and aspirations. Thus, the salvation of Christ is extended through the incarnation to the entire physical world. The rituals of the Church such as the Eucharist already perform a small transformation of matter into a cosmic and spiritual role. How this transformation in the Eucharistic host can be extended to all of creation and consecrated by the Church can be imagined and observed within matter. For example, the flowing out of the divine from the Eucharist and back to Christ is imaginatively presented in a short work, “The Monstrance.” In “The Monstrance” a friend relates to the narrator a mystical vision in which he observed the spreading of the divine from the Eucharist into the world. From the host came waves of a white substance that enveloped everything and the world became “like a giant host.” The flowing host gave life to everything and purified everything

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before returning to its original form. This story reveals Teilhard’s conviction that the divine was present and purifying composite substances in an analogous way to that of the Eucharist. In sum, the Church is “the body where materiality encounters revelation and is transformed by it.”61 Not only does he employ novel formulations of traditional concepts like incarnation, etc., but the Teilhardian synthesis also implicitly challenged the role of the magisterium. The course and end of history was no longer revealed through the teaching authority of the Church. Indeed, by the First World War, he confessed to an “attraction to this spiritualized form of religion,” a faith contained “entirely in the heart and will” that questioned specific theological doctrines such as original sin. 62 While his ideas were novel, they lacked key traits associated with the Modernists. Teilhard did not historicize Christ and he cared little for Biblical controversies. The young Jesuit also valued the transcendence and grandeur of Jesus, whose humanity should be elevated to a cosmic stature. Jesus was the vessel of the Pauline pleroma in whom “all things consist,” who “fills all things,” and “who is in all.” These mystical and devotional dimensions of Teilhard found few corresponding voices among the Modernists.63 In addition, Teilhard differed from the Modernists in affirming a unique deposit of faith in the Church that was confirmed in his visit to Rome in 1948 where he was heartened by the “unique,” “remarkable,” and “unshakeable solidity” of Christian faith and truth. Rome was the focus of an extraordinary “spiritual radiation” flowing from the almost 2,000 years of Christian history. The Catholic Church with its theology of incarnation is ultimately the point of convergence of all the forces pushing toward the Omega point—the unity with God. Teilhard does not call for a radical reformulation of the ecclesiology of the Church, but for a new sense of its traditions and the organic development of dogma. The truths of the Church, including the key principle at its center that Christ will physically gather together all souls, will present new aspects as humanity becomes more aware of its history and environment.64 Although the Church does its task imperfectly as it reflects the imperfection of humanity to completely express the absolute richness and form of Christ, it is the “most perfect approximation” to truth available to humanity. Hence, while it might be tempting to resist the imperfection of the Church by withdrawing from its institutions and seeking theological perfection on one’s own, this would be a mistake. Hence individuals outside of Catholicism or even Christianity can recognize and love Christ, but they lack the participation in the unity of a body which reacts vitally as an organic whole to the combined forces of Christ and mankind.”65 These differences with Modernism and positive accounts of the role of the Church did not assuage official concerns. There were criticisms of his

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methodology that ignored scholastic philosophy and deductions from first principles. He countered, “It seems to me impossible to concede that revelation should have come to release us from the duty of pursuit; and in the grave defect (or rather temptation) of ‘extrinicism’ from which churchmen suffer (in wanting to make theological and a priori judgments about all reality).” The official Thomism was particularly galling since scholastic formulas were the “only way to get an idea in circulation.” Despite his anxieties, Teilhard often expressed a desire for reconciliation and integration. A convergence might be possible, because the secular and the sacred “run together in the end.” He hoped to discover an orthodox formula in which to express this integration. He mused that perhaps he only needed to distinguish his thought and the philosophia perennis and supplement the latter. Moreover, he agreed that the Church must not concede too much in its engagement with the secular world. Contact with science could not justify pantheism or do violence to Church dogmas. These dogmas insured that obedience to the will of God spiritualized desires and affections. 66 In his path between religion and science, there must also be a prudential judgment regarding how quickly to force the hand of the Church. His reflections resulted in a formula that guided the remainder of his career. I hope never to do anything against the Church outside of which I can see no current having any chance of success. . . . I shall remain absolutely myself, because the further I go the more I love and respect nothing but the truthand also because the worst that could happen to me would be to be sent off to one of those distant shores where I would ask nothing better than to work and do research.67

The formula for principled and loyal dissent was easier to state than accept. After the First World War, Teilhard embarked on a course of writings and lectures that increasingly aroused the suspicion of the Church. A paper on original sin by Teilhard mysteriously found its way to Rome and the Vatican then denounced his theory of evolution with its unsettling theological implications. He signed documents in 1924 and 1925 affirming traditional teachings on six propositions on original sin. His loyalty to his order and Rome had conflicted with his duty to follow the truth, but remembering the advice of his mentor, Edouard Le Roy, to separate external and internal acceptance, he had reluctantly acceded to the commands of his superiors.68 Following this affirmation, the Church authorities assigned him to China and requested that he limit his writings to scientific publications. He accepted this request with some anxiety, but there were important consolations since he loved field research. As long as there were regular visits to Paris and he maintained his scientific contacts in Europe, he was

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content to contribute to the “sacred” duty of field research. He was “little affected” by the news of his final severance from the Institut Catholique in Paris because he had rediscovered a “zone of serenity” in which the distant machinations of the Vatican were nothing compared to the possibilities of the universe.69 This was neither the first nor the last time Teilhard would make a tactical decision to retreat and accept Church discipline. He became quite adept in times of crisis at reaffirming his obedience and devotion to the Church and begged the indulgence and protection of his order while he marshaled the aid and advice of friends. In times of tension, he often embarked for distant shores, concentrated on scientific projects, and generally lowered his profile on controversial issues. This “softening” procedure lessened his punishments.70 The difficult dance with Church authority initiated in the 1920s continued for the next three decades. A leery Church minimized his opportunities to infect others. His delicate position was sometimes aggravated by well-wishers and misleading or false accounts of his positions. For example, there were misguided newspaper accounts of his “Darwinian” position in a visit to America in 1937. Following this article, the offer of an honorary degree at Boston College was revoked.71 The official relationship with the Vatican was constantly strained, but there were some nuances in the shadow boxing. The acts of his opponents were often indirect and operated through delay or indirection. Within the curial fogs, it was difficult to discover who and what was the real problem. In a 1948 visit to Rome, Teilhard was treated politely and he exchanged pleasant conversation with the staunch Thomist Reginald GarrigouLagrange. At the end of the trip, there was only a confirmation, however, that he could neither teach nor publish. While this polite, but firm rebuff was disappointing, there were limits to what could be done by the curia. While he dismissed the theology of Teilhard, Pius XII assured a French diplomat that his fellow citizen would never be condemned while he was pontiff.72 The limited papal protection was not a suggestion of agreement. Pius XII’s encyclical Humani Generis (1950) completely rejected the Teilhardian position on evolution. Teilhard was furious and he accused the encyclical of exhibiting a “masochism and sadism of orthodoxy.” The encyclical appeared to require the faithful to “swallow the truth under its crudest and stupidest forms.” The Church failed to recognize that the theories of relativity and evolution were as critical to understanding God as the constant refinement of dogmas.73 While accepting these disciplinary measures, Teilhard developed other ways to have his message heard. He mimeographed brochures for close friends and accepted invitations to lecture at universities, secular foundations, and other scientific associations. He accepted memberships in pres-

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tigious academic organizations. There were numerous private meetings arranged by friends with colleagues. The result of these varied forms of communications was that Teilhard’s notoriety continued to spread despite the restrictions. A student on retreat with Teilhard in 1925, Jacques Perret, who would later become a professor at the Sorbonne, recalled the startling impact of the retreat master’s call to recognize the connection of the world and faith. Far from being a peripheral zone of Christian activity, far from having to be justified as a concession made by the Church to our weakness, activity on the human level-work in the world-was presented to us as the most immediate realization of God’s will, the extension of his most central designs for the world. The dovetailing of all this with the most exacting spiritual ideals, and with the most deeply personal love of Jesus Christ, was for me and for many of us, a great awakening.74

Teilhard continually sought openings with the secular world because the “integration of science, philosophy and religion is bound to come.”75 The proposal of an integrated vision was designed to avoid the historical conflict between the “neo-humanism” of science and a “`classic’ formulation” of Christianity. The hostility between these formulations was “the underlying source of all of today’s religious disquiet.” In Augustine, Aquinas, Bossuet, and even Pascal, the bonds of humanity were only theoretical or juridical. The classical Christian position must be abandoned since it falsely assumed that the objects of nature were perfect, static, and to be restored to God by “intellectual obedience and temperance.” The individual salvation motif discouraged many scholars who were interested in nature and humanity. Pascal was the perfect example of a Christian whose piety eventually rejected scientific and mathematical research as a waste of time. Moreover, the pessimism of Pascal was mirrored by many in the Church who discovered only silence instead of the creative energy of God in the universe.76 Teilhard’s foundational problem was that he sought an integration of religion and science that was fundamentally in opposition to the epistemological, metaphysical, and cosmological assumptions of the Church during his life. Teilhard wanted the scholastic method to be scrapped and the magisterium to be developed according to a more complex inquiry that recognized the organic and evolutionary character of life. Scientific categories such as complexification and evolution were to be integrated with Christian metaphysical explanations. Hence, dogmatic formulas incorporating science “will necessarily assume a continually new aspect as man becomes more conscious of his past and environment.”77 In The Divine Milieu, he asserted that the Church needed this new path because it was deadened by an adherence to “convention” and

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not “conviction.” Unlike the humanists who were confidently marching to save the world, Catholics had lowered expectations, because of a pessimism that feared anything new. Christianity and secular thought did not have to remain in a polar opposition. Secular aspirations were “in essence religious, which make the men of today feel so strongly the immensity of the world, the greatness of the mind and sacred value of every new truth.” If the Church failed to engage the humanity of the contemporary world on its own terms, however, the result would be an artificial constraint on the divinizing task of the faithful.78 Assuming it awakens in time, the Church could guide humanity from anthropogenesis to its consummation in the Christogenesis of the Omega point. The Church would become the axis on which the bundles of human activity converged in their consummation in the cosmic Christ. The sap of the faith must rise to meet this challenge and be led by a new Ignatius or Saint Francis. The Church could thus bring the world within the embrace and guidance of the faith.79 In this task, the Church must incorporate a new humanism, which employed a “phenomenal” approach that recognized the convergences of energies in the world. Christianity should be synonymous with an optimistic advance of the world.80 To creatively shape the evolving advance or “planetization” of life, Christianity must recognize the value of research. This “vital human function” would become the creative fulcrum of the modern world. It harnessed the capacities, resources, and energies of the current age to its ends. Research was what “really matters in the world” and was the “form in which the creative power of God is hidden and operates most intensely.” Research increased complexity and consciousness while it directed the world toward the Omega point, the cosmic Christ.81 In turning from a religious to a scientific audience, could Teilhard integrate his religious vision with existing scientific theories? This was a difficult move because of the anxiety of many scientists about religion. While aware of the sensitivities of many of his scientific colleagues to religion, Teilhard nonetheless had a mission to bring them to God. In an interview, he stated, “St. Francis Xavier, as you know, had his Indes to evangelize, well, my Indes are the field of modern scientists. What an immense multitude of souls in search of God, if only someone would come to their aid and show the way to him.”82 This mission required some guile. Having collaborated with many scientists on their projects and discoveries, he knew their fears about religion. He would explain his vision in a nonthreatening scientific idiom when possible and, on other occasions, he deployed either scientific or new terms that incorporated both the findings of science and the revelation of religion. In his concluding chapters in The Phenomenon of Man,

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Teilhard concluded that his scientific colleagues need not fear the “r” word because religion 1) Through its being rooted in the past and a ceaseless development exhibited the characteristics of a phylum; 2) As a phylum, it followed an ascent of consciousness towards a synthesis based on love that progressed precisely in the direction presumed for the leading-shoot of biogenesis; 3) In the impetus which guided and sustained its advance implied essentially a consciousness of being in a vital relationship with a spiritual and transcendent pole of universal convergence.83 While defending a tentative but increasing unity in the realm of religious beliefs, Teilhard observed that the unification impulse was also present in the evolutionary processes of geology and biology. Eschewing religious terms or assumptions, he focused on the evidence of increasing unification. Scientists had not observed this increasing unity because they were experts on the specific and the concrete, but lacked the breadth and depth necessary to comprehend the full metaphysical implications of the natural world. For example, geologists studied levels in the sediment and the evolution of the earth, but they were blissfully indifferent or unaware of the final concentric sphere on the earth, the realm of human life. Similarly, the human sciences of economics and politics remained unaware that human beings were “hyper-biological-phenomena of a surprisingly high degree of organization.”84 These diverse sciences should be united in a comprehensive study of the human person. For their part, scientists should accept “the primacy of Spirit” operating in their research and directing their efforts toward the Omega point. The spiritual dimension of life might not be as problematic as was often assumed by the scientific community. The scientific life devoted to human “well being” and the spiritual objective of “fuller being” in religion were complementary, not exclusive objectives.85 This uniting of religious and scientific impulses contributed to a two-part “cycle” which led circuitously, but inevitably, to the Omega point. The first portion of the cycle is the modern scientific project, a Baconian disassembling and recognition of the parts of nature. The constituent parts of nature must be grasped before there was any understanding of the totality of natural operations. This analytical approach eventually reduced, through many stages, the natural world to inanimate matter, cells, and the basic forms of energy animating the world. Experiment and theory would then adumbrate the more complex forms that evolved from the “statistical laws of large numbers and chance.” For many scientists the resulting “cluster” of evolutionary laws progressively eliminated the existence of the Godhead, morality,

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feelings, etc. Scientific procedures were animated by a faith that humanity, without religion, could “read the secret, track down the source” of nature and its operations.86 With this approach, science discovered only “the extreme lower limits of the real.” There was a higher unity of “concentration,” however, that was missed by a purely materialistic analysis. The absolute and the intelligible at the center of the universe advanced to a point of unity over time. In order to achieve this concentration, humanity must act as “conscious collaborators in a Creation which was still going on in us, in order to lead us, . . . to a goal (even on earth) much more lofty and distant than we imagined.”87 Any pure scientific materialism, unlike its Christian counterpart, could not achieve “valorisation” or “amorisation.” The Christian valorisation guaranteed a sensible world where human labor was “irreversible” and “cannot be lost.” The rationalization of the world through a valorisation unleashed the spiritual and unifying energy of love (amorisation) of the Omega point so that the world was explainable, directed, and good.88 The optimism of Teilhard in his depiction of a future Christianity did not make him blind to the challenges of the twin integrating forces of science and religion. If their respective positions were modified through persuasive discourse, however, the path to a luminous future was open. Thus it is, I believe that the incorporation and assimilation by Christian thought of modern evolutionary views is sufficient to break down the barrier that for four centuries has been continually rising between reason and faith. Once the immobilist obstacle has been removed there is nothing in the future to prevent Catholics and non-Catholics from advancing together, hand in hand, along the highways of discovery. Today frank collaboration on both sides has become possible.89

Thus, the advances of the world were beneficial stages in initiating the journey, but they must be submitted to a conversion, a “sort of reversal, a turning about, an excentration.” Scientists should accept this integration because the center of the universe could not ultimately be reached by serving some “earthly cause however great.” The result of a true cooperation would be an “ultra-evolution” in which all intellectual seekers, religious and secular, attempted to “super live” to force the ultimate stage of life.90

NOTES 1. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Science and Christ (New York: Harper and Row, 1969), 36.

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2. Teilhard, “The Heart of Matter,” 17–20, 197–98; Cuenot, Teilhard de Chardin, trans. Vincent Colimore and Rene Hague (Baltimore: Helicon Press, 1965) 3; Henri Bremond, Le charme d’Athenes (Paris: Bloud & Gay, 1953), 163–66. 3. Robert Speaight, Teilhard de Chardin: A Biography (London: Collins, 1967), 21. There was also a theme in Auvergne folklore that applies to Teilhard. The protagonists of numerous folk tales searched for the one eternal truth, object, etc., amidst the flux of human reality. The discovery of the eternal entity resulted in the wounding of the protagonist who either abandoned the secret or remained alone with its reality for the remainder of his life. Mary Lukas and Ellen Lukas, Teilhard (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1977), 13–15. 4. Speaight, Teilhard, 20–24; Claude Cuenot, Teilhard de Chardin, 1, 2; Teilhard, “Letter to His Parents” (May 23, 1910), in Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Letters From Hastings (New York: Herder & Herder, 1968), 97. 5. Teilhard, “My Universe,” 198. 6. Teilhard, “The Heart of Matter,” 21, 22. 7. Cuenot, Teilhard de Chardin, 4–5; Speaight, Teilhard, 26–30. 8. Cuenot, Teilhard de Chardin, 6–8. 9. Henri de Lubac, “Avant-Propos,” in Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Lettres de Egypte 1905–1908 (Aubier: Editions Montaigne, 1963), 7–8; Speaight, Teilhard, 37–38; Teilhard, “Letter to His Parents,” in Teilhard, Letters From Hastings (October 11, 1910), 118; (June 13, 1910) 98; Henri de Lubac, “Introduction,” in Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Letters from Hastings (New York: Herder and Herder, 1968), 5–10. In England, he also furthered his geological and botanical knowledge and met a local geologist, Charles Dawson, who invited him to participate in a number of expeditions including one that discovered portions of the notorious Piltdown man. The Piltdown man was a fabricated skull and related bones which were discovered in 1913 in an expedition by Dawson. The recovered artifacts were proven to be a hoax in 1950. Teilhard discovered a tooth belonging to the Piltdown man in August of 1913. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “Letter to His Parents” (August 15, 1913), in Teilhard, Letters From Paris, 98. 10. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 122. 11. Teilhard, “The Heart of Matter,” 25. There were significant differences with Bergson. For example, the creative union of Teilhard was a convergence to a point and not a divergence from a central source. Teilhard, “Creative Union,” in Teilhard, Writings in Time of War, 157; Teilhard, “Letter to Leontine Zanta” (April 3, 1930), in Teilhard, Letters to Leontine Zanta, 102–4. 12. Teilhard, “L’homme,” in Dictionnaire apologétique de la foi Catholique (Lille: Desclee de Brouwer, 1910), col. 503, 504. 13. Marguerite Teilhard-Chambon, “The Great War,” in Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, The Making of a Mind, trans. Rene Hague (New York: Harper & Row, 1961), 23. 14. On Teilhard’s military citations, see Teilhard, The Making of a Mind, 29–32, 41. 15. Speaight, Teilhard, 68–71; Teilhard, “Letter to His Parents” (October 8, 1911), in Teilhard, Letters From Hastings, 169; See also Teilhard, “Letter to Marguerite Teilhard-Chambon,” in Teilhard, The Making of a Mind (March 27, 1916), 159; (January 1, 1917) 167; (January 9, 1917) 167; (October 13, 1917) 217; (September 12, 1918) 236.

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16. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “Nostalgia for the Front,” in The Heart of Matter, 177, 178; Teilhard, “Letter to Marguerite Teilhard-Chambon,” in Teilhard, The Making of a Mind (November 2, 1916), 140; (October 7, 1915) 73; (August 14, 1917) 202; (September 23, 1917) 203. There was in the Second World War a similar sense that the evolutionary advance of the world was not limited by the war. Teilhard, “Letter to Bruno de Solages” (July 11, 1941), in Teilhard, Lettres Intimes, 311–14. 17. Teilhard, “Letter to Marguerite Teilhard-Chambon,” in Teilhard, The Making of a Mind (November 13, 1918), 250–51. 18. Teilhard, “The Great Monad,” in Teilhard, The Heart of Matter, 184–87. The phrase “The Great Monad” was borrowed from Benson in Lord of the World only to be replaced in succession by the “Anthroposphere” and in a final incarnation the “Noosphere.” Speaight, Teilhard, 75; Teilhard, “Letter to Marguerite TeilhardChambon” (July 14, 1916), in Teilhard, The Making of a Mind, 112. 19. Teilhard, “My Universe,” 204. 20. Teilhard, “Cosmic Life,” 49, 50, 58. 21. French Editor’s Note in Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, The Divine Milieu (New York: Harper and Row, 1960), 155. 22. Teilhard, “The Mass on the World,” 125–26; Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 43–47, 79. 23. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 45–47. 24. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 56. 25. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 59. 26. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 61. 27. Teilhard, “The Mass on the World,” 121–23. 28. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 62–66, 73, 96–97, 120. 29. Celia Deane-Drummond, “Sophia, Mary, and the Eternal Feminine in Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and Sergei Bulgakov,” Ecotheology 10, no. 2 (2005): 215–22; Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “The Eternal Feminine,” in Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Writings in Time of War (London: Collins, 1968), 191–202. 30. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 106–8. 31. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “The Mass on the World,” in Teilhard, The Heart of Matter, 120–123; Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 122–23. 32. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 72. 33. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 79. 34. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 75–83. 35. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 85–92, 101. 36. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 86. 37. Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 70–74. 38. Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 58–61. 39. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 81–83; Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 77–79, 96–108. 40. Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 110–16, 138. 41. Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 160–64. 42. Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 175–80, 209–15. 43. Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 236–39. 44. Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 247–53. 45. Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 255–58, 267–68, 290–92.

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46. Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 257–72. 47. On the issue of universalism, democracy, and Teilhard’s influence on Third World leaders like Leopold Senghor see Speaight, Teilhard, 220, 296–97. 48. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “The Road of the West” (1932), in Teilhard, Toward the Future, 42–45. 49. Speaight, Teilhard, 220, 296–97; Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “The Spiritual Contribution of the Far East,” in Teilhard, Toward the Future, 134–47. 50. Teilhard, “The Place of Technology,” 159–61. 51. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “The Salvation of Mankind” (1936), in Teilhard, Science and Christ, 130–36. 52. Teilhard, “The Formation of the Noosphere,” 172; Leonard Laudadio, “Teilhard de Chardin on Technological Progress,” Review of Social Economy 31 (October 1973): 170–71; Teilhard, “The Place of Technology,” 160–62. 53. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, L’apparition de l’Homme (Paris: Seuil, 1956), 223; Teilhard, “The Mass on the World,” 121. 54. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “Social Heredity and Progress: Notes on the Humanist-Christian Value of Education” (1945), in Teilhard, The Future of Man, 25–36; Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “Some Reflections on Progress” (1941), in Teilhard, The Future of Man, 51–81; Teilhard, “Some Reflections on the Rights of Man” (1947), in Teilhard, The Future of Man, 193–95; Teilhard, “Reflections on Happiness” (1943), in Teilhard, Toward the Future, 107–29; Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 247–53, 267, 278–82. 55. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “Some Reflections on Progress,” 73–75. 56. Teilhard, “Some Reflections on Progress,” 74–76; Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “The Essence of the Democratic Idea” (1949), in Teilhard, The Future of Man, 238–43; Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “The Planetization of Mankind” (1946), in Teilhard, The Future of Man, 124–33. 57. Speaight, Teilhard, 246; Teilhard, “The Planetization of Mankind,” 124–33. 58. Gabriel M. Allegra, O.F.M., My Conversations with Teilhard de Chardin on the Primacy of Christ, Peking, 1942–1945 (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1971), 75; For examples of his evolutionary theology, see Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “Christology and Evolution” (1933), in Teilhard, Christianity and Evolution, 76–95; Teilhard, “Christianity and Evolution: Suggestions for a New Theology” (1945), in Teilhard, Christianity and Evolution, 173–186; Teilhard, “Reflections on Original Sin” (1947), in Teilhard, Christianity and Evolution, 187–98, 237–43. 59. Henri de Lubac, The Faith of Teilhard de Chardin (London: Burns and Oates, 1964), 3. 60. Teilhard, Toward the Future, 21, 156; Teilhard, Writings in a Time of War, 86–87; Teilhard, Science and Christ, 116–27. 61. Teilhard, Writings in a Time of War, 64, 203–24, 286–302; David Grumett, “Church, World and Christ in Teilhard de Chardin,” Ecclesiology 1, no. 1 (2004): 93; Teilhard employs a formula here that is similar to that of Irenaeus of Lyon. Bernard Sesboue, Tout Récapituler dans le Christ: Christologie et sotériologie d’Irénée de Lyon (Paris: Desclee, 2000), 203–5; Teilhard, The Hymn of the Universe, 46–55. 62. Teilhard, “Letter to Marguerite Teilhard-Chambon” (November 6, 1916), in Teilhard, The Making of a Mind, 142, 143. 63. Letter of Paul to the Colossians, 1:17; 2:10; 3:11.

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64. Teilhard de Chardin, “Letters from a Traveler,” 299, 302; Teilhard, Heart of Matter, 117. 65. Teilhard, Heart of Matter, 114–18; Teilhard, Christianity and Evolution, 168. 66. Teilhard, “Letter to Marguerite Teilhard-Chambon,” in Teilhard, The Making of a Mind, (July 14, 1918) 216; (July 28, 1918) 222; (October 3, 1918) 244; (December 10, 1918) 115, 116; (August 4, 1916) 116. 67. Teilhard, “Letter to Father Valensin” (July 4, 1920), in Teilhard, Lettres Intimes, 62. 68. Cuenot, Teilhard de Chardin, 61–85. 69. Cuenot, Teilhard de Chardin, 61–85; Speaight, Teilhard, 174, 175. 70. Speaight, Teilhard, 155–72, 307; Teilhard, “Letter to Monseigneur Bernard de Solages” (February 2, 1952), in Teilhard, Lettres Intimes, 405. 71. Speaight, Teilhard, 234, 260, 281. 72. Speaight, Teilhard, 283–86. 73. Speaight, Teilhard, 299. 74. Cuenot, Teilhard de Chardin, 60. 75. Teilhard, “My Intellectual Position” (1948), in Teilhard, The Heart of Matter, 144; Allegra, Conversations with Teilhard, 98. 76. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “The Sense of Man” (1929), in Teilhard, Toward the Future, 13–17; Allegra, Conversations with Teilhard, 84–85. 77. Teilhard, “On My Attitude to the Official Church,” 115–17; Speaight, Teilhard, 155. 78. Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 152–54; Cuenot, Teilhard de Chardin, 403. 79. This would remain his consistent position for over three decades. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “On My Attitude to the Official Church” (1921), in Teilhard, The Heart of Matter, 115–18; Teilhard, “Letter to Vicar General of the Jesuits, Father Janssens” (October 12, 1951), in Teilhard, The Divine Milieu, 38; Teilhard, “Letter to Father Valensin” (December 31, 1926), in Teilhard, Lettres Intimes, 141–48. 80. Teilhard, “The Sense of Man,” 29–34. 81. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “The Religious Value of Research” (1947), in Teilhard, Science and Christ, 197–202. 82. Allegra, My Conversations with Teilhard de Chardin, 37. 83. Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 298. 84. Cuenot, Teilhard, 70–71; Teilhard, “Letter to Leontine Zanta” (January 10, 1927), in Teilhard, Letters to Leontine Zanta, 76. 85. Teilhard, “The Sense of Man,” 29–31; Teilhard, “The Basis of My Attitude,” 147, 148; Teilhard, “The Function of Art as an Expression of Human Energy,” 89–90; Teilhard, “My Universe,” 198; Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 283, 284; Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “Science and Christ,” in Teilhard, Science and Christ, 21–22. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “Research, Work and Worship” (1945), in Teilhard, Science and Christ, 214–16. 86. Teilhard, “Science and Christ,” 23–27. 87. Teilhard, “Science and Christ,” 30–34. 88. Teilhard, “Catholicism and Science” (1946), in Teilhard, Science and Christ, 190– 191. 89. Teilhard, “Catholicism and Science,” 190. 90. Teilhard, “Research, Work and Worship,” 216; Teilhard, “The Mass on the World,” 121, 129, 130.

4 ✛

Bernard Lonergan’s (1904–1984) Cognitive Project

Deep within us all, emergent when the noise of other appetites is stilled, there is the drive to know, to understand, to see why, to discover the reason, to find the cause, to explain. Just what is wanted has many names. In precisely what it consists, is a matter of dispute. But the fact of inquiry is beyond all doubt. It can absorb a man.1

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ernard Lonergan, unlike Maritain and Teilhard, engages science and technology through his epistemological project. While Maritain approached the universe seeking truth with distinct methods appropriate to the given level of knowledge, Teilhard assumed a theology of nature that posited an evolution of increasingly complex forms of matter and consciousness that rose toward the divine and a final eschaton. In contrast, Lonergan’s turn is inward, toward a cognitive yearning because “the specific drive of our nature is to understand, and indeed to understand everything, neither confusing the trees with the forest nor content to contemplate the forest without seeing all the trees.”2 Initially, Lonergan began this intellectual program by examining the theoretical and cognitive operations essential for Aquinas to pursue his intellectual project in the Middle Ages. Having explored how Aquinas acquired his knowledge, he then applied this method of cognitive appropriation to a wide range of disciplines. He believed that his cognitive

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philosophy would allow the Church to positively engage those elements of contemporary thought that had seemed to be at odds with the faith such as the scientific method and philosophical idealism. As his project was unpacked, he desired nothing less than a common approach at a fundamental level among a broad range of intellectual systems, including religion and science. This exploration would thus allow the Church to know, assimilate and transform “the basic developments out of which come the modern world” and through this assimilation make a thoughtful transition to modern society and culture.3 Lonergan’s intellectual project was bold and provocative, seeking to do nothing less than to reconcile Christianity with the data and theories of the twentieth century just as Aquinas had reconciled the newly rediscovered Aristotle with the Platonic forms of Christianity in the thirteenth century. In sum, he believed it the duty of a Christian theologian to “mount to the level of one’s time.”4 Despite the boldness of this project, Lonergan was anxious, particularly in the early years, to pursue this project as a form of speculative theology that did not directly challenge existing Church teaching. In speculative theology, he posited a real difference between the continuity and the history of dogma and the succession of theses and antitheses that characterize the human effort of fides quaerens intellectum (faith seeking knowledge). Theological speculation gropes through trial and error toward the discovery of its proper method and technique in a given historical context.5 So, Lonergan’s project could be cast as a form of faith seeking understanding utilizing a cognitive blueprint that could explain, direct, and verify the paths of diverse forms of knowledge. Before unpacking the details of this cognitive project, it is important to depict the intellectual process that produced his mature vision. Why would he be drawn to such a formidable task that would require a Herculean effort? What was behind his iron perseverance to build an immensely complex and nuanced philosophical and theological structure? Applying Lonergan’s hermeneutics to their author, his life experiences are the “formal context,” the “dynamic mental and psychic background” that provides the habits of “sensibility and skill, of intellect and will” that are the impetus for his philosophical and theological reflections.6 Unfortunately, there were few interviews granted until his final years and the comments on his early years are sparse and guarded. Perhaps, a public airing of such personal reflections would have been uncomfortable for a man so completely devoted to the life of the mind. Despite a reticence to discuss the “dynamic mental and psychic background” of his intellectual quests, certain relevant facts suggest important experiential influences. An interest in social issues might have stemmed from Canadian parents who were the descendants of marginalized peoples that included Irish immigrants and British loyalists escaping from the American Revo-

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lution. In his immediate family, a scientific approach and technical skills were certainly aspects of his father’s training as an engineer and employment as a surveyor for the railroads. His mother was a model of Christian piety and charity. Robert Louis Stephenson’s Treasure Island introduced him as a youth to the imaginative possibilities of the written word.7 In his adolescent schooling, he particularly enjoyed mathematics where “you knew what you had to do and could get an answer.” He had mixed feelings, however, about much of his subsequent education by the Jesuits beginning when he was thirteen. They certainly inculcated the value of “intelligence” and he admired a few inspirational teachers. Still, he perceived a distressing laziness in the classicist approach of Jesuit education that assumed a single, normative cultural pattern that had changed little since the Counter Reformation. A later reading of the historian Christopher Dawson’s The Age of the Gods would provide an anthropological alternative to the classicist notion of culture.8 Lonergan’s relationship to the Jesuits and his religious vocation in general are difficult subjects to appraise due to his reticence. Without much explanation, he confessed to making his decision to become a Jesuit on a streetcar in Montreal as he headed to a retreat. He then entered the disciplined life of the novitiate in 1922 at Guelph, Ontario. In his two juniorate years with the Jesuits, Lonergan read a wide array of classical and Christian authors. He also taught mathematics, Latin, and Greek to his fellow Jesuits and he engaged in a number of the required debates, one of which was to determine the justice of the Galileo condemnation. The Lonergan scholar Frederick Crowe speculates that his mentor developed in this period an ascetic and disciplined approach that contributed to his later notions of the self-appropriation of knowledge. A stint at Heythrop, a Jesuit College near Oxford (1926–1929), further sharpened his intellectual capacities although he did not favor the Suarezian philosophy taught there. A nagging nominalism was cured by exposure to J. A. Stewart’s Plato’s Doctrine of Ideas. From this reading on Plato, he learned the importance of a systematic method in unpacking ideas. While at Heythrop, he concluded, “The theory of knowledge is what is going to interest me most of all.”9 The first articles by the young scholar displayed a budding interest in the process of learning. In “The Form of the Mathematical Inference” (1928), he explored Euclid’s proofs and rejected the argument that one could appropriate the proof by focusing on the concept of a geometrical figure. Instead, Lonergan discovered that Euclid’s inquiry concentrated on the image of the geometric figure. The sensible object allowed a person to get the idea through the image; it is both direct and intuited. In this analysis, Lonergan rejects conceptualism and recognizes the cognitional element that he later articulated as insight into phantasm.10 Another

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article analyzed how Newman’s illative sense provided an additional basis for cognitive certainty through a personal appropriation employing inference to seek certitude instead of scientific and syllogistic reasoning. Indeed, this form of knowledge was “far higher, wider, more certain, subtler than logical inference.” In later years, he likened the illative sense to his own “reflective understanding.”11 The next stop for Lonergan was a biennium in Rome. In the eternal city, he formulated his first ideas about an “integral renewal of Catholic thought.” A fellow student introduced him to the works of Joseph Marechal, who disclosed how knowledge was discursive and not intuitive with the decisive component in judgment. Gradually, he formulated the aspiration to adumbrate “a Thomist metaphysics of history” that combined the laws of the human sciences—economics, psychology, etc.—into a “higher synthesis in the mystical body.” While pursuing the causes of order and progress, he discovered the historian Christopher Dawson’s notion of the forces that caused cultures to emerge into a type of order and A. Franklin Shull’s evolutionary concept of emergent probability.12 He was not fully aware of the mechanism, but he was probing various systems to explain the progress of history and intellectual concepts. He was on to his ultimate quest. Frederick Crowe summarized the “links” between these early years and his subsequent exploration of a synthesis as follows: the path leads directly from “The form of mathematical inference” to the verbum articles of 1946–1949. The role of wisdom and the conditions for wisdom are not so different in “True judgment and science” from what we see in those articles. The distinction between concrete inference and scientific investigation forecasts Insight’s concrete judgment of fact with those of scientific probability. Logic is already reduced to a subordinate role and, most of all, primacy is given to the alternative criterion of “the mind itself.”13

THE ROLE OF AQUINAS The first hints of his ultimate intellectual project were produced in the novitiate years. In 1933 he recorded that he read some primary texts of Aquinas and “began to suspect that he was not nearly as bad as he was painted.” Lonergan traveled to Rome in 1939 and met with his dissertation director, Charles Boyer, who reached for a copy of Aquinas’ Summa Theologica and commented that he did not understand its discussion of operative grace (gratia operans). Boyer asked the young Jesuit to study the historical sources in order to explain the concept.14 Lonergan traced these ideas back to their historical roots. Augustine’s notions of operative and cooperative grace were responses to the attack of

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the Pelagians denying the necessity of grace. In De gratia et libero arbitrio, God operates on the evil will of man to make it good. Subsequently, man cooperates with the good will so it can perform good works. This distinction concerning grace became the basis of operative and cooperative grace for the scholastic masters.15 Based on the works of Augustine, Anselm, Albert Magnus, and others, Aquinas began the process of knitting together a coherent picture of grace from their partial insights. For Aquinas, grace not only influences the merits of our actions and elevates them above the human level, but it also prepares each person for justification by an infusion of good will. A second form of grace enabled humanity to “translate our good intentions into good actions.” Thus, there was habitual and actual grace and each of these forms of grace was operative and cooperative. In studying Aquinas’ views on grace, Lonergan noted how he shifted between different expositions on the subject. In this dynamic process of theological speculation, “the centre of the whole issue shifted violently; certain developments were released at once; others followed in a series of intervals, change implying further change, till the genius of Aquinas mastered the situation.” The specific process of how the doctrine of grace developed revealed a more general insight about knowledge acquisition and the path to higher levels of knowledge.16 Lonergan’s subsequent “Verbum” articles added to his developing theory of knowledge acquisition. These articles explored how the human mind has an analogous experience to that of the emanations of the Trinity. In the first step, the father expresses the good and true in the son. For Augustine and Aquinas, there is posited a parallel development in the human mind of an inner word or verbum that is consciously generated in the mind in accordance with understanding and truth. The operation of verbum reveals that the human mind is an image and not a vestige of the Trinity because the mind is “rational in its conceptualizations, in its judgments in its act of will.”17 This “emanatio intelligibilis,” the rational process of the word in Aquinas, is distinct from a scholasticism that begins with external concepts, propositions, and syllogisms. Scholastics often declared that the extrinsic inspiration comes from without as “concretions of divine ideas and a divine plan,” but the exact nature of the intellect remained shrouded in obscurity. They took “concepts for granted; they were too busy working out arguments to produce certitudes.” In contrast the original Thomist concept of the inner word sought to discover the operative elements of the intellect or what he termed “psychology.”18 Lonergan’s epistemology thus begins not on the outside with scholastic extrinicists or internally wrestling with a priori categories like Kant. He initiates his search for knowledge with the central term, that of the inner word or verbum and its cognitive processes. The inner word is both the

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object of thought in apprehension and then the product of thought in a judgment on the idea of the object in the mind.19 At the center of Lonergan’s appropriation of the inner word was a two-step procedure. Illustrative examples allow the unifying of sensible data into coherent concepts through “insights into phantasm.” Phantasms according to Aquinas are examples that allow a person to examine what they are trying to grasp. Insight is “an act of understanding” or “a matter of knowing a cause.” In simple cases, the knowledge of a cause requires the locating of that which connects the sensible data and the concept. Thus, an insight is “the grasp of the object in an inward aspect such that the mind, pivoting on the insight, is able to conceive, not without labor, the philosophic concepts.”20 Having defined a grasp of insight into phantasm, Lonergan is then prepared for the second stage in acquiring knowledge that shifted his attention from the intelligibility of direct insights into phantasm to expressing a consciously reflected truth through judgment. Is the insight necessarily true? An exceptional idea is just that—an idea that may or may not be confirmed by subsequent knowledge through a judgment. Judgment is the result of a habit that infinitely regresses unless there is some “habitus principorium.” This initial habit is formed from natural intelligence and its forms of reason can be inspired by self-evident truths such as the principle of noncontradiction that is not limited to any particular sensible instances, but is universal in scope. Judgment is thus an operation in the mind with respect to a concept and it relies on first principles, demonstrable conclusions, and a reliable authority in order to judge a thing to be true. This judgment is based on an “apprehension of the evidence” in a personal act of consent that commits the person. The resulting truth is a truth in the subject rather than a truth absolutely.21 This reflective sense of judgment assumes a number of different forms. Human decisions proceed from an accumulation of probabilities, “too manifold to be marshaled, too fleeting to be formulated.” The act of judgment, as demonstrated in science, is synthetic in that it unites understandings and provides higher and more complex “apprehensions of intelligibility of a wider sweep.” The fact is that “insights are not unrelated atoms, they developed, coalesced, formed higher unities. . . .” The truth of these higher integrations is based on a correspondence of “mental composition with real composition.” Wisdom unites and infuses the entirety of this process from understandings to judgments through first principles, the accumulation of probabilities, and the construction of ever-higher unities.22 The development of the inner word prepares the reflective agent to turn such judgments into external actions through the outer word. This move parallels the emanation of the Holy Sprit from the Father and the Son.

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The outer word is the realm of meaning that employs words, ideas, and actions to express the reality of the inner word in that realm that is neither true nor false, but actual. The inner word has meaning essentially and the outer word through participation in the inner word. Lonergan’s development of a cognitive theory that is analogous to the Trinity has historical as well as epistemological justifications. The historical context of Aquinas was a world that had not fully incorporated theory into theology. The medievals shifted onto a new horizon because of the mendicant movements and the recently recovered works of Aristotle from Muslim sources. This new horizon attempted through novel forms of logic and categories to reconcile the disparate dimensions of Christian theology. Aquinas started from data and then applied theoretic techniques to reach a resolution from seeming contradictions.23 The engagement with Aquinas provided Lonergan with clues on exploring the foundations of knowledge in the contemporary world. In this quest, Lonergan discovered an isomorphism or mirroring between the method, form, and substance of Thomist philosophy and science in regards to methodology. For example, there is a similarity between the relation of hypothesis to verification and definition to judgment. The similarity is that the first terms are neither true nor false, and certainly not a part of knowledge without the confirmations or denials produced by the second term. This comparison demonstrates through an “analogy of proportion” that “scientific hypothesis stood to verification as Thomist definitions stands to judgment.”24 This isomorphism is but one example of the possible parallels that would also include the following:

Thomism 1) Desires to determine what God created; 2) Verified definition by judgment; 3) Thomist abstraction is independent of a spatio-temporal framework; 4) The inner word or definition is reached with much difficulty, but is never perfected until beatitude; 5) Seeks definite knowledge of essence in form and matter and there is a difference between essence and form.

Science 1) Desires to determine what is correct in nature; 2) Empirically verified any hypothesis; 3) Einstein’s theories of relativity are invariant in regards to a spatio-temporal framework; 4) Seeks ever greater approximation through testing but ultimate knowledge is never reached; 5) Scientists seek definite function in forms and matter which are satisfied by all possible measurements. 25

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After analyzing these parallels, Lonergan ponders why Thomist and scientific methodologies are isomorphic. He dismisses the argument that it is the result of the similarity of human minds. There are other philosophies with little isomorphism to scientific thought. It is rather a specific aspect of the human mind, understanding, that allows for this possibility. For Aquinas, the soul comprehends its nature through a “scrutiny of acts of understanding.” Similarly, the objective of science is “the complete explanation of all phenomena” through “intelligibility in sensible data.” Observations, measurements, and experiments provide the data.26 What then is the role of Aquinas in the development of modern science? Aquinas concluded that a study of nature is critical because a “unified apprehension” is only possible by including an understanding of nature, for otherwise “divine grace would be perfecting an unknown nature.” In addition, there is posited a distinction between the natural and the supernatural, which allows for some disciplinary autonomy for science. Hence, a basis for the scientific revolutions of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries is prepared to some degree in Thomism.27 There certainly are major differences, however, in the matters observed and the methods employed between Thomism and the scientific method. The scientific method tends to begin with observations of nature that are prior to and independent of any specific scientific results. By contrast Thomist philosophical methods are simultaneous with their philosophic product and therefore coexist with the particular results. Moreover, empirical science, unlike Thomism, is an independent discipline that deploys experiments that yield correlations that depict the relations between objects.28 Since medieval science did not incorporate the dynamic cognitive processes that created Thomist metaphysics, Lonergan openly criticizes the scholastic approach to the natural sciences. He concedes that the medieval approach is a critical stage in an evolution toward contemporary science, but a univocal vision stifled its growth. The focusing on metaphysical terminology instead of “things” prevents the creation of a truly autonomous science. This sweeping criticism seems unfair in regard to many neo-Thomists like Maritain whose approach certainly permits a high degree of autonomy. Lonergan also claims that causation from predication in Thomist metaphysics, in contrast to modern science, is absolute and determined by verification from the proofs of syllogistic reasoning. It is on this issue of causation that Maritain, as previously mentioned, discerns complementary forms of metaphysical and physical causation.29 Nonetheless, for Lonergan the Aristotelian science adopted by the Thomists, although inadequate, is the initial phase of an evolution to modern science that starts with a horizon, passes a “critical point,” and then ushers in a new world of specialization. This specialization process

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is not a radical series of departures, but an organic evolution that is “grafted” upon the preexisting horizon. Because it is so closely connected to the preexisting achievements, this development appears “superfluous and even arbitrary.” The process of development, which is cooperative and cumulative, employs novel methods and procedures that create different forms of organization, products, and goals. The new discipline deploys a “technical language” and specialist criteria.30 What then was the form of the transformation between Aquinas and modern science? This transformation shifted the epistemology from logic to method. Logic was the foundational method of Aristotelian/Thomist science, but it became a limited heuristic device in modern science for “promoting clarity, coherence and rigor in the formulation and application of hypotheses and theories.” In this fashion, science preserves the prior forms of method “in their integrity, refines their performance, extends their relevance, enriches their significance.”31 Modern science also accounts for the subject, the human being in the process of learning. With Aristotle, the individual could hardly fail to grasp “what is self-evident and, having grasped it, he can hardly fail to draw conclusions that are necessary.” In contrast the modern search for knowledge is initiated in the subject and involves intellectual conversion, open-mindedness, striving, humility, and perseverance.32 Despite some continuity, the change from Aristotelian to modern science is a dramatic shift from a static metaphysical methodology to the dynamic processes of contemporary science. Citing the historian of science, Herbert Butterfield, for the proposition that there are sharp methodological distinctions between the Middle Ages and the Scientific Revolution, Lonergan appears to favor some aspects of the discontinuity thesis. If the metaphysical and cosmological dimensions of Aristotelian science are so predominant and stifling to empirical science, William Harvey’s qualified but extensive use of Aristotle in advancing his medical theories or Nicholas of Cusa’s proposals of multiple worlds before the Scientific Revolution would not be possible.33 Since his interest is primarily to follow the pattern of increasing levels of insight in science, Lonergan seems to transcend the continuity/discontinuity battle since his theory of cognitive development suggests an important shift in methodology that can also demonstrate significant Aristotelian/Thomist roots and contributions.34

AN INTEGRATED VISION By exploring the intellectual project of Aquinas, Lonergan discovered an efficacious path for appropriating the cognitive features of the human mind. He also uncovered isomorphisms and distinct differences between

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the Thomist methods of seeking knowledge and those of contemporary natural sciences. Having presented these comparisons and contrasts, I can now suggest how he refined his methodology in order to fully formulate a different system than his medieval mentor. The mature cognitive system of Lonergan was detailed in thousands of pages in works like Insight and Method and Theology. I will not attempt an exhaustive summation, much less an interpretation of his full project. Instead, I will select some of the most salient aspects of his project for the natural sciences. Some of the relevant points in these works for his ethical critique of science will be discussed in the next section. Returning to Lonergan’s project, it is important to remember that his early studies laid the foundations of a hermeneutical structure, but the intellectual trajectory that began with Grace and Freedom and Verbum finally became in Insight a comprehensive program. This method focused on the self-appropriation of the rational subject who has insights, forms concepts, weighs evidence, reflects, judges, and decides. The specific means of self-appropriation must include several heuristic stages that lift the seeker applying this method to successively higher viewpoints by asking, What am I doing when I am knowing? Why is doing that knowing? What do I know when I do it? The answer to the first question is derived from the data of consciousness. The answer to the second is derived from the answer to the first. The answer to the third is derived from the answer to the first and the second.35

The cognitive agent thus seeks a “reasonable grasp and intelligent affirmation of knowledge.” This movement from the senses to reality is nothing less than an “intellectual conversion,” a turning or pivoting of the knower from his senses to higher levels of rational assent culminating in a higher grasp of reality.36 Scientific examples provide a series of “fivefinger exercises” that invites the reader to discover in themselves just what happens when they understand. Lonergan declares that the guiding orientation of the scientist is the orientation of inquiring intelligence, the orientation that is of its nature a pure, detached, disinterested desire simply to know. For there is an intellectual desire, an Eros of the mind. Without it there would arise no questioning, no inquiry, and no wonder. Inasmuch as this intellectual drive is dominant, inasmuch as the reinforcing or inhibiting tendencies of other drives are successfully excluded, in that measure the scientific observer becomes an incarnation of inquiring intelligence and his percepts move into coincidence with what are named the data of sense.37

Expanding on his previous work on the concept of insights into phantasm, the initial operations of inquiring intelligence follow three essential

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steps from experience to understanding. These steps include the receiving of data, the formulating of an idea of their explanation, and finally the verification of the proposed explication. The cognitional pattern as it is applied to science and mathematics starts with clarity and ends in complexity in the first eight chapters of Insight.38 The methods of science become more sophisticated, but the fundamental cognitive pattern of an insight 1) 2) 3) 4) 5)

comes as a release to the tension of inquiry, is sudden and unexpected, is a function not of outer circumstances but of inner conditions, pivots between the abstract and the concrete, and passes into the habitual texture of one’s mind.39

There are key dimensions of insight in Archimedes’ discovery of the displacement of water when he weighed King Hiero’s crown. Archimedes’ insight demonstrates that the discovery of knowledge depends on the commitment of the knower who is attentive to the data, does not avoid the difficulty of inquiry, and applies all possible measures to link the data to their interpretation. The commitment of Archimedes thus confirms a key point for Lonergan that “Genuine objectivity is the fruit of authentic subjectivity.”40 Armed with a process and a personal commitment to inquiry, a knower in science can utilize the aforementioned cognitive pattern to recognize a moment of insight. The full realization of the insight and the passing of that fully realized insight to others is subject to rules of knowledge acquisition. These rules allow us to pose questions, assess the data, and begin to formulate concepts. Lonergan develops a number of key conceptual tools for translating a mass of data in experience to the level of understanding. We can filter the data by realizing what is not essential to the insight like the empirical residue and inverse insights. For example, the relevant direct insights of science contain “the aspects of the data that are necessary for the occurrence of all insights in the appropriate range.” Those elements unessential for an insight are matters of fact like time and place and are termed “the empirical residue.” Similarly, certain questions produce little or no advance in knowledge. An inverse insight is the recognition in such instances that there is a need to explore other paths utilizing different questions. For example, Newton’s laws of motion did not state the cause of gravity, but only defined its measurable effects. This recognition was in some ways a strategic decision and accepted some unanswered questions in order to further the broader objectives and possibilities of the scientific project.41 Gradually, the process of insight also reveals heuristic canons operable across the scientific disciplines. These canons provide schemata for

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determining the scope and direction of scientific inquiry. The particular process to be used, classical or statistical, can be determined by trial and error. Classical and statistical methods are complementary approaches for science as each one isolates what the other finds undesirable in the data. For example, classical scientific investigations are the result of direct insights and are systematic, that is, they are based on what would happen if certain conditions are fulfilled. Pure repetition suggests a classical investigation. An example here would be the circling of the sun by the earth. These systematic processes are based on determinate principles. In the final analysis a classical approach tells one absolutely what would happen if certain conditions were met. Any variation from the predicted process would be highly problematic and suggests questions about either the data or the theory.42 In contrast to classical investigations, statistical investigations investigate unsystematic phenomena like the weather. They are concrete and unsystematic and determine how often the conditions are likely to be met in a process. This process is prepared for novelty since it seeks probabilities in the information being examined. The frequency of phenomena replaces absolute certainty. Random variations, unless very frequent, are to be expected. A systematic variation from predicted results would suggest an interference with the data.43 There is also a third type of heuristic structure applicable to living systems whose intelligibility is different from classical or statistical structures. In “genetic” structures, there is a constant process of development. Hence, genetic structures are focused not only on classical and statistical correlations, but on sequences in which the “correlations and regularities change.” The chemical process between acorns is the same, but they differ from the chemical processes in the tree that grows from the acorn.44 After discussing general heuristic structures, Lonergan discusses in Insight a series of canons of intelligence that guide the parsing of data. The canon of selection recognizes that the analyst of a specific subject or inquiry cannot “examine all the trees in this endless forest of possible thoughts.” The scientist restricts herself to what can be perceived or observed. With the increasing specialization of modern science, theoretical scientists lean on the specialist in data development. These observers are like the craftsmen of old, who by “positive effort and rigorous training” become “a master of the difficult art of scientific observation.”45 Another way to prune the forest is the canon of parsimony that excludes from the consideration of the scientist any unverified or unverifiable statements. Likewise, the canon of relevance notes the need of the scientist to grasp the intelligibility in the data. The intelligibility in the data relates one thing to another and not to us. For example the study of

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the masses in the field of mechanics is on the relationship of said masses to one another and not to human persons.46 With the pruning and careful development of data through these canons, classical and statistical laws are developed from the resulting information. In the canon of operations, these laws are then applied in concrete situations such as experiments where they are tested and sometimes explained in part by other laws. This process of application uncovers new data, poses new questions, stimulates fresh insights, and from these processes there result the revision or confirmation of existing laws. In this process there is thus “a perpetual recall from the abstract realm of laws to the complexity of the concrete and so the necessity of ever more laws.” This creative process produces ever-higher viewpoints.47 The resulting intelligibility from employing all of these canons thus fosters the flow of cumulative knowledge and seeks ultimately the explanation of all phenomena. Hence, the knowledge obtained is finally subjected to the canon of complete knowledge that holds that the knowledge must always seek to fully explain the data presented to the scientist. Thus, empirical knowledge leads to an increasingly complex and satisfying set of explanatory laws.48 The complementary dimensions of the heuristic structures and the canons of empirical method are part of an emergent probability that suggests the possibility of our moving from personal belief to a degree of objective knowledge. The attentive intellect must seek an emergent probability from “schemes of recurrence” that are conditioned insofar as the sequence cannot exist without the other parts. Modern science is thus more than understanding; it is a confirmation of our judgment that results in a virtual conditioned. The virtual conditioned is a proposition whose conditions have been met. This proposition includes objects that are imaginable, but cannot be sensibly ascertained such as those demonstrated in Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle.49 The processes of obtaining scientific knowledge in the form of emergent probability and the virtually conditioned are not the result of isolated events, but are part of interconnected insights. This upward spiral of knowledge operates from moving viewpoints that begin with the simplest case as it rises from “below upwards.” This movement results from the asking and answering of questions as the participant is raised to “higher viewpoints.” The result of this moving viewpoint is not a single set of coherent statements, but “a sequence of related sets of coherent statements.” In each stage there is the potentiality of grasping by insight a higher set of rules that will govern the operations and elicit information for the next stage.”50 In the final analysis, the idea of emergent probability is a way of understanding the phenomena of the world. Classical laws anticipate a constant

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system and statistical laws calculate the likely frequency of particular events. So what about changes or new phenomena? A natural system is likely to have random elements causing new events. Emergent probability is open to this process and many new schemes develop when there are challenges to prior conditions. These new elements will also be systematized at each level of development as each level integrates the random events from the lower levels. For example in evolution, random mutations are likely to produce variations that over time produce new species. The new species integrate apparently random features of chemistry, etc. Thus chance selection is an example of the emergence of probability. Species come into existence, survive for a while, and then disappear according to a schedule of probabilities.51 The next realization, which I will touch on only briefly, is at the level of metaphysics the processes of knowing from experience to understanding and ending in judgment results in an increasing grasp of reality or being. How can we be sure of our affirmation of our judgments in our consciousness? Here, we must not allow the process to be interfered with by rashness, timidity, hope, fear, etc. Instead, our methods and logic are fused to a pure desire to know. It is through the desire to know that we are connected to being, not through medieval philosophy or scientific method. Lonergan concludes that the desire to know detects the true ground of being in his metaphysics and overrules other approaches as follows: Upon the normative exigencies of the pure desire rests the validity of all logics and all methods. A logic or method is not an ultimate that can only be established by a hullabaloo of starry-eyed praise for Medieval Philosophy or for Modern Science, along with an insecure resentment of everything else. Logic and method are intelligent and rational; their grounds are not belief nor propaganda nor the pragmatic utility of atom bombs and nylon stockings. Their grounds are the inner exigence of the pure desire to know. They are to be revised in so far as they fail.52

In such a cognitive approach, the inquisitive mind must not only explore the cognitive acts or operations or the ethical level of our relations with others as in the next section, but we also operate in a tradition, in a historical context. We proceed as part of a process of interpretation of the existing traditions of a subject such as science. How do we assess the scientific knowledge presented to us through millennia of human living? The first step is to seek to attain a universal viewpoint. Such a viewpoint is the result of both considering all possible interpretations through the lens of the interpreter’s experiences, knowledge, and critical skills. In his or her comprehension of their own basis for interpretation, there is the key for applying these same techniques to other cultures, etc.

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This process is aided by canons for a methodical hermeneutics. This would include a canon of relevance that recognizes the need to begin the interpretive analysis from the standpoint of a universal viewpoint in order to place the interpretation within “the protean notion of being.” Hence, the interpretations must be able to be stated exactly to allow for the examination of differences of interpretation that can be eliminated by appeals to the “available data.” The process of interpretation is further advanced by the canon of explanation that accumulates insights, posits that such insights must respond to “dialectical alternatives,” and then communicates the results through “differentiation and specialization of modes of expression.”53 The interpretive task happens over generations and requires a division of labor in order to carefully parse the relevant documents and information. The canon of successive approximations provides a method to arrive at continuously improving the assessments. These include an interpreter with a universal viewpoint, a through grounding in self-knowledge that will allow a tracing of the stages of the evolution of an interpretation, a recognition of a need to close the gap between meaning and expression in an interpretation, and finally there must be convincing evidence and data for “a broadly based and interlocked coherence.” The process of a universal viewpoint also requires a canon of parsimony that both supports a broad consideration of data and will exclude the most bogus perspectives. Direct and inverse insights allow for the reality of accidents such as mere matters of fact that could not be determined by the theoretical construct in the interpretation.54 There is one addendum to the cognitive framework of Insight that I would like to add to the Lonerganian method. In Method and Theology, Lonergan continued to develop his cognitive analysis and apply it to theology. Here he refines and supplements the idea of “functional specialization” in which he accounts for the concrete process of moving from data to results and relies heavily on the process analysis of Insight. He distinguishes functional specialization from a field specialization that is focused on the kind of data examined or subject specialization that organizes its research in terms of the results from specific theoretical differences. Instead, the process of unpacking an area of study in functional specialization requires the following: 1) a recognition of the interaction of empirical data and one’s pre-empirical philosophical presupposition; 2) carefully reaching a judgment by attention to data, unifying it through a hypothesis and verifying or denying the hypothesis; 3) judgments based on genuine subjectivity, on one’s most authentic personal orientation.55

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Functional specialization has applications for many fields including contemporary issues in science, as will be discussed in a subsequent chapter. In his focus on the processes of knowledge acquisition, Lonergan is operating between crass determinism and a completely open-ended process. He is neither a traditional scholastic nor a modern relativist. Knowledge can be confirmed but it is subject to challenge and change under cognitive analysis, ethical considerations or historical interpretation. The acquisition of knowledge processes results in the self-affirming subject taking control of scientific processes in a self-conscious appropriation of the relevant cognitive operations. This appropriation crowns the historical evolution of science. If you think of science in terms of formal objects, you are thinking of science as the Greeks thought of mathematics. Next, if you move on to think of science as the study of development, you are thinking like thinkers of the Renaissance and later mathematicians. But if you think of science as constituted by a group of operations, then the division and unification or integration of the sciences becomes a matter of the division and integration of sets of operations.56

A CRITIQUE OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY Through examples from the natural sciences, Lonergan delineates the complex procedures for acquiring insights, understandings, judgments, and historical interpretations that lead to the constant refinements of theory. These procedures are not disembodied or isolated activities. They operate in a distinctive human culture formed by specific historical realities embodied in institutional structures. In previous centuries, loosely affiliated individuals might have discovered scientific insights, but a new professionalism was extant by the twentieth century that employed technical language and mandated a mastery of common conceptual understandings and technical systems. Educational credentials such as a Ph.D. became increasingly necessary and scientists joined the appropriate associations, attended congresses, read journals, contributed to publications, and designed the necessary tools and equipment for their experiments.57 Scientists relied on the past efforts of their community to keep their traditions “alive and flourishing.” In this reliance, they operated from a position of faith about certain preconditions for their work. This faith was not unconditional and the path of knowledge might require a scientist to both affirm and reject a portion of the tradition of his discipline. As previously noted, the Scientific Revolution rejected Aristotelian methodology, because there was a “crisis in existing methods, procedures, theories, and assumptions which are seen to fail.” The consequence of such crises

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of anomalous data was a “radical revision” of basic concepts and methods. Revisions of the scientific horizon often encountered considerable resistance, both individual and structural. Within the structural insecurity, there was a psychological resistance in the scientist who “dreads to change, to remodel the organization of himself, his living in the scientific world.”58 Despite this resistance within the relevant scientific field, change occurred after a “relatively brief lag” which was followed by a unification of the field in which the extension of the scientific horizon is widely accepted.59 The community would “witness and attest” to these breakthroughs through criteria that included an awareness of 1) 2) 3) 4)

what had already been achieved; the further data still awaiting a satisfactory explanation; the contribution actually made by the new view; a grounded presentiment and intelligent surmise, of new avenues for exploration that had now come within man’s reach, and 5) if the decision was a hard one, that there must be the additional exploration of virgin territory and the established anticipation of still further advances.60 Such criteria allowed for the development of systems that sought everrefined standards of clarity, coherence, and rigor. This dynamic process constantly raised and answered new questions about the connection between the “accepted view and the awkward outstanding data.”61 The form of these breakthroughs at the social and community levels was not explored in detail. Lonergan does not offer a detailed analysis of Kuhn’s paradigm shifts or Lakatos’ research program. The key point was not the sociology of such decisions, but their cognitive import. The dynamism of the scientific method was a critical feature of the process of witnessing, attesting, judging, and confirming knowledge followed by additional cycles that extended knowledge. Each scientist contributed to this process with the assistance of the community. It remains the high privilege of method to raise the stature of individuals by making them members of a scientific community and so compensating for the weakness of any by the presence, the aid, the challenge of others. So the gifts of each become the leaven of the whole mass and, while this leavening process works its effects insensibly at any time, still over time it is not difficult to document its cumulative effect.62

The methods of science are impressive and dynamic, but science like all things human is susceptible to corruption through the lure of money or power, particularly if there are technological applications. Moreover, the

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alleged objectivity is not realized in fact. Some scientists fiercely defended their paradigms against all challengers and their criteria were not always self-correcting and sometimes had to be challenged by an outsider from another discipline. The scientific process, for all of its positive features, is not immune to ethical problems that are the result of a breakdown in the march of cognitive advancement. We have freedom of will and as Michael Schute observes, “our thinking can be defective, our judgments biased, and our choices poor.”63 Aware of these potential problems, Christians must adumbrate a coherent image of humanity that responds to scientific positions. Lonergan supported an aggiornamento with science, but this engagement is not some “simple-minded rejection of all that is old and some breezy acceptance of everything new.” Science could overstate its epistemological claims and assert an unwarranted certainty that was contradicted by revelations such as quantum theory. In opposition to the advocates of scientism, Lonergan witnessed that the subjective dimension of the scientist was primary and ineradicable, because the scientist was not merely a detached observer, but also a perceiver. Moreover, science in the modern age was also more statistical than absolute. Causation was really correlation because basic premises were freely chosen postulates and not necessary truths. In the early decades of the century, scientists still spoke of the necessary laws of nature and even of the iron law of economics. Yet there were already hints that absolute certainty was absent from many other scientific developments. Darwin’s theory of evolution relied on probabilities and general relativity removed the certainties of space and time.64 Science also overreached its disciplinary boundary in formulating philosophical or theological propositions. The extra scientific philosophy of materialism “misrepresented nature and excluded human freedom.” Responding to the “spectacle” of religious persecution and wars, Enlightenment philosophers also discarded God as they adopted the ideal of human autonomy. Science and reform became the watchwords of subsequent centuries that favored mechanistic, materialistic, and deterministic perspectives. Ironically, science and “dogmatic” theology shared an impulse for certitude, not inquiry. For the prophets of scientism, the integration of human knowledge was henceforth “identified with the unification of the sciences, and that unification is obtained by the simple device of proclaiming that objectivity is extroversion, knowing is taking a look, and the real is a subdivision of the `already out there now.’”65 This regnant scientism contained a dangerous view of human freedom and responsibility. Science is the king which has replaced the old judge; it is the court of last appeal; it rules men’s lives through its ministers—the experts, the popularizers,

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the consultants, the planners, and the organizers. Obviously, if men are just aggregates of knobs, then experts are needed to do their thinking for them, popularizers are needed to tell them what to do, and organizers are needed to get them to do it in the right way.66

This “scientific monism” engaged in a reductionism that blithely ignored “that there was involved an extra-scientific supposition in the pronouncement on the meaning of objectivity, knowledge and reality.” Science held that knowledge is solely a “certain knowledge of things through their causes.” Hence, it favored “a leveling down of human aspirations” as regimentation and rigidity become primary values in western culture. Such scientism forgot that human beings were not merely matter, but “persons with intelligence, initiative, freedom, and responsibility.”67 Scientism also neglected some parallels with religion. Science employed a form of faith like most other areas of human experience because the accumulated knowledge of science was a deposit of belief, a faith on which the scientist pursued uncharted or partially charted realms of thought.68 Scientists pursued “verified possibilities” and relied on “statistical frequencies,” but this process implies that scientific discoveries are not as universal as had been assumed in earlier ages. Therefore, the intervention of the transcendent was not necessarily an abrogation of inviolable laws and, therefore, “the scientific case concerning miracles has weakened.” Disagreements would remain, however, and such misunderstandings stemmed, in part, from the issue of metaphysics. While science explained natural phenomena, metaphysics anticipated the general structure of proportionate being or what was known by “human experience, intelligent grasp and reasonable affirmation.”69 In sum, metaphysics was the detached and disinterested drive of the pure desire to know and its unfolding in the empirical, intellectual and rational consciousness of the selfaffirming subject. From the unfolding of the drive proceed all questions, all insights, all formulations, all reflections, all judgments; and so metaphysics underlies logic and mathematics, the various sciences and the myriad instances of common sense.70

While metaphysics and science vied for hegemony, the key was for each discipline to discover their respective roles. Metaphysics should neither dictate nor be subservient to the scientific knowledge that it anticipates and unifies. This was because metaphysics contains virtually and structurally what the sciences were to discover formally and in detail. Metaphysics incorporated the results of such efforts and made them coherent by knitting them into a unity by discerning in them the concrete manifestation of an integral heuristic structure. Science is not, however, merely a subset of metaphysics. While metaphysics was the “total” question and

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the “total” answer, the “whole” of metaphysics was not identical to its parts. Rather, metaphysics pressed together these disparate fields like a “keystone” since it was “the whole in knowledge but not of knowledge.” The stability of metaphysics was much greater than science. Whereas science was susceptible to the acquisition of new viewpoints from theoretical alterations, there was no viewpoint beyond that of metaphysics that penetrates all areas of knowledge. 71 If the differences and distinctions between science and religion, as demonstrated in the dichotomy of metaphysics and science, were not maintained then the overstepping of disciplinary bounds was inevitable. Such a boundary error is an example of a profound human capacity for engaging in a downward cycle away from insight and the acquisition of knowledge. Another source of error was a bias from misapplied methods or selfish interests that could similarly precipitate “flights from understanding.” The “flights from understanding” can also be the consequence of “an incomplete development of the intelligent and reasonable use of one’s own intelligence and reasonableness.” This anti-intelligence is resourceful, always providing “superficial minds with superficial positions.” It can initiate a downward spiral in which “the deteriorating situation seems to provide the critical, unbiased mind with factual evidence in which the bias is claimed to be verified.” Intelligence comes to be regarded as irrelevant to practical living and initiative becomes the “privilege of violence.”72 The role of the “privilege of violence” was confirmed in the twentieth century with the carnage of two global and numerous smaller wars. Science assisted these “flights from understanding” by creating dangerous technologies that harnessed a “power over nature and men too vast and terrifying to be entrusted to the good intentions of unconsciously biased minds.” The scientist is in an odd position with regard to his creations, being both the progenitor of the technique and a citizen subjected to its capacities. In the latter role, they should operate as responsible members of a larger “cultural community” of enlightened public opinion that transcends political frontiers and the prejudices of history. The role of the cultural community is to nurture the advance of knowledge through social, educational, and other structures.73 But how could this “cultural community” restrain naked power and hubris? There must be a comprehensive answer because the “flights from understanding” are often supported by the “whole texture of a civilization.” A rigorous study of insight allows for a recovery of human dignity by a re-appropriation of cognitive processes that required attentiveness, intelligence, and proper evidence. If the “dynamics” of this process favoring insight are grasped, then there would be some guidance for reordering the course of human conduct and eliminating the sources of these “flights” so completely that the cultural community would never again be

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subject to their influence. Science has an important role in combating the “flights from understanding” in educational systems.74 Having asserted principles for an engagement with modern science, Lonergan applied a similar analysis to technologies. This parallel analysis made sense because modern science and technology were no longer divided kingdoms as with the ancient Greeks. There was instead a sliding scale of relationships from pure theoretical research to engineering. This scale of differences could not obscure an underlying unity because they pursue mutually supportive objectives as “functionally related parts within a single world.”75 As in the case of science, the advancement of technological knowledge also required certain practical preconditions. There must be a working model that is feasible, financially viable, and responsive to existing markets or demands. With such preconditions met, the creation of a technology is an act of creating meaning in what was previously only potentiality. As early as Verbum, Lonergan understood that technological inventions were the product of the inner word, that is, a product of human imagination and judgment. This liberation of imaginative capacities was part of a cycle of creativity in which the “new inventions complement the old to suggest further improvements, to reveal fresh possibilities and, eventually, to call forth in turn the succession of mechanical and technological higher viewpoints that mark epochs in man’s material progress.” As a result of this upward spiral of creativity, Western culture constructed the artificial world of cities, roads, and industries that were the “cumulative, now planned, now chaotic, product of human acts of meaning.” Resources and social structures were adapted in response to these developments under the aegis of a creative intelligence.76 The synergy between technology and science assisted in the development of knowledge, expanded the possibilities for action, and generally improved the human condition. The genetic method demonstrated in such advances can occur when human knowledge and social and cultural structures are optimal and follow a “law of integration” for combining diverse elements on behalf of human development. The aspiration to reach this hopeful scenario should be balanced by the recognition that human beings lived with a horizon of limited knowledge and may not successfully strive toward a horizon of complete knowledge. Lonergan opines that we must often choose between our “animal” natures and self-centeredness or we can select a “universe of being” that is known by “intelligent grasp and reasonable affirmation” that can function only through “detachment and disinterestedness.” This battle of dual natures is the constant tension present in our consciousness.77 Technology was particularly susceptible to a downward spiral of choices in the realm of applied knowledge or “common sense.” Ethical

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errors concerning technologies often resulted from the reality that common sense was concerned with the concrete and the particular. It entertains no aspirations about reaching abstract and universal laws. It is easily led to rationalize its limitations by engendering a conviction that other forms of human knowledge are useless or doubtfully valid. . . . It is incapable of analyzing itself, incapable of making the discovery that its peculiar danger is to extend its legitimate concern for the concrete and the immediately practical into disregard of larger issues and indifference to long-term results.78

The history of the twentieth century revealed in sublime detail that humanity could choose to limit its analysis of technologies in this way. In addition, personal and collective biases from greed, resentment, and cynicism exploited technologies for the benefit of a single person or group.79 Greed was present in scientists who benefited professionally and personally from their projects. Even if the interest was not financial, scientists, engineers, and their epigones were “immersed in the particular and the concrete” and were “anything but ready to sacrifice immediate advantage for the enormously greater good of society.” These biases often sprang from ingrained cultural patterns. The antidote was a new human science in which the biases of common sense were “counterbalanced by a representative of detached intelligence, that both appreciates and criticizes, that identifies the good with neither the new nor the old.” As with science, informed opinion must transcend narrow political or cultural boundaries and foster an enlightened “cultural community.”80 Beyond an informed cultural community, the correct path for technology and science was ultimately a reintegration and forgiveness in an openness to God. The modern world must recognize that “empirical science can become practical only through theology, and the relentless modern drift to social engineering and totalitarian controls is the fruit of man’s effort to make human science practical though he prescinds from God and the solution God provides for man’s problem.” This turning to the ultimate was a “religious conversion” that allowed for a perfecting of previous “intellectual” and “moral” conversions. An intellectual conversion was the stage of opting for a full critical theory of knowledge and a moral conversion seeks objective good against all potential biases. In a religious conversion, a fundamental good will and love directs humanity and allows each person to endure the difficulties of implementing their intellectual and moral conversions.81 What would the details of this theological ethics look like? Although there was some ambiguity in the details, Lonergan assumed that it would involve a measured development with careful reflection on the ultimate consequences and not just the short-term benefits of any technology.

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This long-term perspective was essential if human bias is to be restrained through a new orientation toward faith, hope, and charity. The ultimate reintegration from a religious conversion is a divine initiative that promotes a collaborative effort.82 In analyzing the role of science and technology in human culture, Lonergan attempted to chart a middle course between the sterility of scientific materialism and the closed system of a traditional Thomism. His cognitive project aimed at an “integration of dogmatic theology with historical consciousness and human science” without the “aberrations of the Enlightenment, Romanticism, existentialism, historicism, or idealism.” This integration would assist in the formation of a more intelligent and just culture. The notion of a single capital “C” culture that permeated his early education by the Jesuits made increasingly less sense in the second half of the twentieth century. The global advances of “instantaneous communication,” “perpetual entertainment,” industrial growth, and a host of other cultural phenomena assured him that the world was far more pluralistic and specialized than had been believed in the preceding generation. 83 The Church’s response to cultural diversity and the advance of the sciences and technology was often disappointing. Lonergan blamed traditional Thomists who had been rigidly antagonistic to modern science, because their Aristotelian epistemology was incapable of effectively engaging modern culture. The program of science had made traditional Christian cosmologies increasingly untenable. The first chapters of Genesis, Ptolemaic astronomy, and other traditional texts for creating a Christian vision of man and his relation to the universe had been assaulted since the Enlightenment by a host of figures from Newton to Heisenberg. There must be a religious account that adequately addresses such changes. Moreover, the Church too often rejected any attempt to engage and enrich modern culture with a “religious interpretation.” In his opinion, the Catholic Church incorrectly responded to these cultural realities and arrived on the scene “with too little and too late.”84 Lonergan’s extensive reflections on science and technology were in no small measure a sustained and systematic presentation of an alternative form of engagement for the Church. NOTES 1. Lonergan, Insight (San Francisco: HarperCollins, (157), 4. 2. Bernard Lonergan, Verbum: Word and Idea in Aquinas, ed. David Burell (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1967), 53. 3. Bernard Lonergan, “The Response of the Jesuit as Priest and Apostle in the Modern World,” in A Second Collection, ed. Ryan and Tyrell (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1996), 166–75.

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4. Frederick E. Crowe, S.J., Lonergan (London: Cassell Publishers, 1992), 58. Crowe cites from an original draft of Insight. 5. Bernard Lonergan, “Theology and Man’s Future,” in A Second Collection, 148; Bernard Lonergan, Grace and Freedom (New York: Herder and Herder, 1971), 1–2. 6. For a thoughtful analysis of Lonergan’s intellectual motivations, see William A. Matthews, Lonergan’s Quest (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 2005), 3–9; Lonergan, “Hermeneutics” (Toronto: Bernard Lonergan Center, 1962), 13. 7. Matthews, Lonergan’s Quest, 17–27. 8. J. V. Rice, “The Lonergans of Buckingham,” Compass: A Jesuit Journal (Special Issue Honoring Bernard Lonergan S.J. 1904–1984) (Spring 1985): 4–5; P. Lambert, C. Tansey, and C. Going, ed., Caring About Meaning: Patterns in the Life of Bernard Lonergan (Montreal: Thomas More Institute, 1982), 194–95, 236–37; Crowe, Lonergan, 3–6; Paul Manning, “Transcript of an Interview of the Rev. Bernard Lonergan, S.J.” (August 30, 1978) (Toronto: Lonergan Research Institute, File #947), 1–4. 9. Lonergan, “Insight Revisited,” 263–64; Lambert, Tansey, and Going, Caring About Meaning, 1–10, 47; Crowe, Lonergan, 6–14; J. A. Stewart, Plato’s Doctrine of Ideas (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1909). 10. Bernard Lonergan, “The Form of Mathematical Inference,” Blandyke Papers, no. 283 (January 1928), 126–37; Bernard Lonergan, “The Form of Inference,” Thought 18 (1943): 277–92; Manning, “Interview of the Rev. Bernard Lonergan,” 1. 11. Bernard Lonergan, “True Judgment and Science,” Blandyke Papers, no. 291. (February 1929): 195–216; Lambert, Tansey, and Going, ed., Caring About Meaning, 1, 22, 32; Lonergan, “Insight Revisited,” 263–65. 12. Crowe, Lonergan, 19–23; Lonergan, “Insight Revisited,” 265–67; Matthews, Lonergan’s Quest, 50–51, 124–25, 310–11; Christopher Dawson, The Age of the Gods (London: Sheed and Ward, 1933); A. Franklin Shull, Evolution (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1936). 13. Crowe, Lonergan, 17. 14. F. E. Crowe, “The Origin and Scope of Bernard Lonergan’s Insight,” in Appropriating the Lonergan Idea, ed. M. Vertin (Washington, DC: Catholic University Press, 1989), 21, 22; Bernard Lonergan, Understanding and Being: The Halifax Lectures on Insight (Toronto: Edwin Mellen, 1980), 350; Crowe, Lonergan, 40–41. 15. Lonergan, Grace and Freedom, 1–12. 16. Lonergan, Grace and Freedom, 14–16, 145. 17. Crowe, Lonergan, 49; Lonergan, Verbum, vii, 34, 45, 213–20. 18. Lonergan, Verbum, 33–34, 46, 186. 19. Lonergan, Verbum, 2–5. 20. Lonergan, Verbum, 1–16, 25, 47–48; Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, I, q.84, a.7. 21. Lonergan, Verbum, 47, 55–59, 62–64. 22. Lonergan, Verbum, 47–53, 58, 67–68; Lonergan, “The Form of Inference,” in Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan volume 4, ed. Frederick E. Crowe, S.J., and Robert M. Doran (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1988), 3, 6–7. Cf. John Henry Newman, An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent (London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1930), 288. 23. David Tracy, The Achievement of Bernard Lonergan (New York: Herder & Herder, 1970), 31.

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24. Lonergan, Insight, 295; Lonergan, “Isomorphism of Thomist and Scientific Thought,” 134. 25. Lonergan, “Isomorphism of Thomist and Scientific Thought,” 133–41. 26. Lonergan, “Isomorphism of Thomist and Scientific Thought,” 139–40. 27. Lonergan, “Aquinas Today,” 36, 50–53. 28. Bernard Lonergan, “Religious Knowledge,” in A Third Collection, ed. Frederick E. Crowe (New York: Herder & Herder, 1988), 136–37; Matthews, Lonergan’s Quest, 124. 29. Bernard Lonergan, “Theology and Praxis,” in A Third Collection, ed. Frederick E. Crowe (New York: Paulist Press, 1985), 186. This was originally a lecture to the annual convention of The Catholic Theological Society of America in Toronto on June 16, 1977. Bernard Lonergan, Method in Theology (New York; Herder & Herder, 1972), 95–96; Lonergan, “Aquinas Today,” 35. 30. Lonergan cites Ranke for the proposition that this process of specialization applies to scholarship in many fields including education. Lonergan, “Aquinas Today,” 37–39. 31. Lonergan, “Aquinas Today,” 46; Lonergan, “Religious Experience,” in A Third Collection, 139. 32. Bernard Lonergan, “The Subject,” in A Second Collection, 72. 33. Nicolas of Cusa, On Learned Ignorance, trans. Germain Heron, (New Haven: Yale, 1954), 114f; Stephen Toulmin and June Goodfield, The Architecture of Matter (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982), 144; Charles Seife, Alpha and Omega: The Search for the Beginning and End of the Universe (New York: Penguin, 2004), 19; David Lindberg, The Beginnings of Western Science (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), xiii, 207, 320–21; Charles Coulton Gillepsie, The Edge of Objectivity (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1960), xv. 34. Lonergan, “Religious Knowledge,” 135–36; Lonergan, “Aquinas Today,” 41. For a fine review of different models for the evolution of scientific paradigms, see Appendix 1 in Robert Richards, Darwin and the Emergence of Evolutionary Theories of Mind and Behavior (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1989), 560ff; Nicolas of Cusa, On Learned Ignorance, 114f; Stephen Toulmin and June Goodfield, The Architecture of Matter (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982), 144. 35. Bernard Lonergan, “Bernard Lonergan Responds,” in Language, Truth and Meaning (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1972), 307. 36. Lonergan, Method in Theology, 238; Lonergan, Insight, 374, 416, 470, 561. 37. Lonergan, Insight, 74. 38. Bernard Lonergan, “Responses to Harper & Row Questionnaire” (1977), as cited in Crowe, Lonergan, 75. Lonergan compared the notion of insight to the approach of Carl Rogers, a psychiatrist who encouraged clients to experience their feelings which they normally experienced but did not recognize. Lonergan, Insight, xvi, xviii, 33, 44–45; Lonergan, “Theories of Inquiry: Responses to a Symposium,” in A Second Collection, 37. 39. Lonergan, Insight, 3. 40. Lonergan, Insight, 5–6. 41. Lonergan, Insight, 19–31. 42. Lonergan, Insight, 33–53 43. Lonergan, Insight, 53–69.

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44. Lonergan, Insight, 71–80, 106–15, 461; Joseph Flanagan, Quest for Self-Knowledge (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1997), 103–5. 45. Lonergan, Insight, 70–74. 46. Lonergan, Insight, 78–79. 47. Lonergan, Insight, 76–77. 48. Lonergan, Insight, 70–102. 49. Lonergan, Insight, 121–28; Bernard Lonergan, Understanding and Being, in Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan volume 5, ed. E. Morelli and M. Morelli (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1990), 19, 293–94, 350–52. 50. Lonergan, Insight, xxii, xxiii, 12–17; Hugo Meynell, An Introduction to the Philosophy of Bernard Lonergan (New York: Harper & Row, 1976), 9–12. 51. Lonergan, Insight, 118–22, 132–34; Cynthia W. Crysdale, ed. Lonergan and Feminism (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994), 150–51; Philip McShane, Randomness, Statistics and Emergence (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1970), 206–47. 52. Lonergan, Insight, 380–81. 53. Lonergan, Insight, 586–88. 54. Lonergan, Insight, 588–94. 55. Lonergan, Method in Theology, 6–25, 237–42. 56. Lonergan, “The New Learning: Mathematics,” 130. 57. Bernard Lonergan, “The Ongoing Genesis of Methods,” in Third Collection, ed. Crowe, 147–49. Lonergan’s characterization of scientific discovery being primarily the initiative of individuals in the Enlightenment is perhaps overstated. The seventeenth and particularly the eighteenth century witnessed the creation of societies devoted to scientific research and the popularization of science in clubs, etc. For such examples in the eighteenth century, see Margaret C. Jacob, ed., The Politics of Western Science (Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press, 1992), 19–56; Roy Porter, English Society in the Eighteenth Century (New York: Penguin Books, 1984), 274. 58. Lonergan, “The Ongoing Genesis of Method,” 148, 149; Lonergan, “Method, Trend and Variation,” 13–15. 59. Lonergan, “The Human Good as the Developing Subject,” 94. 60. Lonergan, “Method: Trends and Variations,” 15. 61. Lonergan, “Method: Trend and Variations,” 13, 14. 62. Lonergan, “Method: Trend and Variations,” 19. 63. James R. Pambrun, “Philosophical Foundations of Theological Attitudes Toward Science,” Eglise et Theologie 18 (1987): 35–39; for examples of the role of institutions in more contemporary scientific controversies see Bruno Latour, Science in Action (Cambridge: Harvard University, 1987); on the essential role of outsiders in scientific developments, see Stephen Jay Gould, “Dinosaurs in the Haystack,” Natural History 101 (March 1992): 2–13. 64. Lonergan, “Method: Trend and Variations,” 21; Lonergan, Method in Theology, 315–17; Lonergan, Insight, 424–25. 65. Lonergan, Method in Theology, 317; Lonergan, “Theology in Its New Contexts,” 57, 58; Bernard Lonergan, “Pope John’s Intention,” in A Third Collection, 234. Lonergan, Insight, 424. 66. Bernard Lonergan, “Respect for Human Dignity,” The Catholic Messenger 7 (July 1953): 415.

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67. Lonergan, “Respect for Human Dignity,” 415–18; Lonergan, Method in Theology, 3. 68. Lonergan, Method in Theology, 42, 43. 69. Lonergan, Method in Theology, 226; Bernard Lonergan, “Natural Knowledge of God,” in A Second Collection, 120; Lonergan, Insight, 390–94, 524. 70. Lonergan, Insight, 390. 71. Lonergan, Insight, 391–93, 430, 508–9; Crowe, ed., Appropriating the Lonergan Idea, 20–28. 72. Lonergan, Method in Theology, 317; Lonergan, “Respect for Human Dignity,” 415–18; Lonergan, Insight, xii–xv. 73. Lonergan, Insight, xv, 236–38; Lonergan, Method in Theology, 99. Lonergan’s comments about vast and terrifying powers were probably a reference to atomic weaponry. This reference appeared in Insight which was primarily written in the years 1949–1953. Lonergan, “Unity and Plurality,” 241. 74. Lonergan, “The Role of a Catholic University in the Modern World,” 109; Lonergan, Insight, xv–xvi; Lonergan, Method in Theology, 99. 75. Lonergan, Insight, 297–98; Lonergan, “The Ongoing Genesis of Method,” 343. 76. Lonergan, Insight, 208, 297–98; Lonergan, “The Ongoing Genesis of Methods,” 343; Lonergan, Method in Theology, 78; Lonergan, Verbum, 5. 77. Lonergan, Insight, 472–75. 78. Lonergan, Insight, 226. 79. Lonergan, “Respect for Human Dignity,” 415–18; Lonergan, Insight, xi–xv, 214. 80. Lonergan, Insight, 237, 690–92, 728; Lonergan, Method in Theology, 360–61; Lonergan, “The Role of a Catholic University in the Modern World,” in Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan volume 4, ed. Crowe and Doran, 109. 81. Lonergan, Insight, 745; Lonergan, Method in Theology, 238–43. 82. Lonergan, Insight, 745. Some neo-Lonerganians have followed their mentor’s idea of turning to religions when common sense can not explain profound life issues like cloning. David Tracy, “Human Cloning and the Public Realm: A Defense of Intuitions of the Good,” in Clones and Clones, ed. Martha C. Nussbaum and Cass Sunstein (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998), 190–203. 83. Lonergan, “Hermeneutics,” 2; Lonergan, “The Respect for Human Dignity,” 415; Lonergan, Method in Theology, 99. 84. Lonergan, “The Absence of God in Modern Culture,” 112–13; Philip McShane, “An Interview With Bernard Lonergan, S.J.,” in A Second Collection, 210.

5 ✛

Thomas Merton’s (1915–1968) Contemplative Critique

The great defect of American thought is a lack of balance: too much science and not enough wisdom.1

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homas Merton, as a Trappist novice master, began a lecture to his charges in the mid-1960s by declaring, “What do I know about technology? I get into the steel building [a recent addition to the abbey of Gethsemani] and I’m lost!”2 This admission played to the stereotype of life in a cloister. Monks make cheese and fruitcake; they are not supposed to know about modern buildings. Despite his professed ignorance, Merton would advance a trenchant analysis of science and technology. He knew they were an inevitable aspect of modern life, capable of assisting or destroying human life. For example, he confided to a Holy Cross brother in Brazil, Technology could indeed make a better world for millions of human beings. It not only can do this, but it must do it. We have an absolute obligation to use the means at our disposal to keep people from living in utter misery and dying like flies. Note: there has never been such abject misery on earth as that which our technological society has produced along with the fantastic plenty for the few. What I am “against” then is a complacent and naive progressivism which pays no attention to anything but the fact that wonderful things can be done with machinery and with electronics.3

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The form of Merton’s dialogue with science and technology was influenced by a variety of factors. In his early years as a Trappist, he adopted a conflict stance and rebelled against an imposition of machinery and an accompanying technological mentality at the abbey. Subsequently, Merton came to appreciate the technological advances at his hermitage like running water and electrical lighting. With his renewed contact with the world in the 1950s, Merton’s concerns focused more on pressing social issues. His reading of social commentators such as Lewis Mumford, Rachel Carsons, Jacques Ellul, and others refined his responses to specific events like the nuclear arms race, the Vietnam War, and the rumblings of an emerging ecology movement. Merton presents any researcher with another challenge. His voluminous writings vary in style and substance and their contents afford few concentrated treatments of science and technology. For the most part the clues are unearthed in letters, journal entries, and brief expositions within larger works. In these fragmentary sources, any researcher must negotiate the swift currents of shifting enthusiasms and judgments. He accurately described himself as a “patchwork,” a “bundle of questions and doubts and obsessions,” and a person with a “complex self-contradictory temperament.” The complexity of his personality was matched by diverse intellectual interests expressed in a variety of literary forms including poetry, essays, autobiography, journals, and letters. One unifying trait in these writings was a relentless and searching intellect that immersed itself in topics such as the desert fathers, medieval mystics, existentialism, Southern writers, Shakers, Sufi poetry, and Zen Buddhism.4 The eclectic interests of Merton seem to suggest little continuity or unity. The Merton scholar Lawrence Cunningham locates a nexus in the monastic vocation where a monk chooses to be on the “margins” of society where he can address the fundamental question of the purpose of human existence. This critique was guided by the monastic themes of “integrity, purity of purpose, constant struggle, thirst for freedom, and the desire for authentic meaning.”5 Merton understood that Contemplation cannot construct a new world by itself. Contemplation does not feed the hungry; . . . But without contemplation we cannot understand the significance of the world in which we must act. Without contemplation we remain small, limited, divided, partial; we adhere to the insufficient, permanently united to our narrow interests, losing sight of justice and charity, seized by the passions of the moments, and, finally, we betray Christ. Without contemplation, without the intimate secret pursuit of truth through love, our action loses itself in the world and becomes dangerous.6

On this contemplative journey, a monk is in a special position to evaluate the positive and negative impacts of scientific and technological ad-

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vances. He labors under the “truth and judgments of God,” seeking the “manifestation of God’s transcendent and secret holiness, which is denied and opposed by sin.”7 In this task he assumes a skeptical attitude toward the claims of the world. He is leery of mass movements that “carry you away with the tide of activism” and mask individual responsibility. Another problem is that prophets must proclaim divine truths in a thoroughly secularized society, but they cannot impose a spiritual “pattern of thought” before participating in this milieu. Religious concerns must adapt a language that is comprehensible by a post-Christian culture without being co-opted when navigating in the troubled waters between activism and isolation.8

TECHNOLOGY INVADES THE CLOISTER Merton’s views of science and technology prior to entering Gethsemani in December of 1941 are largely unknown. There are a few clues. In 1939, Merton under the spell of his latest enthusiasm, James Joyce, made a list of “modern words” that included “sterile, sterilize . . . Lockheed dive bomber, magnetic mine, heavy and light machine guns, tommy guns, minesweeper.” On another occasion after participating in a radio broadcast at Columbia University, he was awed at the instant contact with so many people.9 When he entered the monastery, Merton rejected a corrupt world imbued with a technology and science that abetted corruption, falsity, and a spiritual vertigo. He advocated a fuga mundi, a “total rejection of the business, ambitions, honors, activities of the world.” The former gadfly of Cambridge was now a crusading Trappist who contrasted the salvific mission of the monastery with a fallen America. This Manichean typology was not subtle and demonstrated a “contemptus mundi.” He later confessed that he entered the monastery with “Thoreau in one pocket, John of the Cross in another, and [was] holding the Bible open at the apocalypse.”10 Even with its relative seclusion in the hills of northern Kentucky, Gethsemani was not immune to the maladies in the secular world. The reorganization and expansion of the monastery in the 1940s and 1950s imported a “small-mechanized army of builders,” whose machinery besieged a flood of new postulants. The tractor was the most dreaded of foes, attacking the fields. Merton wondered, “What thoughts it represents, what fury of man, what restlessness, what avidity, what despair. Around and around it goes clacking its despair.” In typical Merton fashion, his views on this modern dragon could vary widely. In another journal entry, he claimed that the tractors in the bottoms at the monastery were hardly

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noticeable. Despite such contrapuntal comments, his most commonly expressed opinion was that the solitude essential for contemplation was becoming scarce because of the intrusion of machinery. The assault was not only by land, but also by air. He recorded in his journals the din from airplane and helicopter flights from nearby military installations. Lighted helicopters pierced the silence of the night “going back and forth in the dark, blat-blat-blat, an awful racket.”11 While he occasionally vented about such intrusions, Merton was more concerned about the encroachment of a technological mentality in the monastery. Cistercian obligation and American ingenuity were providing too much physical energy. The brothers departed for their work assignments “like a college football team taking the field.” The monks who worked with the machinery had a special difficulty adjusting to silence and “where many machines are used in monastic work . . . there can be a deadening of spirit and sensibility, a blunting of perception, a loss of awareness, a lowering of tone, a general fatigue and lassitude, a proneness to unrest and guilt which we might be less likely to suffer if we simply went out and worked with our hands in the fields.”12 Indeed, the spirit of productivity, formulas, and efficiency had even entered prayer life. Sometimes, spiritual directors, whose calling was to assist the life of prayer assumed a technological mentality in their counseling. The “director” is thought to be one endowed with special, almost miraculous, authority and has the power to give the “right formula” when it is asked for. He is treated as a machine for producing answers that will work, that will clear up difficulties and make us perfect. . . . Such spiritual direction is mechanical, and it tends to frustrate the real purpose of genuine guidance. It tends to reinforce the mechanisms and routines with which the soul is destroying its own capacity for a spontaneous response to grace.13

A PROPHETIC ASSESSMENT OF THE TECHNO-SCIENTIFIC CULTURE With his opening to the world in the mid-1950s, Merton admitted that technology, for better or worse, was a reality at Gethsemani. Monks in modern air-conditioned rooms could no longer claim a separation from technology.14 Merton accepted a qualified reconciliation with the world. A major stimulus in this transformation from conflict to dialogue was a separation of individual persons and the technological and modern systems in which they lived. As early as August of 1948, there are hints of a change.

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Although I feel alienated from everything in the world and all its activity, I did not necessarily feel out of sympathy with the people who were walking around. On the whole they seemed to me more real that they ever had before, and more worth sympathizing with.15

This was one of the first hints of a shift from a stance of unqualified conflict with the secular culture. He would continue to struggle on occasion with a “contempt” for other human beings. At the Cincinnati airport in 1952, the passengers seemed filled with a “moral corruption that had been brought in by the planes from New York.”16 The solitude of his religious life gradually became a medium for a genuine contact with the external culture. It was no longer a sanctuary for a rejection or a denial of social obligations. Nonetheless, there remained certain temptations. A prideful solitude could exclude “God and society.”17 These reflections on society finally climaxed in the “Vision in Louisville” in March of 1958 on a Louisville street corner. I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all those people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream of separateness, of spurious self-isolation in a special world.18

Merton’s developing ideal of solidarity centered on a connection with individual human beings. The mistakes and faults of the broader culture remained as urban life often exhausted and deadened the spiritual quest. This is reflected in the “the constant noise of machines and loudspeakers, the dead air and the glaring lights of offices and shops, the everlasting suggestions of advertising and propaganda.” The “technological furies of size, volume, quantity and speed” were symptomatic of an age of desperate illusions. The city, to the extent that it succumbed to such illusions, was corrupted even if the inhabitants should be rescued.19 Louisville left me with a sense of total placelessness and futility. The immense movement, spread over everything, of hot traffic and irritated people, in a complex swirl of meaninglessness. They could have everything within reach. Why all this senseless movement? And the noise and the stink. . . . Yet I love the city too and the people in it, though not their foolishness (which of course is not their fault).20

As these observations in 1962 suggest, Merton had a heightened interest in social concerns from the middle of the 1950s that brought a calibrated skepticism to bear on the influence of science and technology. He warned of a global capitulation to the primacy of “man’s desire to better himself and his world by science.” Given this temptation, “the central problem

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of our time” was how humanity could render science serviceable to man and not political power. In the final analysis, the “Church must try to save modern man from his Faustian tendencies, and not become a sorcerer’s apprentice while doing so.”21 For his task as a contemplative critic, Merton was handicapped, because unlike Maritain, Teilhard, and Lonergan, he had little formal training in the sciences He had only taken a few courses in astronomy and geometry at Columbia University in the 1930s. Beginning in 1957 Merton tried to correct his ignorance by reading with admiration a number of works about physicists. He supplemented biographies and texts with scientific magazines and science fiction.22 Displaying his typical intellectual enthusiasm, a journal entry in 1957 revealed the “first contacts with this beautiful mind and person who is Einstein.” He would later confess that “Neil Bohrs and Co. are definitely among my no. 1 cultural heroes.”23 In his studies, Merton discovered that scientists were often insightful regarding the need for international cooperation. Werner Heisenberg correctly recognized the enormous impact of scientific advances on traditional cultures. Although fond of particular scientists and their insights, there were also some caveats about their opinions on religion. Einstein was in a “muddle” like many “cultivated men” because he could not accept the divine in an “integrally social manner” and opted instead to accept a pure intelligence.24 Science also provided, however, some insights for the religious life. Quantum physics denied Newtonian claims to perfect cause and effect. The deity was no longer a “Supreme Engineer” who created rational rules for the operation of the universe and then departed from creation. Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle had suggested that activity at the subatomic level is not capable of predictive certainty. This discovery undermined any scientific determinism that excluded religion. Indeed, the uncertainty principle reminded Merton of Saint John of the Cross’s claim that God ultimately eludes concepts. Moreover, such discoveries in quantum physics revealed that the science of the nineteenth century had really been a belief system based in part on faith and speculation and not perfect objectivity.25 While he learned about and evaluated the strengths and weaknesses of science as a discipline, Merton was most concerned when scientific knowledge created suspect technological inventions. Catholic thinkers represented polar positions on the issue of technical advances.26 Merton’s critique of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin exhibited a significant ambivalence, wavering between admiration, indifference, and criticism. He had a personal affinity for the struggles of the French priest who was subject to “all the usual petty machinations of a baroque, political Church to keep him quiet,” but he initially found the substantive positions of his French

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colleague baffling. While Teilhard exhibited personal courage, valid religious intention, and creativity in developing novel approaches to theology, his work was “pitifully naive in its confusions and its good will.” In addition, the science was questionable, the poetic prose lamentable, and the theology suspect. The neologisms were a “bit romantic” and the “activism” in his analysis “seems to have a very tinny kind of sound when you tap on them to see what they are like.” In sum, the Frenchman was guilty of a “fantastic progressivism.”27 While he had profound concerns, Merton reconsidered Teilhard when he read the apologia of the theologian Henri DeLubac, who emphasized his fellow Jesuit’s insight that matter and spirit are two aspects of the same reality. The connection of matter and spirit was also justified theologically with its connection to the doctrines of incarnation and the mystical body of Christ. Teilhard employed the Pauline doctrine of pleroma, or the fullness of God, to aver that Christ created and redeemed all things from the “servitude of corruption.” The redemption of matter was not foreign to Christianity because the Eucharist was the matter in which Christ gave himself to humanity and through this act redeemed matter by a participation in the divine.28 Merton agreed with Teilhard’s proposal for an intense recapitulation of everything in Christ through prayer, liturgy, and especially work. Thus, technology and science will “humanize and spiritualize matter, preparing it for the advent of Christ.” In proposing this vision, Teilhard was a “pilgrim of the future” who wagered on human advancement. Teilhard, like Pascal, placed a wager that God needs man. Without humanity, God “cannot be fully manifest in his creation.” Thus, the human being was the structural key to the meaning of being and the organization of the universe.29 Still, it was difficult to agree with the French priest’s assertions that the hydrogen bomb and the communist takeover of China were signs of human advancement in the noosphere. This view of totalitarian regimes seemed to undermine his earlier balanced understanding of participation in the world. This naiveté suggested that the Jesuit had difficulty explaining the “mendacity and hatred of humanity, particularly in technological warfare.” Teilhard also rejected the assumptions of any Christian piety that denied the material world in order to remain fastened to a purely spiritual realm. Some of Teilhard’s followers vastly simplified this to the point of requiring the abandonment of solitude and prayer. For his part, Merton valued like Teilhard the work of many scientists because the process of salvation manifested itself in connecting the spiritual to the unity of the material universe. Thus, the Church must not reject scientists who are religious to the extent that their works are clues to “the immensity of the world, the greatness of the mind, and the sacred value of every new truth.”30

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These Teilhardian insights could not hide another fundamental difference, however, in the profound problem lurking behind the instances of the individually destructive applications of technologies. This destructive tendency resulted from an almost irresistible human compulsion to dominate nature. This misguided libido dominandi was reflected in Adam’s prideful act of trying to improve his “wisdom and science” in the Garden of Eden when humanity exchanged a “perfectly ordered nature elevated by the highest gifts of mystical grace for the compulsions and anxieties and weaknesses of a will left to itself.” The consequence of this fall was a devotion to false and egoistic goals rather than the love of God. This disobedience prompted an “orgy of idolatry” that nurtured a relentless quest for money and status as an anodyne for the alienation of the modern world. This Pascalian “divertissement” attempted to dull the reality that action was only a means and not an end.31 In the 1960s, the reading of Lewis Mumford and Jacques Ellul provided some depth and breadth to Merton’s instinctive distrust of the frenetic activity in the contemporary human condition. Mumford declared that the technological revolution had made the prime directive, “will this work?” instead of “what is it?” or “is it right?” In 1964, Merton received a copy of Jacques Ellul’s The Technological Society. The French sociologist’s critique of technical progress was “provocative,” “full of firecrackers,” and attractive to a monk who had for years rejected the implicit activism flowing from the machinery at the monastery. The fundamental contention of The Technological Society was whether a mentality of progress and process should trump all other ideological or institutional worldviews. At its most fundamental level, “technique” was an “automatic self-determining system in which individual choices have largely ceased to count.”32 Technique was corrupting because it buttressed the notion that each individual was an autonomous creature capable of continual improvements leading to the liberation of the human condition. Paradoxically, the result of technique was bondage, not freedom because technology alienates those who depend on it and live by it. It deadens their human qualities and their moral perceptiveness. Gradually, everything becomes centered on the most efficient use of machines and techniques of production, and the style of life, the culture, the tempo and the manner of existence responds more and more to the needs of the technological process itself.33

The total claims of “technique” opposed any religion or philosophy not fully attuned to the requirements of efficiency and material progress. What was the moral basis for judging science or technology if we eliminate religion and ultimate principles? There remained only an allegiance to a rudderless process in which creation is its own justification. There

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was almost no reflection on the consequences to humanity of such a mandate. The proper order of control was reversed with humanity serving the machine because of a “vast uncontrolled power which is leading man where he does not want to go in spite of himself.”34 With the mandate of technique to pursue efficiency, Christianity became irrelevant in responding to the moral and psychological dimensions of the contemporary predicament. In his article, “The Angel and the Machine,” Merton explored the loss of the angelic presence in contemporary life. Angels were superfluous in a modern world dominated by an abstract science and the frenetic activity of technique. Unfortunately, the angelic demise robbed the world of the personal character of divine revelation as a source of grace and freedom. The angelic warnings and encouragements were replaced by the momentary and futile desires of production. The angels could only be reclaimed at the boundaries of human experience where they can teach us how to rest, to relax in silence, to “let go,” to abandon ourselves not in self-conscious fun, but in a self-forgetful faith. They can deliver the world from its “massive boredom.”35 While eliminating the need for angels or any other religious explanations, the ubiquitous demands of technique also eliminated any significant opportunity for the individual to discover within themselves the “spiritual power and integrity which could be called forth only by love.” Contemplation unlike air flight “suspends modern life” and truly “gets you somewhere.”36 For the contemplative, air travel could provide moments for reflection on immanence and transcendence. A flight from Indianapolis to Minnesota in 1956 inspired a poem, “White Pasture.” In the poem the airplane suspends the passenger between heaven and earth where he can meditate on the ethereal among the clouds. Yet, the serving of a meal was a reminder to “do something Earthy lest we become too spiritual.” These spiritual speculations remain undiscovered by most of the passengers numbed by their modern preoccupations and on their journeys continuing to “go nowhere.”37 Another form of transportation, the automobile, also had negative connotations, because it wasted resources, clogged streets, and was symptomatic of a mythic American “flight from reality.” The car was a fitting symbol for the entire culture.38 The attachment of the modern American to his automobile and the symbolic role played by his car, with its aggressive and lubric design, its useless power, its otiose gadgetry, its consumption of fuel, which is advertised as having almost supernatural power . . . that is where the study of American mythology should begin.39

There was another technology, television, which facilitated a different sort of disorder. Although he had never seen an extended amount

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of television, Merton was informed that it was becoming a mainstay of American culture and that by 1962 an estimated 90 percent of households had a television and the average viewing period was six hours per day. Merton observed that the long viewing hours produced “a very fine picture of hell sometimes. When I see advertisements I want to curse they make me so sick and I do curse them.”40 Of all of the inventions of the twentieth century, the computer was perhaps the instrument that most completely embodied the problem of technique. The computer alienated humanity through its rapid binary processes and lack of independent capacity for thought or judgment. Merton sketched in one of his journals a story line that centered on the diary of a computer still operational after a nuclear apocalypse. The computer commented on nothing, but does so “brightly, busily, efficiently, in joyous and mechanical despair.”41 The anthropological errors displayed in the cybernetic revolution inevitably seeped into social mores. Human beings were reduced to “biological machines endowed with certain urges that require fulfillment.” Marriage was increasingly viewed as a contract based on momentary considerations of the potential of each person as a product. The object becomes not a loving covenant, but a profitable deal in which we “unconsciously think of ourselves as objects for sale on the market.”42 Why would humanity accept a regime of “technique” that nurtured a coarsened view of social relationships? In part, the problem was a misguided epistemology. As the physicist Max Born noted, it was a triumph of the intellect instead of reason. The intellect distinguished between the possible and the impossible, while reason distinguished between the sensible and the senseless. Thus, manned space flight could simultaneously be a triumph of intellect and a failure of reason.43 A society strictly guided by intellect will not have the resources to constrain technology as individual creativity and authentic experience were conceded to experts and their technocratic systems. Flannery O’Connor in her novel, The Violent Bear it Away, explored the myth of the scientifically oriented expert. In this novel the schoolteacher was the representative of the modern world and was “illuminated and blessed with a scientific world view” and is “acquainted with all the best methods for helping people to become happy and well-adjusted in the best of all possible societies.” The teacher was determined to liberate a young boy from the “obscurantism and superstition” of one of his family members, “the prophet,” who sensed that the teacher was full of the conviction that the infinite rightness and leveling power of “scientific method” justified his transforming other people into his own image, which is the image of nothing.44 Despite the isolated protests of a few writers like O’Connor, the technoscientific experts pursued a reckless agenda that attempted to control

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nature. Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring provided examples of the capacity of nature to resist human manipulation by the survival of insects that were rendered ever more destructive because the pesticides that were aimed at the insects devastated other animals.45 The ecological destruction was another example of a misguided ideal of progress wrecking the divine creation. Someone will say: you worry about birds: why not worry about people? I worry about both birds and people. We are in the world and part of it and we are destroying ourselves, spiritually, morally and in every other way. It is part of the same sickness, and it all hangs together.46

This destructive tendency of the technological society was also extant in the technologies of war. Some hint of these concerns came early. While he accepted the Catholic just war doctrine, he could not, even in World War II, view “killing people with flame throwers as any form of Christian perfection.” The death of his brother, an assessment officer on a bomber in the Second World War, intensified his feelings. Merton eventually concluded that science in the service of a wartime government quite easily forgets its humanistic aspirations. This capitulation stemmed from a misguided anthropology. Science was concerned with “man in general” and with the individual human being only insofar as that person was part of a statistical unit. Such an approach ignored the aspirations and uniqueness of each human being.47 The ethical limitations of science allowed it to create military technologies like nuclear weapons that threatened civilians. These weapons were the result of a “moral ignorance and callousness” that were symptomatic of a nation without “clear objectives.” The ideal of scientific humanism employed an “anti-humanism” directed by technocratic elites. Lyndon Johnson’s Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara, trained in efficiency at Ford, was typical of the modern bureaucrat lost in “abstractions, sentimentalities, myths, delusions.” In such technocrats, a “surface idealism” and a “celebration of warm human values” hid an unreflective technological paradigm of capacities and progress.48 Nuclear weaponry adopted the irresistible logic of the technological mentality. The Indianapolis, a cruiser carrying the materials for the atomic bombs to Tinian Island, had instructions that if the ship was sinking to save the uranium before the crew. The nuclear weapon had become more valuable than human life. Moreover, the language of birth and faith were ironic choices for code words of the project. The spare and calm verses of the poem “Original Child Bomb” depict the unreality of an act which was too logical and detached. The tone of detachment signaled that the danger of nuclear war was not from insane men obeying insane orders, but from sane men following sane orders that were both efficient and exact. The

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defense expert Herman Kahn in Fortune magazine declared “reasonable” an entire set of options that would result in the killing of millions. After the creation of this weapon, there was a tendency to move too quickly to a position of moral absolutes contradicted by the facts. Complex realities and considerations cannot achieve this degree of certainty.49 We must also not forget the potential victims. Merton had met with some Hibakusha, who were the Japanese victims of the American atomic bomb blasts, and he was reminded that abstract speculations on nuclear war might end in the death of millions. This conjunction of technical virtuosity and human annihilation was possible because there was an insufficient grounding in nontechnical values, particularly transcendent ones. Human beings in this process became a product, a thing to be manipulated and perfected, or if necessary deleted. True objectivity, therefore, demanded the recognition of the real consequences to human life and society in playing the nuclear card. Despite his radical analysis for his time, Merton’s tactical assessments on the nuclear issue could be surprisingly pragmatic. He admitted some merit, for example, in the plan of Edmund Teller for a limited and purely defensive tactical nuclear strategy as a means to prevent an unlimited conflict.50 Other scientists such as Neils Bohr, Leo Szilard, and Werner Heisenberg were among those who grasped the problems with their atomic discoveries in a “widely human way.”51 Why did many scientists, albeit a bit tardy, exhibit a keen sensitivity to the ethical dimensions of the nuclear project? In a response that resonates with Maritain (natural law) and Newman (the voice of conscience), Merton observed that The natural law has not been and cannot be abrogated. It is written in the hearts of all men, including Communists. It can of course be violated and silenced and indeed it is frequently and systematically violated, and has been for centuries in numberless ways both by societies and individuals. Still it must be recognized that the voice of conscience cannot be permanently silenced. Men will continually be confronted with truth. Even if natural ethics do not guarantee protection against the danger of nuclear war, there should be at least a vestige of sanity and common sense that would make us all realize that massive nuclear destruction should be avoided.52

With an obligation written on the heart and expressed in the conscience, many prominent scientists eventually advanced a disarmament agenda. Merton corresponded with Leo Szilard, one of the founding fathers of the atomic bomb, who eventually opposed the expansion of nuclear weapons. In the early 1960s Szilard had contacted the monk about his proposal for a peace lobby. Merton acknowledged that these proposals were “as close as anything I have seen fitting on with Catholic moral teachings and the Popes.” Specifically, Szilard held that one of the superpowers must

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make the first move and he recommended a limited unilateral initiative. This initiative would declare that the United States would not bomb Soviet cities with atomic bombs unless they first initiated such an attack. A warning to the civilian populations would precede any detonation of atomic weapons.53 Merton wondered whether it was possible to bring Szilard and the other peace movements under a common umbrella organization to exert some collective pressure on the political process. To secure a common effort, he wrote Szilard a letter in April of 1962 praising the scientist’s recent initiatives and offered to donate royalties from a recent book to a Catholic peace group. The letter criticized certain Catholic realist thinkers on nuclear weapons while praising scientific opposition to the bomb that countered the “absurd, inhuman, and utterly distorted assumptions that have become the basis of thinking of the majority.” Szilard responded that he was grateful for the interest and promised to keep Merton notified of his program for securing signatures in opposition to the bomb. When Szilard died two years later, there had been no additional contacts. The opportunity for close cooperation was lost, perhaps because of the extent of their commitments and the late date of the communication.54 Even if Szilard and Merton had met, their pacifist ideals were contrary to the mood of the country and many in the Church. This period witnessed a renewal of the old debate about the patriotic obligations of American Catholics. In October of 1962 Dom Gabriel Sortais ordered him to desist from publishing any more articles on issues of war and peace. Creative solutions to this problem were developed. Two articles were published under pennames and many of the letters were mimeographed and circulated among friends.55 The devastating reality of nuclear weapons confirmed that an early intervention was essential in regards to future technological issues. Merton realized in 1967 that genetic mutations from x-rays might be a harbinger of a “drastic genetic change in the near future.” He proposed that leadership be exerted to control genetic advances so they would not be employed “haphazardly.” He declared that “once again it becomes imperative that there be some concerted action by the best minds everywhere to control this power in view of the interests of man.”56 Nobody was exempt from the problem of technique. Medical facilities applied a technical mentality to individual patients. In his personal experiences, hospitals were a “totally alien country” where long bouts of passivity are broken by unannounced medical interventions. Swirling teams of medical providers arranged “ingenious and complicated happenings” in a “medieval frenzy.” Doctors are really “artists” who employed a “remarkable flair for improvisation on people’s backs, elbows, guts, etc.”

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Only the human contact of nurses and friends helped to mitigate the dehumanization in these invasions.57 The dehumanizing modalities of medical care once again demonstrated that human beings were too often the raw material for systematic technical manipulations. At industrial plants, factory workers served the modes of production. When he dropped off a package at a General Electric plant in Louisville, he observed the sublime power of industrial techniques. What struck me most was the immense seriousness of the place—As if I had found at last what America takes seriously. Not churches, not libraries. Not even movies, but THIS! This is it. The manufacture of refrigerators, of washing machines, of tape recorders, of light fixtures. This is the real thing. This is America.58

The problem was not work per se. Moderate amounts of labor could “purify and pacify the mind and dispose [a person] for contemplation.” The problem was that excessive amounts of work agitated the soul. The interior life must not be subjugated to “unnatural, frantic, anxious work, work done under pressure of greed or fear or any other inordinate passion.” Even if such work was freely chosen, it signaled that a form of proportionate labor had been lost in the modern world.59 The problems detected in military weaponry, medical care, and industrial labor demonstrated the hegemony of Ellul’s “technique” in many cultural systems. Specific technological inventions raised parallel concerns. The turning of science or technology into an idol resulted in a state of alienation, limited any moral critique, allowed the qualitative to become quantitative, and substituted an artificial world for nature at every turn. In exchange for easing the rigors of human life, science and technology often sacrificed at the altar of progress many humanizing elements such as truth, love, and justice.60

BALANCE AND THE FUTURE OF HUMANITY In discussing the problem of science and technology with a Japanese Hibakusha, Merton noted that the West had too much science and not enough spiritual wisdom. Our culture must reinterpret the world as a creation of God, as fallen “due to the self-idolatry of godless man and his society,” and as the locus of a divine redemption in which humanity is “summed up, perfected, and completed in Christ.”61 In a dialogue with the world, the key to fostering a more humane culture was to develop an anthropology that accounts for human failings and yet affirms our participation in the beauty of the creation and the ultimate purposes of the divine in history. Each individual must initiate a new path by rejecting the claims

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of technique and seeking within himself or herself an integral life that balances the spiritual and the physical, the rational and the imaginative. This quest requires a reassessment of one’s basic value system through a contact with the true ground of being. The contemplative thus seeks a form of wisdom that is not “simply an aesthetic extrapolation of certain intellectual or dogmatic principles, but a living contact with the infinite source of all being, a contact not only of minds and hearts, not only of ‘I and Thou,’ but a transcendent union of consciousness in which man and God become, according to the expression of Saint Paul, ‘one spirit.’”62 In seeking divine contact, Merton held in his latter years that western contemplatives could benefit from eastern traditions that warned of excessive attachment to things or actions of the world. Merton knew well the quote of Chuang Tzu, “He who is controlled by objects, loses possession of his inner self.”63 The world should be transcended by a pure consciousness that is not “consciousness of or about something or someone.” There is a withdrawal into the self in order to face the “deepest forces of reality itself.” Zen Buddhism thus recovers an “immediate awareness” of the spiritual life that was not “dimmed by the technical progress and prestige of science.”64 While contemplation and the inner life uncovered a path to enlightenment, there were also external salves for the western psyche traumatized by technique. Gazing at the stars in the Kentucky sky, he recounted that in its etymological roots, contemplation meant to look for portents in a portion of the sky. Merton had shown an interest in the stars since learning about them from his grandmother. As a college student he had taken a course on astronomy at Columbia.65 The astronomical reflections of a contemplative stand in contrast to the concerns of the technological world. For a contemplative, creation is more than the raw material for technological manipulation; it is the privileged locus of a secret and eternal love. Out of the heart of that dark warmth [the forest] comes the secret that is heard only in silence. . . . So perhaps I have an obligation to preserve the stillness, the silence, the poverty, the virginal point of pure nothingness which is at the center of all other loves. I attempt to cultivate this plant without comment in the middle of the night and water it with psalms and prophecies in silence. It becomes the most rare of all the trees in the garden, at once the paradise tree, the axis mundi, the cosmic axle, and the Cross.66

Merton’s hermitage provided in his later years a perfect location for ruminations about nature. It was, to borrow a phrase from T. S. Eliot, “the still point” in a turning world between the tended garden of the monastic fields and the wilderness of the forest. Here a person could confront the “lush tangle of life and death” amidst the pools of water, the cadence of

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frogs, and the rustling trees. In many of his most trying moments, nature was a resource for centering his life when it came dangerously close to spinning out of control. 67 The gift from nature of purification and healing inspired an ecological sensitivity that the modern world blocked through a “technocratic and self-centered `worldliness.’“ The goal should instead be an ecological balance like the hermit shares with the environment around his home, because nature and humanity connected us to the Pauline promise of a divine redemption.68 To express the replenishing wisdom of nature and the dangers of human pride, Merton fashioned a modern myth, “Atlas and the Fatman.” In this myth, the three main characters are Atlas, a titan who represents the forces of nature, the deluded Fatman who wishes to be an allpowerful deity, and the narrator. On his journey in the world, the narrator observes the Fatman, like King Canute, attempting to command nature. The Fatman is the symbol of a deluded technological society attempting to dominate its environment. By contrast the titan, Atlas, represents the forces of a spontaneous and beautiful nature that seeks reconciliation with humanity. If there is an appropriate response from humanity, Atlas will provide mankind with peace and wholeness.69 This myth of “Atlas and the Fatman” suggests that American culture did not respect nature. A failure to respect nature was in part the consequence of a domination mentality that precipitated violence and destruction. This mentality was prominent in writers like Ernest Hemingway, whose “male virility cult” exploited nature at every turn.70 The myth of a civilizing destruction stemmed from the Puritan fear of the “hideous and desolate wilderness” that represented an uncontrolled domain of moral wickedness. Taking his cue from Max Weber, the taming of this dark world of unconstrained nature led to prosperity. This religious perception was subsequently co-opted to sustain the myth of capitalism with the “land ruined, the water contaminated, the soil charged with chemicals, ravaged by machinery.” Merton rejected this strain of historical thought and admired instead the Transcendentalists, who perceived that nature was the realm of God, a location for healing and sanity. The wilderness offered spontaneity that balanced the unchecked rationalism in the city. Merton’s views had evolved from a description in 1955 in which he managed the elimination of beech trees that were “beautiful, but useless.”71 How then to reconcile this environmental ethic with Catholicism? A valued principle of Thomism was that grace perfects nature, but there must be a nature left to be sanctified. Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring asserted that technology’s constant imperative to construct efficient projects had compelled the use of insecticides that threatened to destroy much of the environment. Carson’s warnings meshed well with the “biotic ethic”

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of Aldo Leopold who opposed the regnant “pseudo-creativity deeply impregnated with hatred, megalomania and the need for dominion.” One of the pioneers of the ecological movement, Leopold, insisted that humanity was part of an interdependent biotic community who maintains its integrity, stability, and beauty as a fundamental ethical principle. Amidst this ecological threat, the Catholic Church “couldn’t care less, at least today.” The Church’s response lagged behind the responses of “humanistic philosophers, artists, psychoanalysts, poets, conservationists, hippies.” These blunt comments were designed to ignite a religious awareness, because the Church must adopt an ecological conscience and “do it fast.”72 While Merton enjoyed nature as wilderness and accepted biotic imperatives, both mental and physical, he also realized that humanity lived by cultivation. The idea of tending nature as a garden can also be a positive paradigm. After all Adam was to “act as God’s instrument in cultivating and developing the natural creation.” A reliance on water, the interior power of the seed, and the quality of the soil intimated a human stewardship of creation. In this stewardship paradigm, agricultural labor preserved a sense of humility and piety that had been lost in the technological society.73 Ultimately, the restoration of the balance between nature and humanity required the cultivation of a “mental ecology” that unified the symphony of existence and blended the sound of the rain on the roof, the smell of black coffee in the morning, and the writings of the Taoist philosopher, Chuang Tzu.74 This mental ecology sought a consilience of the diverse pieces necessary for human flourishing in a divine plan. In addition to contemplation, nature, farming, and the cultivation of a mental ecology, Merton recognized that there were ways of employing individual technologies that were consonant with a balanced life. The scale of the technology was important. Huge projects like the space program were a colossal waste of resources and promoted a cycle of illusion. Technology must adapt and accept a human scale in order to be complementary to the contemplative life. Technology at the abbey must be more conducive to the contemplative life. For example, he recommended that monks should alternate shifts between louder and quieter machinery.”75 Over time, Merton conceded that technologies like the camera could provide important aesthetic experiences. Initially, he resented the intrusive camera and its “awful instantaneous snapshot of pose, of falsity eternalized.”76 Several years later, his views would change dramatically. Fascinated by the photographs of John Howard Griffin, Merton borrowed his camera as early as 1964 and received a camera from him in 1968 that he gratefully employed in the months before his death. The terms for accepting the camera are instructive. Griffin could have it back at any time, including the death of the renter. This is not merely an act in accord with

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a vow of poverty, but recognition that the technology was secondary to the contemplative life. The machine must not be coveted, but employed as an artistic lens. On his many walks, the “Zen camera” then became a “catalyst for contemplation.” It creates mental images and a “heightened awareness very similar to meditative prayer.”77 The means and ends of a productive process were also part of judging a technology. In opposition to the regnant mass production mentality of technique, craftsmen incorporated a balanced understanding of life and faith. Merton admired the historical example of the Shakers, a sect that had broken with the Quakers and believed in celibacy, universal brotherhood, pacifism, the equality of the sexes, and the communal sharing of goods. Merton visited a former Shaker colony near the monastery and admired their artisanship that was simple, warm, and through a “wordless simplicity” humbly expressed their religious devotion. Moreover, the Shakers understood that the good of the work and the worker are connected. The worker must develop a conscience about his or her work. The work proceeds to make an object according to their order and use. A product or a service done correctly produces a spiritual satisfaction. This means that the work must reflect competency and care; it demonstrates more than proficiency but less than obsession.78 Merton also recognized implicitly what Romano Guardini explicitly described in his Letters from Lake Como (1923–1925), that there was a positive connection of nature to certain forms of technology. The key for Guardini was that a true culture was elevated above nature and yet remained close to it. In such a quest, human beings must “master nature by the power of mind and spirit, but we ourselves remain natural.” When a technology masters nature completely then “a living closeness to nature has been lost.” Thus a sailboat that utilizes the wind is immersed in nature while an ocean liner overcomes and is independent of the forces of nature.79 For Merton, the camera, tape recorder, and craft skills demonstrated that technical methods, as Guardini noted, can be consistent with a search for beauty, faith, and contemplation in harmony with nature and its processes. These vocational benefits prompted an admission in 1967 that he might need to “take back some of the things that I have said about technology.” The machine can be an “innocent,” a medium through which human errors are transmitted and magnified. Largescale processes and machines that express and foster a technological mentality are not innocents.80 Turning from the resources of the individual for seeking contemplation and personal renewal, the question persists on how to assess the societal impact of science and technology. A Christian contact with the world must be capable of expressing its ethical judgments on specific technical applications. In formulating these judgments, we must draw a distinction

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between theoretical science and technology. Morality will not have any jurisdiction over pure science as a form of knowledge. In contrast, the application of science to create machines or in novel techniques is not “universally beneficial” and is a subject of ethical study and judgment. The development of ethical principles in a techno-scientific society is difficult because the creation of new inventions and processes occurs very swiftly and the malevolence of these capabilities hides beneath a veil of rationalization and righteousness. Slogans and simple formulas replace serious reflection. Consider the slogan of the World’s Fair of 1933–1934 in Chicago, “Science Finds, Industry Applies, Man Conforms.” Destructive technologies are often unchallenged and participate in an “expensive and complicated form of cultural disintegration.”81 The central problem of the modern world is the complete emancipation and autonomy of the technological mind at a time when unlimited possibilities lie open to it and all the resources seem to be at hand. Indeed, the mere fact of questioning this emancipation, this autonomy, is the number one blasphemy, the unforgivable sin in the eyes of the modern man, whose faith begins with this: science can do everything, science must be permitted to do everything it likes, science is infallible and impeccable, all that is done by science is right. No matter how monstrous, no matter how criminal an act may be, if it is justified by science it is unassailable.82

Confronted with this technological triumphalism, how does one construct a response that restores authenticity and integrity? The first rule is to proceed with caution. There were dangers in denying the role of science and technology. As noted in Gaudium et Spes, science is a “sign of God’s grace” and the “Christian message does not demand neglect of the world and progress but an obligation to do these things.” The Church must assist in discovering through a difficult deliberative dialogue any ethical reservations.83 In this deliberation, the creativity and autonomy of theoretical science is to be preserved, but its application in technology must be consistent with religious first principles. Scientists and engineers are not necessarily the most objective judges of the legal and ethical parameters of their actions. They focus on efficiency not morality and they often have a vested financial interest. They are not the primary preservers of justice that “has greater worth than technical advances.” Justice concentrates on the primacy of the person that is in accord with the common good of humanity and will only be secure when technology was made “to serve man” through a recognition of human limitations within the rule of law.84 Assuming these problems, what restraints such as laws or regulations were appropriate to impose on technologies? There was no systematic exposition on this subject by Merton. In his lecture notes on technology

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for the novices, he does cite with approval the following principles from Admiral Hyman Rickover’s lecture, “A Humanistic Technology”: 1) The short range private goals of all interested parties must be balanced with a consideration of the common good; 2) The health and lives of citizens must be protected and even extended to insure the “psychic health” and the ineffable nature of every human person; 3) Any technology must conform to the principle that the liberty of an individual ends where it harms another; 4) A technology must be assessed in advance as to its potential for harm. The technology should not be applied until it can be rendered harmless; 5) Authorities should consult and listen carefully to the advice of their experts.85 This public policy formula needed the leavening insights of other disciplines. Who might provide this assistance and be allies in a technological critique? Despite the seepage of “technique” into every dimension of human life, there was a “widespread rebellion” against the “established cult of science.” This prophetic protest was labeled “vitalism” by Merton. It had very diverse sources of inspiration from Henri Bergson to Sigmund Freud and some followers like Gabriel Marcel and Teilhard de Chardin among Catholics. Vitalism did not reject science per se, but only rejected its totalizing tendency that denied the sanctity of the individual. Vitalism flowed in a “current” between scientism and a rejection of modern life. In its religious versions, it perceived God as an “immanent mystical force” that was manifested through the evolutionary process.86 A Catholic may be unlikely to accept most of the “eccentric theological implications of vitalism,” but there was common ground in a rejection of the “objectivity of science” and the “primacy of the living subject.” The individual is the situs of spontaneity, uniqueness, self-expression, and fulfillment, but this focus on the individual can also glorify irrational and subconscious forces that can foster resentment and even nihilism.87 The uncertain possibilities of an alliance with vitalism were not Merton’s only problem in formulating his cultural critique. Within the Church, Catholics tended to be divided between “passive and inert conventionalists” who blindly cling to what is familiar and a small band of eccentric faddists “who are in love with anything new because it is new.” Instead, a proper Catholic humanism must begin with a sound anthropology. The vitalist imagery of man bringing God into the world by his own creativity is partly correct, but it is only correct as poetic imagery and not theology. In Christian humanism, there is a creative response to

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grace and this creativity “actualizes the divine life” in each person. God’s being, however, is not the result, as in vitalism, of man’s immanent creative powers. Rather, the freedom and creativity in man flows from the “infinite, necessary and absolute being of God” through the “mystery of freedom, creativity and grace” centered in the incarnation.88 There remains the difficulty of how the historic message and symbols of Christianity can be communicated in an age of computers and nuclear capabilities. The insatiable demands for newness in a technological and market-driven society can be maintained for an extended period by the manipulation of advertising. Fortunately, faith can penetrate through the white noise of advertising jingles. It is a gift from God and revealed at the heart of the Gospel. The message may be ignored in the contemporary world because it is not lived by Christians. If Christianity becomes a living faith, then it would be more believable. The world might then attach importance to a Christian call to cultural transformation.89 There is also hope for a Christian humanism in the final analysis because each person longs to recover his or her true self. The products of technique can only lead to “pseudo-satisfactions” that produce a profound anxiety. This anxiety will promote within the human heart a call for renewal, a “liberation of creative power.” The deadening impulse of modern life can only offer hyperactivity and “pseudo-celebrations” in various forms of artificial entertainment. In contrast, the Church is a place of “assent and acclamation of man’s entire being” where there is both true forms of “festivity” and contemplation. The antidote is a conversion requiring the death of our false external selves and the internal seeking of God in silence and prayer. The presence of his likeness transforms each person as they are “drawn” by love into the “space of a sublime and unthinkable freedom.” The result of this conversion is the creation of “new men” in Christ. The progress of the individual is inevitably linked to the progress of society. A Christian humanism founded on our inner spiritual awakening will build the kingdom of God in this world by seeking a society that is just, humane, and peaceful. Hence, social initiatives must insure for all a reasonable standard of living, a reasonable degree of freedom, opportunity for education, and a mature participation in political and cultural formulations.90 Merton’s analysis of detrimental and beneficial technologies, ethical issues, and a Christian humanism suggested that the world was at a crossroads. Our choices will guide us toward either a false collectivity or a human community consonant with a Christian humanism. The contemporary world might choose to live in a collectivity united by the desire to maintain “enormous,” “obsessive,” and “uncontrollable fabrications” of our “selves.” In a collectivity we yield to being “part of a pure myth” in which they abdicate “conscience, personal decision, choice, and responsibility.” This

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“fabrication” of a “self” mutates each person into one of Ionesco’s rhinoceri who comply with every illusion of the collectivity. The collective “ignorance” of mass man is the “axiomatic foundation of all knowledge in the human collectivity.” As a result, human society becomes “putrid, it festers with servility, resentment, and hate.” Technology and science are conspirators in this process by providing for every material need that fosters an illusion of omnipotence. Conformity and material abundance are then the twin foundational principles that bind the individual to the collectivity.91 The result is not happiness but a collective despair, a wound that can only be healed by a religious balm. No amount of technological progress will cure the hatred that eats away the vitals of materialistic society like a spiritual cancer. The only cure is, and must always be, spiritual. There is not much use talking to men about God and love if they are not able to listen. . . . In other words, since faith is a matter of freedom and self-determination—the free receiving of a freely given gift of grace—man cannot assent to a spiritual message as long as his mind and heart are enslaved by an automatism. He will always remain so enslaved as long as he is submerged in a mass of other automatons.92

How then to stop being mindless cogs in the machinery of the collectivity? There are two paths to this liberation that are not mutually exclusive. The individual can choose social activism, which rejects the mantra of collectivity by opting to assist others “without thought of personal interest or return.” Another option to achieve a release from the siren call of the herd’s collective life was through poverty, renunciation, and contemplation. This approach challenges the illusions of the collectivity and allows for “peace and understanding.” This illumination is the foundation for a renewed contact with humanity since the contemplative is every man in his true nature, solitary and poor. Having discovered a vital spiritual path, the contemplative can accept an honest relationship with all other beings.93 In accordance with Gaudium et Spes, Merton argued that the aforementioned paths of social activism and contemplation can build true communities. This form of community enables communication among authentic persons, because individuals have “faces, identities and histories of their own.” They are no longer isolated cogs in the mass society and can communicate with one another in the “openness and dialogue of love.” The “openness” involved the recognition that one’s self is in “confrontation with and in free, vital relation with the existence and potentialities of the other.” This relationship is based on Martin Buber’s I-thou communication instead of the I-it communication with the other as object. A community is not guided by “interest and necessity, but by love and grace.”94 So we must make our choice and it will make all the difference.

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What we have then is a conflict between two concepts of community: a false and arbitrary fiction, a collectivist togetherness, in which all possibility of authentic personal existence is surrendered and one remains content with one’s neutral quasi-objectified presence in the public mass; or a genuine community of persons who have first of all accepted their own fragile lot, who have chosen to exist contingently and thereby have accepted the solitude of the person who must think and decide for himself without the warm support of collective fictions.95

In the final analysis, Merton posed two conceptions for the future, a collectivity and a community. These ideals provide criteria for assessing the impact of science and technology that can be compared as follows: Collectivity 1. Favors material progress and prosperity; 2. Grants a priority to the pursuit of exotic and scientific achievements instead of human values; 3. Allows an excessive focus on work, internally generated goals and timetables in an obsession to reach monotony, but in harmony with human creativity and dignity; 4. Trusts in an unassisted human wisdom to discern and achieve proper ends; 5. Permits technologies that dull human intelligence through the passivity in the instruments.

Community 1. Favors the priority of moral growth and the dignity of the human being; 2. Grants a priority to the knowledge of the community and each person as a member of the community; 3. Is concerned with the human dimension of work that should not be boring, routine, or focused on higher levels of production; 4. Supports spiritual as well as rational values; 5. Promotes technologies that sharpen the intellect of the consumer.

In his quest for coherence in the modern world, Merton approached the subject as a prophet. His prophetic approach was not always popular, but Merton accepted that he must “face the anguish of being a true prophet, or he must enjoy the carrion comfort of acceptance in a society of the deluded by becoming a false prophet and participating in their delusions.” This “iconoclastic criticism” must be forthright and fearless to be sure, but it must also be nuanced and prudential in its contacts with science and technology. After all, there was much to learn from science and technology and a climate of respectful dialogue could make the learning process a mutual one.96 In this dialogue, he probed for both points of

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compatibility and social pathologies. In regards to the latter, he favored a prescription that would include social awareness, contemplation, nature, ethical reflection, scholarship, art, and the nurturing of genuine communities in a Christian humanism. If this prescription was rejected, the prognosis was bleak. Science and technology are indeed admirable in many respects and if they fulfill their promises they can do much for man. But they can never solve his deepest problems. On the contrary without wisdom, without the intuition and freedom that enable man to return to the root of his being, science can only precipitate him still further into the centrifugal flight that flings him, in all his compact and uncompromising isolation, into the darkness of outer space without purpose and without objective.97

NOTES 1. Hiromu Morishita was a teacher and a Hibakusha, a survivor of Hiroshima, who visited Merton at Gethsemani on a trip around the United States in 1964 by a group of Hibakusha. Merton, “Letter to Hiromu Morishita” (March 8, 1965), in The Hidden Ground of Love, ed. William H. Shannon (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1985), 459. 2. This is from a recorded lecture of Merton to his novices at the Abbey of Gethsemani. Thomas Merton, “The Christian in a Technological World” (Electronic Paperback Series). 3. Merton, “Circular Letter, Lent 1967,” in The Road to Joy, ed. Robert Daggy (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1989), 98–99. 4. Thomas Merton, Learning to Love Exploring Solitude and Freedom, ed. Christine M. Bochen (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1997), 125; Thomas Merton, Thomas Merton in Alaska (New York: New Directions, 1988), 150. 5. Lawrence Cunningham, “The Monk as Critic of Culture,” The Merton Annual 3 (1990): 189, 192–97. 6. Lawrence Cunningham, Thomas Merton and the Monastic Vocation (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1999), 209. 7. Thomas Merton, The Asian Journals of Thomas Merton (New York: New Directions, 1968), 329; Thomas Merton, Disputed Questions (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1960), 222–23. 8. Merton, “Letter to James Forrest” (April 29, 1962), in The Hidden Ground of Love, 266; Merton, “Letter to Erich Fromm” (September 26, 1961), in The Hidden Ground of Love, 315; Thomas Merton, “The Christian and the World Preliminaries” (May 1966), in Merton Collected Essays, vol. 6 (Louisville: Thomas Merton Center), 48–50. 9. Thomas Merton, Run to the Mountain, ed. Patrick Hart, O.C.S.O. (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1996), (December 14, 1939) 110, (December 18, 1940) 280; Mott, The Seven Mountains of Thomas Merton, xxi. 10. Merton, Entering the Silence (March 11, 1947), 44; Thomas Merton, Dancing in the Water of Life (April 7, 1965), ed. Robert E. Daggy (San Francisco: HarperCol-

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lins, 1997), 225; Thomas Merton. “Is the World a Problem?” Commonweal 84, 3 (June 1966): 305. 11. Thomas Merton, The Sign of Jonas (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1953), 5; Merton, Turning Toward the World (June 16, 1962), ed. Victor A. Kramer (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1996), 228; Merton, Entering the Silence (December 14, 1946), ed. Jonathan Montaldo (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1996), 32; Merton, Learning to Love (September 20, 1967), ed. Christine M. Bochen (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1967), 293. 12. Merton, “Letter to Dom Gregorio Lemercier” (October 23, 1953), in The School of Charity, ed. Patrick Hart, O.C.S.O. (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1990), 68–69; Merton, A Search for Solitude (July 23, 1956), 54; (August 14, 1956), 64; Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander (New York: Image Books, 1966), 25. 13. Thomas Merton, Spiritual Direction and Meditation (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1960), 18–19. 14. Merton, “The Christian in a Technological World,” 50–51. 15. Merton, Entering the Silence (August 14, 1948), 223. 16. Merton, Entering the Silence (March 6, 1949), 287; Merton, A Search for Solitude (July 26, 1952), 6. 17. Merton, Entering the Silence (June 19,1949), 326; (August 26, 1949), 362. 18. Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander (New York: Doubleday & Company, 1966), 156–57. The Louisville Vision occurred on March 18, 1958. For his journal version of this event see Merton, A Search for Solitude (March 19, 1958), ed. Lawrence S. Cunningham (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1996), 181–82. 19. Thomas Merton, Raids on the Unspeakable (New York: New Directions, 1966), 4, 11, 70–71; Thomas Merton, No Man Is an Island (New York: Harcourt Brace & Co., 1955), 108–9. 20. Merton, Turning to the World (September 6, 1962), 244. 21. Merton, “The Christian and the World” (May 1966), Merton Collected Essays, vol. 6 (Louisville: Thomas Merton Collection), 49; Merton, Dancing in the Water of Life (April 15, 1965), 228; Thomas Merton, “The Church and the ‘Godless World’4,” The Merton Seasonal 27 (Spring 2002): 3–9. 22. Merton, “Letter to Jacques Maritain” (June 11, 1963), in The Courage for Truth, ed. Christine M. Bochen (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1993), 38. He noted in this letter the evidence for evolution in Africa in a National Geographic article. Merton, Dancing in the Water of Life (September 12, 1964), ed. Robert E. Daggy (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1997), 143. In 1967, he enjoyed reading Ruth Moore, Neils Bohr, The Man, His Science and the World They Changed. Merton, “Letter to Guy Davenport,” in The Courage for Truth (June 11, 1967), 252. 23. Merton, A Search for Solitude (December 17, 1957), 146. Merton’s brother, John Paul, even as a child, displayed a much greater interest in science and technology. Merton told his father’s former art teacher in 1931 that his brother, John Paul, wanted to be a scientist. Merton, “Letter to Percyval Tudor-Hart” (January 20, 1931), in The Road to Joy, 56–57; Mott, The Seven Mountains of Thomas Merton, 482. 24. Merton, Turning to the World (May 29, 1963), 324. He thanked Jacques Maritain for notes on evolution from a Thomist viewpoint. Merton, “Letter to Jacques Maritain” (August 13,1967), in The Courage for Truth, 53; Merton, A Search for Solitude (December 25, 1957), 148; (December 27, 1957), 149–50.

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25. Thomas Merton, “Contemplation and Action,” in Thomas Merton, On Nuclear Weapons (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1988), 116–38; Merton, Turning Toward the World (May 26, 1963), 322–23. 26. Merton, “Technology,” 53–55; Merton, “Letter to Lord Northburne” (June 4, 1967), in Witness to Freedom, ed. William H. Shannon (New York: Harcourt Brace & Co., 1994), 319. 27. Merton, “Letter to Jacques Maritain” (June 11, 1963), in The Courage for Truth, 38; Thomas King, “Thomas Merton on Pierre Teilhard De Chardin,” The Merton Seasonal 4 (Summer 1979): 2; Merton, Learning to Love (June 10, 1967), 246–47; (June 25, 1967) 254; Merton, “Letter to Martin Lyngs” (April 24, 1965), in The Hidden Ground of Love, 454; Merton, “Letter to Marco Pallis” (December 10, 1964), in The Hidden Ground of Love, 468. 28. Merton, “The Plague of Camus: An Introduction,” in The Literary Essays of Thomas Merton, 214–17; King, “Thomas Merton on Pierre Teilhard de Chardin,” 2–4; Merton, The New Man, 136–49; Merton, No Man Is an Island, 184. Merton cites on behalf of the Pauline idea of pleroma, Romans 18:19–21 and Colossians 1:15–17. 29. Merton, “Teilhard’s Gamble: Betting on the Whole Human Species,” Commonweal 87 (October 27, 1967): 109–11. 30. Merton, “The Universe as Epiphany,” 32–38; Merton, “Teilhard’s Gamble,” 109–11; Letter of Thomas Merton to Jean Leclercq (1964) in Thomas Merton and Jean Leclercq, Survival or Prophecy? The Letters of Thomas Merton and Jean Leclercq, ed. Brother Patrick Hart (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2002), 108. 31. Merton, The New Man, 110–11; Merton, “Letter to Henry Miller” (August 7, 1962), in The Courage for Truth, 277; Merton, The New Man, 118; Thomas Merton, Disputed Questions (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1960), 178–79. 32. Merton, “The Christian in a Technological World”; Merton, “Letter to Père Herve Chaigne” (December 28, 1964), in Witness to Freedom, 109; “Letter of Thomas Merton of December 26, 1964 to Bernard Haring,” in The Hidden Ground of Love, 383–84. In this letter to Haring, Merton recommends to the council Fathers of Vatican II Jacques Ellul’s “monumental work,” La Technique. 33. Merton, “Answers to Hernan Lavin Cerda,” 6. 34. Thomas Merton, “Una Sociedad que Esta Peligrosamente Enferma,” Punto Fina 11 (September 15, 1967): 14–16; Merton, “Letter to Bernard Haring” (December 26, 1964), in The Hidden Ground of Love, 383–84. 35. Thomas Merton, “The Angel and the Machine,” The Merton Seasonal 22 (Spring 1997): 3–6. 36. Merton, Disputed Questions, 127–34; Merton, “Letter to Rosemary Radford Ruether” (March 19, 1967), in The Hidden Ground of Love, 505–8; Merton, Entering the Silence (March 28, 1948), 195; Merton, Learning to Love (July 18, 1967), 266. 37. Merton, A Search for Solitude (July 22, 1956), 53–54; (August 4, 1956) 62. Merton wrote during another flight in 1956 that “if you can be quiet in a plane it is a wonderful place in which to meditate.” Merton, The Asian Journal of Thomas Merton, 4. 38. Merton, Learning to Love (June 18, 1966), 316. 39. Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, 76. Merton never learned to drive. 40. Merton, Turning Toward the World (October 22, 1962), 259; Merton, “Letter to Erich Fromm” (September 26, 1961), in The Hidden Ground of Being, 316; Merton, “Letter to Czelaw Milosz” (March 28, 1961), in The Courage for Truth, 72.

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41. Merton, Turning Toward the World (March 2, 1962), 207; Merton, Dancing in the Water of Life (January 31, 1965), 200–201. 42. Thomas Merton, “Love and Need: Is Love a Package or a Message?” in Thomas Merton, Love and Living, ed. by Naomi Burton Stone and Brother Patrick Hart, O.C.S.O. (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1979), 25–38. 43. Merton, “Answers for Hernan Lavin Cerda,” 6, 7. 44. Thomas Merton, “The Other Side of Despair,” The Critic (October–November, 1965): 12–23. 45. Merton, Turning Toward the World (March 19, 1963), 304; Merton, “Technology,” 54. 46. Merton, Turning Toward the World (December 11, 1962), 274. 47. Merton, “Letter to Mark Van Doren” (Lent, 1941), in The Road to Joy, 10; Merton, “For My Brother: Reported Missing in Action, 1943,” in The Collected Poems of Thomas Merton, 36; Merton, “The Church and the `Godless World’-4,” 3–9. 48. Merton, “The Church and the `Godless World’-4,“ 3–9; Merton, “Answers for Hernan Lavin Cerda,” 5–9; Merton, Learning to Love (April 16, 1966), 41. 49. Thomas Merton, Original Child Bomb (New York: New Directions Books, 1977), 293–302; Thomas Merton, Raids on the Unspeakable, 48; Merton, Dancing in the Water of Life (May 1, 1965), 245–46; (December 11, 1963), 44. 50. Merton, “Letter to Ernesto Cardenal” (September 11, 1961), in The Courage for Truth, 126; Merton read Teller with some approval in 1962. Merton, Turning Toward the World (May 10, 1962), 218. 51. Thomas Merton, The Nonviolent Alternative (New York: Farrar, Strauss & Giroux, 1971), 259, 260; Merton, Learning to Love (June 3, 1967), 244. 52. Thomas Merton, Peace in the Post-Christian Era (New York: Orbis Books, 2004), 110. 53. Merton, “Letter to Leo Szilard” (April 12, 1962), in Witness to Freedom, 50, 51; Merton, “Letter to Father J. Whitney Evans” (June 13, 1962), in Witness to Freedom, 55; Merton, Peace in the Post-Christian Era, 110–20. 54. Merton, Witness to Freedom, 38; Leo Szilard, “Letter to Thomas Merton” (May 2, 1962), in Thomas Merton Collection at Bellarmine University, Louisville, Kentucky. 55. William H. Shannon, “The Year of the Cold War Letters,” in Toward an Integrated Humanity: Thomas Merton’s Journey, ed. M. Basil Pennington (Kalamazoo, MI: Cistercian Publications, Inc., 1987), 166–71. 56. Merton, Learning to Love (June 3, 1967), 244. 57. Merton, “Letter to Father John Eudes Bamberger” (May 4, 1967), in The School of Charity, 332; Merton, Dancing in the Water of Life (May 8, 1964), 102, (August 6, 1965) 276–77; Merton, “Letter to Robert Lax” (March 1940), in The Road to Joy, 153–54. 58. Merton, A Search for Solitude (September 26, 1958), 218–19. 59. For a similar analysis cf. Simone Weil, Oppression and Liberty, trans. Arthur Wills and John Petrie (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1955), 38–39, 108–11; Merton wrote on Weil. Thomas Merton, “The Answers of Minerva: Pacifism and Resistance in Simone Weil,” in The Literary Essays of Thomas Merton, ed. Patrick Hart (New York: New Directions, 1981), 134–40; Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation, 19; Merton, No Man Is an Island, 79–80, 108–10, 131.

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60. Merton, “The Christian in a Technological World”; Merton, Dancing in the Water of Life (July 14, 1964), 126; (April 17, 1965), 230; Merton, “Technology,” 53–54; Merton, Turning Toward the World (July 9, 1962), 230. 61. Thomas Merton, “The ‘World’: The Church and the ‘Godless World’-1,” The Merton Seasonal 27 (spring 2002): 7, 8. 62. Merton, “Preface” to Japanese edition of New Seeds of Contemplation, 58. 63. Thomas Merton, The Way of Chuang Tzu (New York: New Directions, 1965), 136–37. 64. Anthony T. Padovano, The Human Journey (New York: Doubleday & Co., 1982), 123; Merton, Asian Journals, 157. Merton studied Edward Conze, Buddhist Thought in India (London: Allen and Unwin, 1962), 81. 65. Merton, A Search for Solitude, xv. 66. Merton, “The Day of a Stranger,” 183; For a compilation of Merton’s writings on nature, see Thomas Merton, Thomas Merton When the Trees Say Nothing (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 2003). 67. Merton, Dancing in the Water of Life (April 3, 1965), 224; Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation, 14, 30; Merton, Learning to Love (October 27, 1966), 151. 68. Merton, “Letter to Abbot James Fox” (October 7, 1951), in The School of Charity, 27–28; Merton, Disputed Questions, 19, 20. 69. Merton, Raids on the Unspeakable, 5, 96–107; Gloria Kitto Lewis, “Thomas Merton’s Myth for Modern Times: A Tale of the City,” The Merton Seasonal 13 (spring 1988): 5–10. 70. Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, 139, 222, 249; Thomas Merton, “An Elegy for Ernest Hemingway,” Commonweal 75 (September 22, 1961): 37–38; Merton, “Letter to Mary Childs Black” (January 24, 1962), in Witness to Freedom, 30–31. 71. Merton, “The Wild Places,” The Merton Collected Essays, vol. 8 (Louisville: Thomas Merton Center), 316–21. Merton acknowledged the influence on his thought of of Roderick Nash, Wilderness and the American Mind (New Haven: Yale University, 1967); Thomas Merton, “Wilderness and Paradise,” Cistercian Studies 2 (November 1966): 83–89; Merton, “Letter to Harry J. Cargas” (February 14, 1966), in Witness to Freedom, 171; Merton, “Letter to Sister Therese Lentfoehr” (September 25, 1956), in The Road to Joy, 222. 72. Merton, “Letter to W. H. Ferry,” in The Hidden Ground of Being (January 12, 1963), 213, 214; Merton, “Technology,” 54; Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, 26; Merton, “The Wild Places,” 326–30; Merton, Dancing in the Water of Life (May 1965), 240 . 73. Merton, The New Man, 78–82; Merton, “Letter to Rosemary Radford Ruether” (March 19, 1967), in The Hidden Ground of Love, 506. 74. Monica Weis, “Living Beings Call Us to Reflective Living: Mary Austin, Thomas Merton and Contemporary Nature Writers,” The Merton Seasonal 17 (autumn 1992): 4–9; Merton, Dancing in the Water of Life (May, 1965), 239, 240. 75. Merton, The New Man, 101–3; Merton, Dancing in the Water of Life (October 29, 1964), 158; (November 10, 1964) 164; (February 24, 1965) 209; Shannon, “Christian Living in an Age of Technology,” 184; Merton, “Letter to Dom Lemercier” (October 23, 1953), in The School of Charity, 68. 76. Merton, Entering the Silence (December 14, 1946), 32; (February 1, 1947), 38; (September 9, 1948), 232.

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77. Merton, Dancing in the Water of Life (September 26, 1964), 149. The later interest stands in contrast to Merton’s boredom with photography in 1939 when he visited a Museum of Modern Art exhibit of Charles Scheeler. The photographs were “neat and so precise and so completely uninteresting.” Merton, Run to the Mountain, 68; Patrick Hart, “Photography and Prayer in Thomas Merton,” The Merton Seasonal 10 (autumn 1985): 2–5; John Howard Griffin, A Hidden Wholeness: The Visual World of Thomas Merton (Boston: Houghton-Mifflin, 1970), 49. 78. Judith Fluornoy, “Thomas Merton and the Shakers,” The Merton Seasonal 22 (spring 1997): 7, 8; Merton, “Letter to Mary Childs Black” (January 24, 1962), in Witness to Freedom, 30–31. Thomas Merton, “The Shakers,” Jubilee 11, no. 9 (January 1964): 37–41. The analysis of work comes from a conference given by Thomas Merton at the Abbey of Gethsemani on July 22, 1964. Merton, Seeking Paradise, 99–101. 79. Romano Guardini, Letters from Lake Como: Explorations in Technology and the Human Race (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1981), 12–13. 80. Merton, Letter to Rosemary Radford Ruether (March 19, 1967), in The Hidden Ground of Love, 507. 81. Merton, “Technology,” 53–56; Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, 65–75. 82. Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, 75. 83. Merton, “Technology,” 57. 84. Merton, Turning Toward the World (June 6, 1960), 9; Merton, “Technology,” 55–57. 85. Merton, “Technology,” 55–57. 86. Merton, “Letter to Leslie Dewart” (June 28, 1963), in Witness to Freedom, 293; Thomas Merton, “The Church and the ‘Godless World’ -4,” The Merton Seasonal 22 (fall 2002): 3–9. 87. Merton, “The Church and the ‘Godless World’ -4,“ 3–4. 88. Merton, Disputed Questions, 151–52; Merton, Love and Living, 135–51. 89. Merton, “The Church and the `Godless World’ -4,” 3–5. 90. Thomas Merton, “Rebirth and the New Man in Christianity” (April 1968), Merton Collected Essays, vol. 6 (Louisville: Thomas Merton Center), 233–38; Merton, The New Man, 120–26; Merton, “Christianity and Mass Movements,” 201–11; Merton, Disputed Questions, 24, 65, 127–28; Merton’s idea of festivity comes from Josef Pieper. See Thomas Merton, review of In Tune with the World, A Theory of Festivity, by Josef Pieper, Cistercian Studies 1 (1966): 108–9. 91. Merton, Raids on the Unspeakable, 14–16; Merton, “The Other Side of Despair,” 208–9. 92. Thomas Merton, Thoughts in Solitude (Boston: Shambala Publications, 1956), xi. 93. Merton, Raids on the Unspeakable, 17–23. 94. Merton, “The Other Side of Despair,” 211–13; Merton, “The Church and the `Godless World’ -4,” 3–5. 95. Merton, “The Other Side of Despair,” 211–12. 96. Merton, Faith and Violence, 68; See also Thomas Merton, “A Buyer’s Market for Love?” Ave Maria 54 (December 24, 1966): 27; Merton, “Letter to Gordon Zahn” (January, 1962), in The Hidden Ground of Love, 649; Thomas Merton, Love and Living, 48–69. 97. Merton, “Preface” to the Japanese Edition of Seeds of Contemplation, 60.

6 ✛

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BOUNDARY TESTING

B

etween the Vatican Councils, the four intellectuals in this book contributed to the dialogue about science and religion within the Church. This process was not without risks. In their distinctive journeys, they learned how to test and explore the dangerous boundaries between two domains. Because of his neo-Thomism, one might suspect that Maritain confronted little Church discipline. Admittedly he was never explicitly censured, but this may be in part because he was not in a religious order and therefore less directly under the discipline of the Vatican. Nonetheless, Maritain was still under suspicion for his alleged naturalism and obvious deference to democracy in his work, Integral Humanism (1936). The Thomist watchdog, Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, warned him that “those in high places have asked me to tell you not to lean toward the left as you give the impression of doing.” The Dominican also implied that his French philosophical colleague was guilty of doctrinal “deviations.” Pius XII warned against his straying beyond speculative philosophy. In response to potential discipline, Maritain confided to Abbé Charles Journet in a letter, “Naturally there is the duty of submission to the church. But we have other duties, towards the truth and towards souls that must be reconciled with that submission.” Interestingly, Maritain in this correspondence also privately admitted grave doubts about the Church’s position on contraception that was “another of those tragic examples where the Church defends a truth by blockading it with ways of thinking that simple human experience has left way behind.” Ultimately, 141

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there was no imposition of discipline, but he worried about the possibility until the Second Vatican Council. Maritain confided to Paul VI in a meeting at the end of the Council of his life of “opposition and struggle” against the views of some within the Church which was acknowledged by the pontiff.1 Teilhard’s evolutionary theology sought to reconcile Church dogma with science, but these efforts often provoked condemnation. To lower his profile, Teilhard usually opted for a strategy of circumscribing his activities, asking forgiveness, and protection from his Jesuit superiors, and placing himself far from Church authorities on missions of scientific research. Like Merton, he also had some of his works printed in limited editions and privately circulated among friends. Although he avoided censure, Teilhard could not publish and had to sign statements repudiating his ideas on original sin. Nonetheless, his writings obtained some notoriety during his lifetime though scholarly contacts, lectures, and a dialogue with a close circle of friends and peers. Despite these limited forms of communications, Teilhard’s message of an evolutionary theology seemed destined for isolation from a larger audience. After his death, however, he was intellectually resurrected by the publication of his writings through a private executrix. The defense of his ideas by influential theologians and their influence on the Second Vatican Council propelled his works into prominence.2 Unlike Teilhard or Merton, Lonergan received no formal restraint on his activities. This is due to a number of factors. In contrast to Teilhard’s suspect connections to Modernism and evolutionary theory or Merton’s vocal social and antinuclear agenda, Lonergan’s formulations had a more orthodox pedigree as a form of Thomism. He also avoided censure because his complex epistemological explorations lacked the broad appeal of Merton or Teilhard. Lonergan’s pre-Vatican II writings largely eschewed controversial issues in science and his intellectual connections were less suspect. A deliberate pace of intellectual evolution complemented relatively safe subject matter and a low profile. His comparison of the relation of Aristotelian and Thomist thought to science displayed his incremental approach. In 1955, he commented on the isomorphism of Thomist metaphysics and science and their parallel processes in arriving at knowledge. By 1974, he was focusing on the limitations of Aristotelian/ Thomist propositions in comparison to modern science.3 Did Lonergan’s selection of topics consciously avoid controversy? This was probably not the primary factor, but it may have been a consideration. In his early years as a Jesuit, some budding nominalist sympathies caused a religious superior to caution, “No one remains a nominalist very long.” Lonergan recalled many years later that it was not lost on him that this “cool” reply was from a “high member of the establish-

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ment at a time when anti-modernist regulations were still in full force.” Still, Lonergan was not afraid of certain risks. While studying for his biennium in Rome (1935), his provincial superior asked him if he was orthodox. The response was yes, but he also admitted that he “thought a lot.” A sense of obedience was present, but it had not stymied his probing intellect. In 1937 he received some important advice on his obligation of obedience from Père Desbuquoix, the founder of the Ecole Sociale Populaire in Vanves. When he worried if his superiors would agree to his course of study, Père Desbuquoix retorted, “Go ahead and do it. If superiors do not stop you, that is obedience. If they do stop you, stop and that is obedience.”4 The combination in Lonergan of both orthodoxy and creativity was a source of inner tension throughout his career. Still, his methods were more successful than those of Teilhard or Merton at avoiding controversy. In his role as a cultural critic, Merton was likely to attract more notice. His social commentary emerged full bore by the late 1950s as he began to critique the world after more than a decade of relative exile. Superiors viewed with suspicion this critique and edited and in some cases denied the publication of his writings.5 The greatest degree of censorship applied to his controversial opinions about the United States and its militarism. In the midst of the Cold War, his assertion of some parallels between the United States and the Soviet Union in their materialism and collective mentality provoked outrage in many quarters. Critics bristled at his examples of a technological mentality of progress corrupting the United States government. Such analyses finally provoked a command against publication on military issues from his Abbot General in April of 1962 because it “falsifies the message of monasticism.”6 In response to the censorship, Merton had these “Cold War” letters mimeographed and distributed to friends and colleagues. When it was suggested that these letters violated the censorship laws, however, he wrote to his publisher, James Laughlin, that “we have very strict censorship laws and I have hitherto been very conscientious about keeping to them.” He argued that mimeographing was common knowledge and only foreclosed if expressly forbidden. There was only one problem with this claim. He also published two articles under pennames in The Catholic Worker and these articles appeared to expressly violate the prohibition.7 In the wake of these intellectual odysseys, the subsequent decades witnessed a significant easing of Church discipline. John XXIII proclaimed that the Bride of Christ must dispense mercy and reasoned persuasion toward other perspectives. Since his pontificate, there have been no subsequent anathemas or a Syllabus of Errors. The strictness of Church discipline has also declined because of the vast expansion of Catholic lay

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intellectuals after Vatican II and the development of many independent Catholic institutions of higher education.8 THE WINDING PATH The four intellectuals studied in this book not only provide examples of the process of boundary testing but they also substantively contributed to a century of challenges and changes for the Church. It might be helpful to retrace the evolution of official teaching after the crisis of Modernism before considering when and how a more vital engagement with the world and more specifically science and technology was adopted by the Catholic Church. On the eve of the First World War, the legacy of the First Vatican Council and Modernism dictated the disciplining of Catholic intellectuals who strayed too far toward the world and away from magisterial teachings. Such discipline promoted a legacy of caution, but there were signs of a different approach under Benedict XV. The new pontiff’s first encyclical in 1914, Ad beatissimi, called for a cessation of animosities within the Church, but there was little dismantling of the many antiModernism mechanisms. After Benedict, Pius XI encouraged scholarly projects related to science, expanded the Vatican Library, and founded the Pontifical Institute of Christian Archeology (1925) and the Pontifical Academy of Sciences (1936).9 The Church’s confidence in its Thomism during the first half of the twentieth century permitted a revived engagement with science and technology in these official actions. The revival of a major thinker, Aquinas, with the imprimatur of an encyclical, was bound to present two extreme possibilities of interpretation. Brian J. Shanley, O.P., delineates the extremes in The Thomist Tradition. At one extreme stand those who believe in strict fidelity to the original thought as expressed in the canonical texts; in their conservative view the main work of the school is exegesis, commentary and defense against external criticism. At the other extreme stand those who believe that fidelity to the master entails adherence to a shared set of basic insights that must be creatively rethought and contextualized in the light of contemporary intellectual currents . . . the main work of the school is engagement, dialogue with other views, internal self-criticism, and the formulation of answers to new questions from out of the tradition’s resources.10

These antinomies between the Vatican Councils were represented by Reginald Garrigou Lagrange on the side of the traditionalists and on the other side the transcendental Thomists and the works of Yves Congar and Henri de Lubac. Of course there were also numerous permutations between these possibilities.

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The neo-Thomists working on religion and science tended to be much closer to the traditional side of this equation, but there were concessions and innovations that flowed from a response to the modern context. In addition to the neo-Thomism of Maritain and the transcendental Thomists, by the Second Vatican Council there existed at least four distinct Thomistic approaches to a philosophy of science with more to follow in the succeeding decades. Why the varieties of thought? Many of the arguments dealt with the respective roles and relationships between metaphysics and the study of the physical world in the natural sciences. One strain of Thomism, centered at Louvain, privileged metaphysics as the starting point of reflections on science. Metaphysics concentrated on necessary truths that were uncovered by reason while the natural sciences could only discover contingent truths based on empirical data. There was a tradition from Duns Scotus that the proper object of the human intellect is to focus on metaphysics and not physical being. The Scotist tradition passed down to the modern age through the teaching of Francisco Suarez in the seventeenth century and then the textbooks of Christian Wolff. In the 1950s, it was espoused by Fernard Renoirte and A. G. Van Melsen. In this tradition, learning begins with the study of being before applying its principles to the physical sciences. The Louvain School, in contrast to Maritain, viewed their philosophy of nature as an applied metaphysics that was divided into cosmology or the study of the inanimate world and psychology or the study of living beings.11 The privileging of metaphysics had strong opposition. In an early salvo of the Thomistic renaissance, Cardinal Desire-Joseph Mercier attacked this tradition and those who divorced the sciences and metaphysics and did not comprehend their complementary aspects.12 The concerns of Mercier were echoed by the River Forest School of Dominicans in the United States that was located at the Aquinas Institute of Theology in River Forest, Illinois, from 1939 to 1969. The Institute hosted an Albertus Magnus Lyceum in order to promote a dialogue between scientists and philosophers. Prominent members of this school included William Kane, James Weisheipl, Benedict Ashley, and Raymond J. Nogar. William A. Wallace was influenced by but was not present in River Forest. The River Forest School and its Albertus Magnus Lyceum started from a different textual basis than many of the other Thomist schools focusing on the commentaries of Aristotle in which philosophy was treated according to its own principles. A second principle was that Aquinas was viewed as a thorough Aristotelian. Any use of Platonic elements by Aquinas was fully compatible with Aristotelian principles and methodology. Hence, any attempt to isolate metaphysics from natural science or to limit the empirical aspect of Aristotle was highly suspect. Given the privileging of the sciences and empirical knowledge, the logical order for learning

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begins with the natural sciences and technology that employs natural objects for human use. The human person is part of the study of nature and hence ethics must be developed to give guidance to human freedom. For the River Forest School, the study of metaphysics was last in the order of learning and would “compare, coordinate, and compare analogically the results of the special sciences.” More specifically, it focused on ultimate causes that transcend the formal objects of the special sciences, but are intimately connected to them. For example, the first cause of motion is not a physical object and thus the natural science of physical causation is connected to the metaphysical concept of a first cause. Hence, reality expands into a realm that cannot be answered by the physical sciences and needs its own science, metaphysics. Natural philosophy is the process of developing first principles beginning with a definition of the formal subject of the sensible and changing world that is self-evident from a dialogical process of collection and classification. This process then moves toward more specific classifications of species, genera, etc. This Thomist process has implications for the development of modern science. Contemporary science since Galileo has mathematized science to such an extent that it has eliminated final causality. This mathematical approach has suggested that it can proceed from a small number of certain axioms. But this tactic only abets a false certainty reflected in Descartes and Newton’s rationalistic reductionisms in physics. The River Forest School, as reflected in the review of William H. Kane, O.P., of Maritain’s Philosophy of Nature in the Thomist, criticized the French philosopher’s separation of the philosophy of nature from the natural sciences. Kane disagreed that the separation is required because of the specific distinctions and diversities at the level of the natural sciences. By contrast, the River Forest School calls for the orderly investigation of the proper principles, causes, and elements of natural phenomena and the understanding of specific details in the light of natural causes. This process of “concretion” is sorely lacking in Maritain’s description of the roles of natural philosophy and the natural sciences. Mr. Maritain rejects the integral and unified view of the philosophy of nature which the ancients held. He points out how desperately modern science and natural philosophy need each other, but he has juxtaposed rather than united them in inner continuity and harmony. Instead of reducing the philosophy of nature to the skeleton of its former grandeur and admitting a science of nature which is not philosophical, would it not be better to agree with St. Thomas that the essences of natural things are sufficiently manifested by their sensory appearances and that natural philosophy can and should attain to the specific details of natural phenomena?13

The result of the aforementioned deviations from the Aristotelian roots according to Benedict Ashley, a prominent River Forest alumnus, is that

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the coherence of the Thomist tradition has been badly fractured. There are no longer coherent scientific concepts for time, space, causation, etc. The resulting scientific worldview is similarly skewed and filled with paradoxes. We have more knowledge but may inhabit a world of blind chance. We have an immense control of nature, but no ethical values to guide us. Human communication and agreement have become increasingly problematic. A tempting error in this context is to embrace a theology that substitutes religious experience for rational philosophy.14 The River Forest School was dispersed with the closing of the River Forest facility in 1969. Weisheipl had already departed before the closing for the Midieval Institute in Toronto. Several of the former members, while continuing their work on the philosophy of nature, have subsequently worked on other areas like the issue of the history of science by William Wallace or medical ethics by Benedict Ashley.15 Charles de Koninck at the University of Laval confronted this issue of the natural sciences and natural philosophy by seeking an answer on how to reconcile in the modern era the division between the senses and the constructs of theoretical science. His solution was to posit that Aristotle discovered the basis for modern science by viewing the natural sciences as dialectical continuations of a fundamental natural philosophy discoverable in his Physics (Motion), On The Heavens (Cosmology), On Generation and Corruption (Physical Alteration), and On the Soul (Biology). The central insight of Aristotle and his interpreter, Aquinas, is that the senses initially guide us to certain conceptual realizations about the world detected by our senses. For example, in Aristotle’s Physics, he begins with motion in general, developing concepts applicable to every kind of change before moving to special kinds of change such as walking or growing. This process is abandoned in the modern sciences that no longer carefully define general terms such as “infinity,” “movement,” or “time.” The problem with the modern scientific approach is that it leaps directly to specificity such as the “way a movement is measured, in terms of time and place.” Since time and place are not defined, they are soon replaced with symbolic constructions like mathematics. Such symbolic constructions, however precise, leave “the basic issues as obscure as ever.” De Koninck concludes that “the only way of achieving true success in such investigation is by a deeper understanding of what was at first only vaguely known.” Why is this the case? De Koninck asserts that a true scientist must be a philosopher in order to seek out the meaning of the most general terms like “time,” “space,” “motion,” etc. To do this, she must go beyond an excessively tight focus on the results of a specific science. Otherwise, the results would not fully explain the phenomena. A scientist who is not connected to the philosophical issues is no more than a technician,

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is merely a tool. Such a technician might describe a human being as no more than an “accidental superstructure made up of electrical charges.” The question might be raised about why modern science has too often adopted the position of the technician, an excessively narrow understanding of any science. This is partly the result of the success of the natural sciences, which has promoted increasing specialization. The specialization is inevitable because of the expanding scope of the natural sciences. De Koninck admits that philosophers may have the duty to think about the general terms because scientists are so busy in their specialties, but the best scientists like Heisenberg and Born understood the role of thinking at the level of metaphysics for the sciences. They implicitly understood that the connection of metaphysics and science is real and must be admitted in principle because “what is knowable as to us must not be confused with what is knowable in itself.”16 Any refusal to accept the connections of metaphysics and the concrete world would either place us in a narrow materialist universe or in “a hopeless metaphysics” in “the empty air of unqualified verbal ‘being.’” Regarding this latter position, he refused to adopt the separation of metaphysics and the natural sciences. Instead, there must be a dialectic between the philosophy of nature and science, the concepts evident from the realm of the senses and the “intellectual creations of science.” Hence, he also rejected Maritain’s view of the sciences as a distinct discipline using emperiometric knowledge.17 He summarized his conviction that the concepts of a natural philosophy extended into the natural sciences which was a departure from some of his fellow Thomists as follows: There is no doubt that our view is not popular among contemporary scholastics. It appears so much more simple to have a neat set of theses called philosophy of nature, and to relegate more concrete investigations to the “scientists.” . . . Still, to enquire what any object of nature is, and to pursue the enquiry down to the last detail, is surely a pursuit which deserves to be called philosophy. To answer such a question, all the branches of natural science should be brought into play, and each of these remains open to infinity. At least this much we know. 18

The death of Charles de Koninck in 1965 and the closing of the Second Vatican Council seemed to spell the end of his distinctive trajectory of Thomism in Canada. The closing of the Council signaled some changes that had been developing for years. The social realities of Canada were changing; the deep devotion of Catholic Quebec was eroding with each passing year. The Church would no longer be the primary provider of social and educational services. At the same time, other strands in Catholic philosophy in Canada began to develop a larger following. The Franciscan Ephraim Longer assisted the revival of Augustinian and neo-Platonic

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traditions. Strands of secular philosophy would get a greater hearing such as Hegel, existentialism, phenomenology, and eventually analytical philosophy. Whatever the cause, the decline in Thomism was precipitous. In the words of Leslie Armour, a student of de Koninck, the besieging forces against Thomism at this point moved so quickly that the Quebec Thomism of Laval University “was swept out of sight” before anyone really had a chance to make a scholarly assessment of its conditions and achievements. New interests like the transcendental Thomism of Lonergan moved in to occupy the attention of Canadian Catholic intellectuals. An example of the fate of Thomism is an article in honor of the seventeenth centenary of the death of Aquinas in 1974. In an edition of Laval théologique et philosophique, Jean Richard addresses the question of analogy and symbolism in the philosophy of St. Thomas, but he also employs the thought of Karl Barth, Paul Tillich, and Bernard Lonergan. The article illustrates how the geography of intellectual discussion had not abandoned Aquinas at Laval but had entered a much more eclectic era. While interest in de Koninck’s work has flagged for the aforementioned reasons, the Notre Dame Press is publishing his complete works, which might help to revive interest in his works.19 Despite the variations in the regnant Thomism and the more positive climates for the religion and science dialogue that gradually emerged, the evidence suggests that from the time of the anti-Modernist encyclicals to the Second Vatican Council, certain issues, like evolution, continued to provoke heated debate. On the issue of evolution, a majority of Catholic writers on the subject remained skeptical of its scientific foundations and often posited a special intervention by God. Scientific skeptics like Hans Driesch added weight to their claims. A minority like Canon Henri de Dorlodot of Catholic University in his book Darwinism and Catholic Thought (1921) began to accept the transformation of species by natural selection without a special intervention. Catholic scientists in France in 1925 organized the so-called Council of Altamira of laity and clerics to discuss evolution. The scientists sent a memorandum to Pope Pius XI, who was impressed and through Cardinal Mercier let it be known that no hostile action was forthcoming from the Vatican against those espousing evolution if the findings remained “prudent” and “objective.” Within the Vatican, the diversity of positions among key cardinals also mitigated any chance for a formal condemnation of evolution.20 By the 1930s, some form of nonhuman evolution was taught to and accepted by most Catholics. The problem was human evolution. The theologian, Rev. Ernest C. Messenger, in his book Evolution and Theology: The Problem of Man’s Origin, argued that the Church had not obtained

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adequate proof to teach evolution, but individual Catholics could do research on and promote the theory and the evolution of the human body. His “Christian Naturalism” suggested that God acted through secondary causes whenever it was possible. Messenger’s cautious embrace of evolution as probable but not conclusive was widely criticized but not formally rebuked.21 Despite the diversity of Thomistic positions and the calls for a greater acceptance of evolutionary theory, Pius XII remained more skeptical than Messenger and his fellow travelers and he connected their position to the liberalization of biblical interpretation promoted by the advocates of nouvelle theologie. In Humani Generis (1950), he reiterated his opposition to the Modernism of the “new theology” which incorporated elements of materialism, existentialism, historicism, and eirenism. This latter category, “eirenism,” was a broad definition of the Modernist heresy that sought to conform Church structure and dogma to a host of heresies. The encyclical reaffirmed the role of the magisterium and the inadmissibility of theological discussion after the Holy See expressed its judgment. Theologians should limit their roles to explicating how the declarations of the magisterium were justified by scripture, tradition, and a Thomist orthodoxy in philosophy.22 As for evolutionary science, Pius XII attempted a reconciliation, but on traditional terms. He recognized Darwin’s allowance of the possibility of a divine creator behind evolution and proclaimed that research and discussion on the issue of evolution were acceptable, but within traditional limits. These discussions must be in conformity with Thomism and the judgments of the magisterium. Certain established doctrines such as divine creation, infusion of the soul, and the doctrine of original sin remained inviolable as posited in “revealed truth and the documents of the Teaching Authority of the Church.”23 Although Humani Generis presented some mixed messages, Pius XII’s approach to science in many of his other addresses was more encouraging. Science, properly linked to religious constraints, must study God’s handiwork. In an address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences in 1955, he praised science and vowed, “The mission confided to you, therefore, ranks among the most noble, for you should be, in a sense, the discoverers of the intentions of God. It pertains to you to interpret the book of nature, to describe its contents, and to draw the consequences therefrom for the good of all.” If science can “enlarge the horizon of human possibilities,” technology must organize these “achievements to work for the immediate service of man.” The extension of human knowledge through electronics, mechanization, nuclear energy, transportation, space missiles, and chemistry allowed for a “fuller and freer development of life.” Television and radio were a wondrous bounty if employed on behalf of communicating

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the faith. Technologies were representative of the “living presence of God” in nature and the wisdom and power of divine creativity.24 There were criticisms as well. Echoing some of the objections of Maritain, the pontiff proclaimed that science can provide factual content about nature, but such content must be analyzed and synthesized within an “underlying principle of unification.” This unity was no longer possible through a purely mechanistic science due to the advances in quantum physics. The proper philosophy to achieve a synthesis of faith and science was Thomism. The old conflict and independence models must yield to integration on the terms set by faith. Pius XII was well aware that this subservience would not be readily accepted because the values and capacities of Christianity sometimes seemed to “pale” before the “achievements of technology.”25 Despite undeniable advances, science and technology must remain subservient, however, to religious instruction, particularly on moral and ethical issues. Modern scientific thought is not accustomed to draw back from any problem, and that is legitimate as long as it remains in its own order. But, as the moral universe transcends the physical world, every acquisition of science is located on a plane inferior to the absolute ends of the personal destiny of man and to the bonds that unite him to God. Scientific truth becomes a snare from the very instant it believes itself sufficient to explain everything without being connected with other truths and above all with the subsisting Truth, which is a Being living and freely creative.26

The consequences of this rejection of a transcendent moral compass were devastating. A passive science and technology had served to propitiate a “night” of “technological terror.” Having studied the latest technological developments, Pius XII warned as early as 1943 that the nucleus of the atom could be smashed to release an enormous amount of energy. A technological terror was demonstrated not only in the atomic bomb, but also in the more quotidian dangers of automation and its resultant unemployment, which were not oriented to the “whole man.”27 While Pius XII admired science and sought to make it compatible with Thomistic philosophy, his successor, John XXIII, sought new directions with fewer caveats for the achievements of science that were to be “welcomed” by the faithful who should “encourage” research. The Church must applaud the “resounding achievements of today’s technicians and scientists, whose feats permitted the harnessing of nature in a way which would have defied the liveliest imagination not long ago” and operated on “almost limitless horizons.”28 In contrast to Pius XII, the themes of reconciling science with faith through Thomism or employing science to confirm the truths of the faith were markedly absent. While asserting a continuity of reconciling science

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and faith from the First Vatican Council, John XXIII turned more often to the theme of creation, declaring that scientific research would provide a “better knowledge of the extraordinary riches of creation.” Indeed, John XXIII’s creation theology declared that humanity had certain rights and obligations flowing from the dominion granted to it in the first chapters of Genesis. Science could detect and explore “the mysterious forces that God has hidden in creation to serve as an aid to man and to contribute to his elevation and lasting progress.” In contrast to the Rome that Teilhard encountered a decade earlier, it was now an accepted proposition that the Church must assist the education and elevation of man on the path of progress. Why not? Humanity, through its “intelligence and freedom,” was but “little below the angels.”29 The pronouncements of John XXIII reflected many of the ideas and concepts of the intellectuals studied in this book. There was a desire to promote scientific research (Teilhard and Lonergan) and the recognition of the value of the scientific method (Teilhard and Lonergan) that were of immense benefit to human progress. The pope’s admiration for technological and scientific advances was not naïve and he expressed, like Maritain, Lonergan, and Merton, a fear that a material and technological mentality would usurp their boundaries and operate as a metaphysical or ethical system.30 Moreover, progress created both triumphs and tragedies on a global scale. In order to avoid future tragedies, a divinely ordained creation obligated humanity to a careful stewardship in which spiritual direction and careful ethical analysis balanced the push for progress.31 In a speech opening the Second Vatican Council that foreshadows the “critical openness” of John Paul II, he declared: The Church has never been stinting in her admiration for the result of man’s inventive genius and scientific progress, which have so revolutionized modern living. But neither has she been backward in assessing these new developments at their true value. While keeping a watchful eye on these things, she has constantly exhorted men to look beyond such visible phenomena- to God, the source of all wisdom and beauty. Her constant fear has been that man, who was commanded to “subject the earth and rule it,” should in the process forget that other serious command: “The Lord thy God shalt thou worship, and Him only shalt thou serve.” Real progress must not be impeded by a passing infatuation for transient things.32

There was a direct Merton connection with John XXIII. The monk had written to John XXIII in 1961 about his views on the danger of a global militarism. He received a warm note from the pontiff’s secretary about how the pope was “impressed” by the letter. Merton had previously corresponded with the pontiff several times and had even received a vestment from him. While the exact influence on John XXIII is unknown,

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many of the themes espoused by Merton on nuclear war appear in Pacem in Terris. Obviously delighted by the encyclical, Merton needled his Abbot General that it was fortunate that John XXIII was not a Cistercian because his views would invoke censorship.33 John XXIII’s qualified acceptance of scientific methods and new technologies guided the Second Vatican Council’s deliberations. The Second Council, unlike its predecessors, was exploring an opportunity instead of responding to a crisis. Humanity was passing through a “new stage of history” and the “intellectual and creative energies of man” were inevitably producing a “social and cultural transformation, one which has repercussions on man’s religious life as well.” The reaction to this situation should be dialogue not closure. The Church admitted to needing additional information to address many technical issues and this competence could only be properly cultivated in a spirit of “lawful freedom of inquiry and of thought.”34 The exchange with secular culture desired by John XXIII and the Second Vatican Council was not unknown in the first six decades of the twentieth century. Catholic intellectuals slowly found broader audiences for their ideas both in other countries and to varying degrees beyond their coreligionists. According to Michael Kelly in his article “The Reception of French Catholic Intellectuals in Britain after the Second World War,” French Catholic intellectuals initiated a “diaspora of ideas” that had a “major impact on British cultural life during the post-war years from 1945 to 1960.” The extent of the impact was determined by practical matters like the locating of effective and influential publishers, personal contacts, and visits to England. In addition, another factor was the extent that the readership was willing to accept points of view that were informed by Catholic values. Finally, the gatekeepers of key journals and book reviews influenced the level of entry into British intellectual life. As a result of their favorable navigating of such factors, Maritain and Teilhard fared well. Maritain was the most widely translated French Catholic intellectual of this period and Teilhard was the most “conspicuous” French theologian.35 In an era of increased dialogue, the Church, liberated for the first time since Constantine from its umbilical cord to governmental patronage and protection, no longer had to support the legitimacy of existing political structures, and could pursue a free engagement with the broader culture as a moral and ethical arbiter. It could focus on human and workers’ rights while supporting democratic institutions. In order to achieve such objectives, the modern world, in its political and cultural dimensions, had to be carefully, but fully, engaged. The Vatican document, Gaudium et Spes, accepted that the “scientific spirit exerts a new kind of impact on the cultural sphere and on our modes of thought. Technology is now

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transforming the face of the earth, and is already trying to master outer space.” These advances were celebrated as “triumphs of the human race” and a “sign of God’s greatness and the flowering of his own mysterious design.” There was an apology for “certain habits of mind, sometimes found, too, among Christians, that do not sufficiently attend to the rightful independence of science.”36 The popularity of Teilhard’s views at the Second Vatican Council was somewhat surprising. As late as 1962, the American bishops received an unofficial, but firm command from the curial head of the Holy Office, Cardinal Ottaviani, that no lectures were to be allowed on Teilhard de Chardin. In May of 1963, a group of theological experts signing themselves as “Periti qui Romae degunt” castigated Teilhard de Chardin’s position on issues like original sin. One archbishop complained that Teilhard had not learned that the story of the “Tower of Babel was intended to be a new constriction on the world.” Later in the Council, there were warnings against an excessive “Teilhardian optimism” in conciliar documents. Indeed, some conciliar documents that appeared to espouse Teilhardian positions were modified to appease this intense opposition.37 Despite intense opposition, there were also defenders of Teilhard. A bishop from Venezuela commented on the “cosmic dimensions of the priesthood” and the “progress of the human race and the consummation of all things in Christ.” Bishop Rene Fourrey of France praised the “very striking and noteworthy influence in the modern world of Father Teilhard de Chardin who has been quoted many times in the Council hall.” A renewed contact with science required an explanation by the Church in an accessible language the “cosmogenesis” of the universe.38 In addition to direct forms of evidence, there was also considerable circumstantial evidence of Teilhard’s influence. The interest in human research that Teilhard raised to an almost divine imperative was present in many speeches of the Second Vatican Council. The Church must have “greater confidence in researching the natural sciences” and abandon a historical antipathy as demonstrated in the Galileo case and the opposition to evolutionary theory that resulted from an excessive fear of scientific advances.39 While espousing a new openness, some of the criticisms of science and technology for adopting a narrow epistemology posited by Maritain, Merton, and Lonergan were also echoed in the Council documents. Gaudium et Spes concluded, No doubt today’s progress in science and technology can foster a certain exclusive emphasis on observable data, and an agnosticism about everything else. For the method of investigation which these sciences use can be wrongly considered as the supreme rule for discovering the whole truth. By

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virtue of their methods, however, these sciences can penetrate to the intimate meanings of things. Yet the danger exists that man, confiding too much in modern discoveries, may even think that he is sufficient unto himself and no longer seek any higher realities.40

While the advances at Vatican II were real and extensive, the Council had not eliminated all opposition to an opening to the world in general and to science and technology in particular. On the eve of the Council, the Vatican issued a monitum and faculties in the Roman Colleges issued votums against the positions of Teilhard de Chardin. In addition, there were statements at the Second Vatican Council of support for the contemporary nuclear policies of the West contrary to the hopes of Merton.41 In the wake of Vatican II, the optimism of the Council turned to caution under Pope Paul VI. His combination of optimism and caution were discernible in comments on the eve of the Second Vatican Council. In April of 1962, then Cardinal Montini declared that the Church had no desire to anathematize the “vast and marvelous civilization of science, industry, technology, and internationalized life of our time.” Instead, the Church must “absorb” secular civilization by providing to science a religious foundation and horizon that were lacking in the world. This objective, communicated not in “curses,” but in “the firm, sharp tones of truth,” would provoke stiff resistance since the modern world exhibited an “anti-clerical attitude” that was hardening into a “general prejudice.”42 As pope, Paul VI admitted that the Church had helped to foster such views by official Church transgressions in the past, but secular pundits often held the Church to impossible standards and beneath these superficial criticisms, he detected the desire to dismiss the Church as obsolete.43 While John XXIII and the Second Vatican Council attempted to balance science and religion in a hopeful vision of the future, Paul VI, like his intellectual guide, Jacques Maritain, became during the latter years of his pontificate besieged by a sense of a losing struggle. The world was “dominated” by a scientific and technological mentality that propelled humanity toward a “new positivism” in which the “methodological necessity and ideological presuppositions” of science isolated man in purely phenomenological or quantitative presuppositions. The result was a dangerous anthropological reductionism. The pontiff employed a critique that was strikingly similar to Maritain’s critique of scientism and Merton’s analysis of technique. The historical attachment to change had since the nineteenth century directed human energies to a “ceaselessly renewed and indefinite progress” that became an “omnipresent ideology” seeking greater knowledge and more consumption. The atomism and collectivization of the ideal of progress promoted the disintegration of families, labor relations, and the environment. The weakest

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of human beings were often the first to suffer from the hegemony of the technological society.44 The threat from an ideology of progress permeated Paul VI’s most controversial encyclical, Humanae Vitae. The pontiff convened a commission of primarily lay experts to advise the Vatican on the issue of reproduction, per the advice of Gaudium et Spes, to seek expert counsel on issues with scientific and technological dimensions. When the majority of the commission suggested an acceptance of birth control, the pontiff ignited a controversy by assuming the primacy of his moral teaching authority to those trained in the secular sciences.45 In reaching this important decision, Paul VI was aware of the importance of the issue of population control and the changed circumstances of the modern family, but these familial realities resulted from a dangerous human impulse to manipulate nature. Personal autonomy was attempting to assert hegemony over biological rhythms. If the natural law of human relations allowed artificial restraints, then it would become easy to void the moral law. Otherwise, a technical mentality would reduce women to objects of sexual gratification. In addition, governments would employ birth control to manage their populations. It was only through the setting of personal and governmental limits to sexual manipulation that the “integrity of the human organism and its functions can be respected.”46 The pontiff correctly anticipated that Humanae Vitae would spark widespread dissent and he countered this opposition by preferring to be “a sign of contradiction” to his age. Hence, there must be a new evangelization because the scientific mentality falsely refused to recognize the source of their discoveries. The result was that man has locked himself up within the space created by his discoveries and his scientific research and has raised a triumphant shout, “This is all there is!” Or else, finding himself bowed down under the wearisome burden of endless toil, he groans, “These are my chains, I can think of nothing else.” The scientific and technological progress characteristic of our age has become a stumbling block to mind and spirit.47

PROGENY The twisting and turning of official views reflects the testing of boundaries by the four intellectuals during the aforementioned pontificates. The four intellectuals would continue, to a greater or lesser extent, to influence general intellectual currents on religion and science after their passing. In this new age of critical openness, these intellectuals became a fertile resource for scores of subsequent scholars. A small and selective sam-

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pling of this progeny highlights their contributions. With the exception of Maritain, the expansion of their roles was facilitated by the changing role of Thomism in the wake of the Second Vatican Council. How did this happen? The theologian W. Norris Clarke summarized the process as follows: But in the sixties and early seventies, with the Second Vatican Council and the general revolt against authority and the weight of the past in all fields, quite different winds began to blow, and major sea changes began to appear within Catholic intellectual circles, too. Over some ten to fifteen years a sudden and rather precipitous decline took place in the prestige and predominance of Thomism among Catholic circles in both philosophy and theology. St. Thomas as authoritative touchstone of orthodoxy, especially in philosophy, was sometimes quietly, sometimes stridently, dethroned. . . . A steady but thinning stream of dedicated Thomistic scholars still kept the thought of St. Thomas sturdily alive and growing, but Thomism was now just one among a number of other philosophical approaches.48

The institutional supports that had anchored the Thomistic debates began to decline as well with the closing of the River Forest Seminary and the end of the St. John University Institute of Science and Religion. On the other hand, the Jacques Maritain Center at the University of Notre Dame (founded 1957) and the Center for Thomistic Studies University of St. Thomas in Houston (1980) continue a vigorous teaching, research, and publication agenda. The decline of Aquinas should not be overstated. A bibliography of Thomist writings from 1977–1990 lists no less than 4,200 entries. A modest revival in the last few decades has included analytical, feminist, new natural law theories, and John Paul II’s blend of phenomenology and Thomism.49 Thomism has continued to influence the Catholic critique of science and technology in the work of Catholic intellectuals such as Stanley Jaki, William Carroll, Benedict Ashley, and William Wallace. During Maritain’s life he influenced a number of his peers, and this influence, although lessened, continues to this day. It has been suggested that he had the largest influence of any Thomism during his life.50 One of his acolytes was Yves Simon, who sought in Foresight and Knowledge to explicate the details of the critical realism of Maritain. Many philosophers of science, like Willard Van Orman Quine, believed that philosophy was derived from science. Employing Maritain, Simon would argue for a middle position in this debate of a kinship between science and philosophy with the philosophy of science occupying a position between the philosophy of nature and the natural sciences. In utilizing this approach, Simon acknowledged that his work in Foresight and Knowledge was a “seed in the furrow in the Degrees of Knowledge.” Other scholars like Vincent Smith, Henry Veatch, and

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John Wild continued to explore Maritain’s insights in their philosophy of nature.51 William Wallace, O.P., in The Modeling of Nature (1996) observed that “the study of science has brought the movement closer, at least, to the study of nature, and thus opens the possibility that the philosophy of science may be more intimately related to the philosophy of nature than has hitherto been thought.”52 More recently, there has been a debate on whether Maritain follows a path similar to Lonergan in locating being through its ineluctability or through the senses.53 Maritain has continued to be influential in some other scientific and philosophical quarters. Scientific quandaries like the issue of nonlocality in quantum physics may need the assistance of his philosophy of nature to understand certain structural discontinuities.54 Several Thomist conferences at the University of Notre Dame in the past decade have sought to explore the continuing significance of more traditional forms of Thomism for contemporary thought including the sciences. One of the participants at these conferences, Anthony Rizzi, a physicist at Louisiana State University, is the founder of the Institute of Advanced Physics. In The Science Before Science, Rizzi employs Maritain’s philosophy of nature to remind his readers and fellow scientists of the reliability of the senses and our ability to know things from these senses that are not merely the product of empiriometric measurement. Rizzi also reasserts like Maritain the role of wisdom and the limits of modern science.55 Since Vatican II, Thomism, which was never univocal, has witnessed intense interest in engaging other philosophical traditions such as analytical philosophy and phenomenology. The question is whether such efforts will jettison the fundamentals of Thomistic metaphysics and epistemology or provide a new language and conceptual insights to bolster Thomism in the current context. The impact of these approaches on science and technological interpretations from a Thomist approach remains to be seen. It is not clear whether they will undermine, replace, or complement neo-Thomist perspectives.56 As previously noted the publication of Teilhard de Chardin’s works and the openness to his ideas during and after Vatican II allowed his ideas to move from limited intellectual circles into the public domain. The result was an explosion of interest. Mircea Eliade would comment in 1967 that the Frenchman’s immense popularity was undeniable and there must be an acknowledgment of “the cultural significance of Teilhard’s success.”57 But what was the source of this rapid cultural influence? Teilhard’s literary progeny spread quickly because his secretary, Jeanne Mortier, was named his literary executrix upon his death in 1955 and Mortier organized a committee of friends composed of family and former colleagues that rapidly published his most important writings. The Association des Amis de Pierre Teilhard de Chardin located in Paris published The Phe-

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nomenon of Man in France (1955), England (1959), and the United States (1959). The Phenomenon of Man sold 90,000 copies in its first six years in France and over 50,000 copies within two years in the United States. After the Second Vatican Council, Teilhard was embraced as embodying an optimism and openness about the modern world. John Kobler published an extensive article in The Saturday Evening Post magazine in 1963 titled “The Priest Who Haunts the Catholic World.”58 The release of previously forbidden books spurred the creation of numerous Teilhardian Associations. In 1964, the Foundation Teilhard de Chardin in Paris was created as an archive and clearing house. Teilhard associations arose in Germany (1964), Belgium (1964), and the United States (1967). The center for activities in the early 1960s in the United States was Fordham University, where Robert Francoeur attracted support and propelled the formation of the Teilhard Research Institute. The Institute sponsored a series of lectures, classes, and workshops. Conferences and lectures on Teilhardian themes have continued to be popular. For example, the American Teilhard Association noted the Teilhardian themes in the 1997 Epic of Evolution Conference in Chicago. The American Teilhardian Association regularly publishes issues of Teilhard Studies and published a set of essays titled Teilhard in the 21st Century in 2004. The religion and science journal Zygon has regularly produced articles on Teilhard and his ideas for more than three decades.59 The French priest’s unusual blend of science, theology, and spirituality would spur a very diverse intellectual progeny because Teilhard could be read as a 1) evolutionary scientist, 2) poet and mystic, 3) natural theologian, 4) Christian theologian, 5) global futurist. As an evolutionary scientist, he was greeted with reservations from scientists, but some ardent followers praised his evolutionary impulses. Ernan McMullin attributed many of the difficulties and questions raised by the Teilhardian system with scientists to his straining to reconcile the scientific and idealist strands of evolutionary theory. His notions of radial and tangential energies demonstrated this tension. The scientist will hold that natural causation is sufficient and this may explain why only a limited number of scientists have been attracted to his ideas.60 In addition, a number of scientists contended that he imported unnecessary metaphysical baggage into their field.61 Michael Heller, a physicist, criticized his view of matter or time in evolutionary theory as too concrete under contemporary theories of quantum physics and special relativity. Evolution was not an “ontological a priori,” but required certain preconditions in order to exist. Further, complexification does not require a radial energy to explain a unique event or differentiation. Current theories suggest that finely tuned initial conditions and the laws of physics and not any other factor are responsible for the development of mat-

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ter. Jacques Monod lamented his laborious style and lack of intellectual rigor. A series of Vatican-sponsored conferences in the 1990s presented scientific challenges in the form of probability and chance to Teilhardian concepts of orthogenetic development.62 Other scientists present more charitable interpretations. The evolutionary biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky might have quibbled semantically with Teilhard, but admitted that his conception of nature harmonized with the basics of biological theory. Paul Chauchard, a specialist in cerebral mechanisms and neurophysiology, supported Teilhard’s notion contra many of the Darwinians of the “within” of matter. Others suggest a compatibility with a number of contemporary theories including the Gaia hypothesis, genetic additivity, chaos theory, and the biosphere. The breaking of scientific disciplinary barriers and the unification of the sciences through physical theories such as quantum physics seemed to suggest a Teilhardian unity of energy and matter.63 He has also been compared and contrasted with a number of other prominent figures in science or the philosophy of science such as Albert Einstein, Alfred North Whitehead, Michael Polanyi, Albert Schweitzer, and Gregory Mendel. Other scientists suggest that a Lakotosian research program can be formulated from Teilhard’s vision.64 There are many ways to view Teilhard from religious perspectives. He is considered by many interpreters as a mystic, one who has an almost inexpressible direct connection with the divine. De Lubac observes that Teilhard had a passion to reach beyond the division of the world for the absolute, the plenitude and the unity he sensed in the universe. Ursula King takes Teilhard a bit further and claims that he is a new kind of mystic who seeks unification in the divine through the physical world. This mysticism is different from some of its predecessors in that it seeks affirmation and solidarity and not an ascetic passivity and isolation. Nonetheless, the mystical impulse describes an interior state that is not susceptible to the analytical rigor of a scientific rationality. Thus, his mysticism could be a block to many scientists.65 As for his religious inspirations, there was an unusually positive response from many liberal Protestant thinkers. Paul Tillich observed many affinities of his works with The Phenomenon of Man.66 Ian Barbour praised Teilhard for avoiding a “God of the gaps” and for being consistent with the Bible.67 Anglicans had a particular interest in Teilhard, with a generally favorable response.68 Process and eschatological theologians explored parallels with Teilhard in numerous conferences. The sense of divine processes operating in the world was a common theme among the participants. More specifically, the scholar of religion and science Philip Hefner concluded that there was a common theological bond in openness, assuming the worth and reliability of creation, a desire to activate human

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energies in a transcendent project, and a reliance on love as the action that fulfills the world’s destiny.69 Other Protestants found Teilhard ephemeral, lacking in scriptural foundations, and extremely weak on the doctrine of sin.70 Among these critics, there had been some concern among evangelicals that Teilhard’s works are fodder for dangerous New Age positions. The biologist-turnedChristian-apologist David Lane, in The Phenomenon of Teilhard, Prophet for a New Age (1986), admits his subject was a “remarkable man” and at times “deeply moving,” but finds his project fundamentally flawed because it falsely compromises Christianity by adopting neo-Darwinism assumptions. The adoption of neo-Darwinism leads Teilhard to distort scripture and the traditional meaning of biblical concepts like the pleroma to develop a cosmic Christ. For Lane, it is no surprise that Teilhard is a prophet to so many New Age thinkers who desire a “global shift in consciousness.” In sum, Teilhard presents a “perverse ‘theological’ perspective which strikes at the very heart of Christianity.” While Lane raises the legitimate question about why so many New Age thinkers find Teilhard appealing, he interprets Teilhard through the lens of his critics and New Age or liberal theologians. He largely ignores the Eucharistic and Sacred Heart sources of Teilhard’s theology and he is aware of but does not fully engage the substantive insights of theologians like Thomas King, Henri de Lubac, and Christopher Mooney.71 Lane’s criticisms can be balanced by reading David Grumett’s Teilhard de Chardin: Theology, Humanity and Cosmos (2005). Grumett attempts to “argue for the integrity of his theology and for its guiding influence over all other elements of his work.” Teilhard’s vision is always subordinated to his Christian theology. Teilhard is not, per Lane, co-opted completely by Darwinism, but is radically different because there is an “active and providential principle of life, rather than random selection.” The vision of the French Jesuit is sustained by the spirituality of the Sacred Heart of Christ, a sustained and close reading of Pauline passages, and the key role of Catholic ecclesiology in his writings. Grumett also carefully explores, unlike Lane, the influences of theological sources such as the Church fathers, Maurice Blondel, the Thomism of Pierre Rousselot, and the appropriation of the insights of other Jesuit theologians such as Pierre Charles and Ferdinand Prat. In addition he counters cites from critics in Lane with other cites from the same Catholic critics, such as Maritain and Gilson, on Teilhard’s piety and faith. So why did so many interpreters of Teilhard ignore the depth of the Catholic intellectual tradition employed by Teilhard? Grumett attributes this interpretive oversight in part to the fact that his works were not widely published and discussed until about the time of the Second Vatican Council. The pre-Vatican sources of Teilhard’s theology were lost in this era of change and Teilhard was not present to

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respond to the claims of his interpreters. In addition, many reviewers conflated the different modes of scientific analysis in The Human Phenomenon with his more religious works. Teilhard’s style did not always explicitly reference his theological sources and this has complicated any theological interpretation of his works.72 In the end, Teilhard asserts without reservation a proposition that is not at the heart of the New Age movement. He is not on a diffuse personal quest. He is instead operating within and abiding by the practices of a distinct religious tradition. Never have I so clearly seen how God alone, and no personal effort, can open our eyes to this light and preserve this vision in us. And never on the other hand, have I understood so fully how much the practice of this particular science of divinizing life calls for the diligent cooperation of every activity I engage in. It needs the sacraments and prayer, and study.73

Grumett’s defenses build on the work of earlier defenders of Teilhard during or shortly after the Second Vatican Council such as Henri de Lubac and Christopher Mooney. De Lubac would note that Lane largely ignores some keys aspects of the spiritual formation of his quarry such as the deeply pious religious life of his family. For example, his sister, Francoise, shared a deeply passionate commitment to Christ. But when she had doubts about her vocation, it was her brother who was her spiritual guide in keeping her in the faith. De Lubac would also caution Lane about boxing Teilhard into only believing in a detached, cosmic Christ. Lane is right that Teilhard expanded or liberally interpreted the Pauline notion of the pleroma to all of matter, but the entity drawing all of life to it through an extraordinary love was a “somebody” not “a some-thing” and it had “a face and heart.” In a rebuttal of Lane’s claim of his conceding faith commitments to evolutionary theory, Teilhard realized that the saving of souls and a personal God made his views difficult for evolutionary scientists to stomach and yet he repeated this view until his last days. Certainly, his devotion to Mary and her role would have been equally problematic. The personal reality of the God of Judeo-Christian history also distinguished him from the false pantheists of the past. Teilhard’s Christ is a burning energy and love present in the Sacred Heart devotions that he loved so much. De Lubac carefully sketches the Christian inspirations for Teilhard’s vision that are often not explicitly referenced in his work. The cosmic Christ has an inspiration in passages from early Church fathers such as Irenaeus, Gregory of Nyssa, and especially Origen. Teilhard derived his notion of God in all things in part from Ignatius of Loyola, Teresa of Ávila, Saint John of the Cross, and even Aquinas who had also been accused of pantheism. 74 There were also many contemporary theological sources for Teilhard’s position contrary to many of his accusers. On the issue of the Pauline

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pleroma and the cosmic Christ, there are theologians like Pierre Benoit, Ferdinand Prat, and Joseph Huby who were favorable to his position.75 Still, the most comprehensive defender was de Lubac. When there is a problem with dogma, de Lubac asserted that Teilhard was exploring tentatively his positions or had been misunderstood as to his intentions. He realized that the extension of the concept of pleroma to all of the physical universe can be fairly described as either a bold theological extrapolation or a groundless position influenced more by an evolutionary vision that scripture or theology. Although even Teilhard knew “he was going further than Paul” in his claims, de Lubac asserts that Teilhard believed he was faithful to scripture and his inner prayer life in seeking a convergence of his spiritual and scientific views in his vision. In the end, de Lubac recognized the enormity of the Teilhardian task, its significant contributions, and some limitations. He does not view Teilhard as having discovered the sole road to theological truth; his subject has uncovered only a “part of the unfathomable riches of Christ.”76 Others have sought to defend Teilhard’s exegetical precedents in the New Testament and early church fathers by a careful parsing of the key passages. For example, the theologian Thomas King notes that the cosmic redemption of matter in Christ is justified by Pauline passages speaking of the redemption of love through the body of Christ. The trick is how to extend this to the entire cosmos, not just humanity. There are hints in passages that speak of Christ as the “one in whom all things are redeemed” (Col 1:17) and God “will unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth” (Eph 1:22–23). Here, Teilhard is appealing to the action of Christ as a world soul, the cosmic body of Christ, that will unite all matter in him just as our individual souls unite our matter.77 Another defender of Teilhard in the wake of Vatican II, Christopher Mooney, also believed that Teilhard could be analyzed, criticized, and purified, but in the end there was much to be assimilated. Mooney explored the impact of Teilhard’s view of a point of centration for the evolution of Christology. Teilhard counters the regnant Thomist position that the Incarnation was essential because of human sin. Following more closely the position of Dun Scotus, he asserts that Christ is the culmination of the supernatural and the natural order. Jesus is the source as well as “the end and the culmination of the created order.”78 Mooney not only reveals traditional sources of Teilhard’s project, but believed that Teilhard provided a basis for a renewed Christology. Theology must “accept the fact of evolution as the starting point for its formulations” in the reconciliation of the natural and supernatural orders. Instead of concentrating on God’s essence, theology must reveal how God has entered the world in order to redeem the natural world by allowing it to transcend itself. Christ is no longer a distant figure at the right hand of

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God but became incarnate and remains the source of the evolution of the universe to its end. A new Christology will end the separation of matter and spirit and connect human and natural history. The result will be a new theological perspective on sin, the Incarnation, the Church, and the Parousia.79 A number of Catholic theologians were not open to Mooney’s call for renewal using Teilhard’s evolutionary Christology and many other aspects of his vision. Why did many traditional Catholic theologians reject Teilhard? As Grumett observed, the interpretation of Teilhard along philosophical, ecological, new age, and scientific lines owes its strength to the timing of the release of his works in the 1960s and the focus on works like The Phenomenon of Man that were prepared for a scientific audience. Hence, many of his interpreters minimized the pre–Vatican II sources of his Catholic piety and his traditional sources within Catholicism. His critics have likewise assumed this stance but with the view toward criticizing his stance.80 His views on the cosmic nature of the mass and the redemption of matter, although they had some predecessors in early Christianity, were a very novel turn for Catholic theology in the twentieth century. From the Vatican, there was issued a monitum and numerous articles that sought to stem the assent to Teilhardian errors on the eve of the Second Vatican Council. One chief accuser was Philippe de la Trinité, who detested the cosmic Christ. Others commented on a lack of transcendence in his theology, a reunion in Christ by purely natural means, and a weak account of evil and sin. The neo-Thomists could not accept the primacy of becoming over being. Maritain, as well as Gilson, criticized their French counterpart’s views on sin, grace, the Incarnation, and the Trinity. He was also accused of espousing a novel form of gnosticism that presented a new pagan philosophy.81 The official comments of the Vatican after an initial chill in the early years have suggested an appreciative if limited use of his works. John XXIII restrained the most severe attacks on the French priest and Pope Paul VI retained fond memories of Teilhard. John Paul II went further and employed in several documents Teilhard’s image of a mass on the alter of the world that had a “cosmic character.” In more recent years, then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger and Cardinal Agostino Cassoroli, who was the Vatican secretary of state, issued statements that have not withdrawn many of the preexisting reservations, but have nonetheless recognized that his life and works are in some respects fertile, perceptive, exceptional, and pious. Ratzinger cited Teilhard’s views on the cosmic role of the Eucharist without either adoption or condemnation.82 A final way to interpret Teilhard is as a global futurist. By the mid1960s, a variety of forms of social consciousness influenced the Teilhard-

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ian scholarship. Max N. Wildiers, a Dutch Teilhardian theologian, had an immense impact on American audiences with his exploration of the idea of global consciousness.83 The idea of relating the Teilhardian themes of planetization and the importance of the natural world to ecological concerns was also explored by scholars such as Thomas Berry, a historian of religion who was president of the American Teilhardian Association from 1975 to 1987. In addition to his reading of Teilhard, Berry incorporated many new influences into his analysis including approaches from Asian and indigenous populations. A number of writers have echoed Berry’s concerns.84 There is also the global social consciousness reading of Teilhard. Prominent among these exponents is Robert Muller, who was an assistant secretary of the United Nations. Muller was an exponent of a global optimism in the human capacity for “thinking, perception, inspiration, elevation, planning, cooperation and love.” He organized through UNESCO two international colloquiums on Teihard and Albert Einstein attended by many scientists and other intellectuals from all over the world that explored the different possibilities for the trajectory of human communities toward the Omega point. It is curious that Muller’s “Transformation 2000” contains many comments on harmony and peace but hardly any mention of science or technology.85 Indeed, Teilhard’s affinity for the industrial world and technology has received comparatively less notice among contemporary scholars. Christopher Mooney in his article “Cybernation, Responsibility and Providential Design” concluded that the rapidity of scientific and technological change in the twentieth century, including cybernation, left humanity on the verge of despair, but Teilhard’s evolutionary theology provided a source of hope and direction amidst this despair by injecting a divine direction to these realities.86 Not surprisingly, Teilhard’s historical evolution of the world was attractive to some Marxists and liberation theologians in reconciling the immanent and the cosmic.87 The thrust of Teilhardian scholarship is currently very active in the areas of a future globalism and contemporary social theories. In the anthology Teilhard and the Twenty-First Century, there are entire sections on ecology and cosmogenesis. There are individual articles on liberation and feminist theology. The only article primarily focused on science and religion is John Haught’s article on chaos and complexity.88 I do not want to discount Teilhard as still a foundational figure on religion and science. Having attended the conference “Biological Evolution: Facts and Theories” at the Gregorian University in Rome in March of 2009, I can personally attest that Teilhard was referenced with several presentations focusing primarily on his works. By way of contrast, Maritain was mentioned in one presentation.89

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In contrast to the explosion of interest in Teilhard, Bernard Lonergan has attracted sustained but more limited attention in important academic fields. His contribution, along with others, was admitted to be essential for Vatican II and the subsequent research program on theology and the sciences in the 1990s. He has been recognized in general works on Catholicism and science. Most recently, he was cited in Catholicism and Science (2008) for his use of a dynamic metaphysics that parallels the desires of science in a form of self-transcendence. The theologian John Haught also references Lonergan for his position that “religion essentially fortifies the humble desire to know” that is “the very drive that gives rise to science.”90 It has also been suggested that he might provide some theoretical ballast for the feminist critique of science. Michael Vertin declared that the feminist critique of Evelyn Fox Keller and Lonergan’s heuristic approach to science might be mutually beneficial. Keller framed a novel position within the three preexisting concepts of women in science. The preexisting concepts included a heretofore-dominant paradigm of “unqualified approbation” of the male orientation of science that affirmed the connection between objectivity and scientific advance. Keller praised this position for recognizing the genuine effectiveness of objective science, but derided its naïve and unreflective interpretation of objectivity in masculine terms. A second school of interpretation held that “objective” science was gender neutral. The problem with this “liberal” position was its desire to separate a masculine bias from the objectivist viewpoint. Finally, “radical” feminists declared that the objectivist model was “intrinsically androcentric” and tied to the very nature of scientific knowing. Woman must therefore completely reject science or at least locate an alternative process.91 Amidst these conflicting theoretical configurations, Keller contended that objectivity and subjectivity are not mutually exclusive. Combining the two perspectives allowed for a dynamic objectivity that “is not unlike empathy, a form of knowledge of other persons that draws explicitly on the commonality of feelings and experience in order to enrich one’s understanding of another in his or her own right.”92 Vertin declared that Lonergan’s heuristic proposals could complement and anneal Keller’s “dynamic” approach to science. The strengths of Keller’s position might be explicated more cogently through a clarification of terms and concepts that distinguished an empirical and a heuristic cognitional methodology. How might this be accomplished? First, “noematic objectivity” is premised upon an authentic “noematic subjectivity” based upon “attentive experiencing, intelligent understanding, reasonable judgment and reasonable evaluating.” If this “noematic” schema were adopted by Keller, it could reconcile her differences with other feminists and philosophers of science who had not experienced a

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cognitional conversion. The philosophy of science refused to recognize that “noematic objectivity” in science was the result of one’s authentic scientific “noetic subjectivity,” that is, attentive experiencing, etc. Keller’s appropriation of Lonergan could enrich her “dynamic” objectivity into a more general methodology applicable to other fields. The feminist critique of science like Lonergan opposed a reductionist account of nature. For the feminist, this hegemony over nature was a product of a male domination mentality and a desire for authority over nature. Lonergan’s heuristic was neither completely mechanistic nor volitional. It recognized both elements as aspects of an inclusive pattern. Classical and statistical laws accounted for both of these realities.93 Moving from epistemology to ethics, Dr. David J. Roy proposed an application of Lonergan’s idea of insight in his article, “Bioethics as Anamnesis: What Lonergan Has Understood and Others Have Overlooked.” Dr. Roy presented several examples of how advancing science presented difficult ethical quandaries. Newborn children with defects, who would have died in previous ages, can now be saved, but the infants saved will often suffer serious defects such as Down Syndrome. The issue is whether these babies should be terminated. Between the antinomies of “sacredness of life” and “quality of life” positions, Dr. Roy posited a third position relying on Lonergan’s finality principle that states that “man develops biologically to develop psychically and he develops psychically to develop intellectually and rationally.” The finality principle averred that “the higher integrations suffer the disadvantage of emerging later. They were demands for finality before they were realities in us.”94 Armed with this principle Dr. Roy undermined the “sacred life” principle by noting that life was not continuous, but a “spiral” of development. Hence, Dr. Roy averred that he “honors” Lonergan’s finality principle in declaring: When biological damage is so extensive that curative, restorative, and corrective medical interventions cannot aid the patient’s development, but only succeed in perpetuating or prolonging a patient’s fixation at a level of development that is not meant to be final and is far short of the variety of purposes and levels of life to which biological human life is ordained- when this obtains, then, . . . medical intervention has reached its limits, works contrary to its calling in perpetuating such fixations, and should not be employed.95

Dr. Roy was not advocating the death of babies who might recover through treatment. Instead, having narrowed the justifiable case for causing the death of the newborn, there was a “moral demand” not to promote the mere existence of a severely damaged newborn. Despite his careful presentation, his position is problematic as an interpretation of Lonergan. Dr. Roy appears to have misinterpreted Lonergan’s finality principle. The finality principle was not a normative claim, but a cognitive aspiration.

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Indeed, Lonergan noted that the principle of finality was “manifested more commonly in aspiration and in dissatisfaction” than in the “higher integrations.” Thus, the desired finality was not a benchmark upon which to terminate human life. Lonergan might also have observed that Dr. Roy relied on an all-too-fallible human judgment, subject to problems of ego, as well as group and general bias. Human ethical limitations are also present in Lonergan’s notion of “moral impotence.” This impotence was the result of “man’s effective freedom” being restrained by the incomplete development of his or her intellectual and volitional capacities. The distance between the completion of these capacities and one’s current state was the gap of “moral impotence.” The human person was a mixture of concentric circles of properly fulfilled capacities surrounded by areas of partial illumination (the penumbras) and an outer void (the outer shadows). The restriction of the luminous aspect can precipitate a flight from understanding. What was true for the individual was also true for social groups. Correct decisions must be “intelligent and reasonable” for a “concrete situation.”96 A much more subtle and refined Lonerganian analysis on an issue of medical ethics is William F. Sullivan’s Eye of the Heart: Knowing the Human Good in the Euthanasia Debate. He applies Lonergan’s notion of “functional specialization” from Method in Theology, a gloss on the cognitive project in Insight. Functional specialization allows a person to attend to data, form a hypothesis, and affirm the reality and goodness of that intelligible unity. In this process, the individual investigator brings together his or her “pre-empirical features,” that is, one’s philosophical presuppositions, and the empirical data explored in a given context. The joining of the pre-empirical features and the empirical data operate like the upper and lower blades of scissors to cut a path to understanding. Sullivan applies this functional specialization to the issue of euthanasia. He concentrates his analysis on the role played by feelings as part of the “pre-empirical features.” Thus, he limits his analysis to exploring one aspect (feelings) of the two blades of a functional specialization and therefore does not reach any definitive conclusion about the moral value of euthanasia.97 Dr. Sullivan as the director of the Canadian Catholic Bioethics Institute since 2001 has also applied the functional specialization approach to a multiyear project on genetics.98 The progeny of Lonergan has extended beyond feminism and medical ethics. He is one of the inspirations for a refutation by the theologian John Haught of scientific naturalism, the reduction of all of life to material causes in nature. Haught asserts that the cognitional project of Lonergan reminds us of the “‘insidedness’ of nature that scientific naturalism usually leaves out of consideration.” Critical intelligence can lead us through our desire to know beyond the “naturalist enclosure” to the fullness of be-

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ing, that is, the divine. In the final analysis, Lonergan’s program and our religious faith provide a “satisfactory adaptive atmosphere for organisms endowed with an unrestrictive desire to know.”99 Lonergan’s contributions to learning have also been both interdisciplinary and intradisciplinary. He examined issues in evolutionary theory, biology, medicine, physics, and mathematics.100 It is perhaps surprising that he has not drawn more interest from those in mathematics and the natural sciences. One can find the occasional scientist who has utilized his works. For example, a physicist from the University of Michigan, Michel Bretz, wrote in Physics Today (2002) that Lonergan’s model of knowledge growth “speaks directly to physicists, other scientists, and sound thinkers everywhere.” He recommends Lonergan for any curriculum redesign of physics courses.101 In addition, Lonergan’s epistemology provided grist for the philosophy of science and the relationship of religion and science. The development of historical schema for the development of knowledge allowed a comparison and contrast with the biologist and philosopher Michael Polanyi.102 An isomorphism has been attempted between evolutionary activities and religious values.103 The ethical implications of insight and flights from understanding had enormous implications for the promulgation of legal and political regulations for science and technology. Other ethical issues have inspired a Lonerganian analysis such as technology, nuclear weapons, and ecology. An insightful use for Lonergan is in understanding the role of research in the history of science. Such research can employ his decision, understanding, and judgment process to evaluate the development of a particular historiography such as in the Galileo case.104 Recently, there has been a number of works analyzing Lonergan through the lens of analytical philosophy. The common interest of Lonergan and many analytical philosophers in method and the impact of the sciences provide a basis for an intellectual dialogue. One aspect in these books is to compare Lonergan with other influential thinkers in the area of science and the philosophy of science such as Michael Polanyi, Bertrand Russell, Alfred North Whitehead, etc. This approach of comparison between Lonergan and such thinkers has drawn fire from some Lonerganians such as Philip McShane. Indeed, McShane has indicated that such efforts will inevitably be doctrinaire and isolationist because of an “absence of informed dialogue with the ongoing problematic genesis of science and its methods.”105 The legacy of Thomas Merton on issues of science and technology was limited compared to Maritain, Teilhard, or Lonergan. This relative dearth was partly the result of a perception that Merton had not written about issues like science and technology. Because of the diffuse nature of his comments, the commentary is largely confined to Mertonian journals and graduate dissertations. The most consistent analyst of this aspect

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of Merton is William H. Shannon. In order to properly explore these issues, he reviewed in some detail the relevance of selected readings and personal contacts. These influences included the Center for Democratic Institutions, Jacques Ellul, Rachel Carsons, Lewis Mumford, and a 1964 meeting at Gethsemani on issues of science and technology. A number of other pieces suggest that the areas of technology and science in Merton scholarship have received significant interest.106 Merton combined his contemplative perspective with these sources to refine his criticism. He concluded that a technological society produced power, profits, speed, and instant results, but there remained the issue of the meaning of life hidden beneath these superficial distractions. In an age of such disoriented seekers, contemplation, interiority, and mystery provided sources of contact with a “divine immanence.” The “age of seekers” thus presented a profound difference between the techno-scientific mentality and the contemplative, between a sense of an integrated community or a dehumanizing collectivity. The notion of technology as oriented toward community, (i.e., a technology that was not autonomous), but oriented toward human and spiritual values, was present in Merton’s love of Shaker furniture that expressed the bond between the artisan, their faith, and a religious community. The object made by the craft had divine significance. Someone who believed “an angel might come and sit on it” made a Shaker chair. The Shaker philosophy of joining spirituality and craft could be applied to other technologies such as cameras, tape recorders, and computers.107 What about Merton’s musings on science? Thomas Del Prete in his article “On Mind, Matter and Knowing: Thomas Merton and Quantum Physics” unpacks why Merton was so interested in the possibilities of quantum physics. The new physics of Bohr and Heisenberg replaced the Newtonian worldview and posited that reality was ultimately “beyond our power to see, grasp, or measure though not, however, to apprehend or intuit in some basic sense.” In our relatedness to nature at the quantum level, the pure objectivity of science is unmasked as the scientist is interactive with the subject that he or she studies in the laboratory.108 While quantum physics held promise for theology, the progeny of science spawned by atomic research posed a potential apocalypse. The issue of nuclear weapons was the gravest technological threat addressed by Merton. In the midst of the Cold War, he opposed nuclear weapons because they were the result of a technological mentality that in the name of ideology eschewed ethical concerns. The Mertonian view was uncomfortably wedged between pacifism and just war, and was criticized by many for being too apocalyptic, applying a mirror image approach to the Soviet Union and the United States, and failing to engage other possibilities in Catholic thought.109

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While his critique of militarism has invited continuing interest, it is surprising that Merton is not more of a resource for ecological thinkers. His journals and letters revealed an advanced environmental sensitivity for his time. In addition, he wrote several essays on issues related to nature and the wilderness and was friends with Wendell Berry, Rosemary Radford Reuther, and others who have had key roles in formulating an environmental ethos. There has been the rare article such as Dennis O’Hara’s comparison of Merton to Thomas Berry and Sallie McFague. O’Hara argued that Merton’s foundation for an ecological ethics derived from his view of creation and Christology, which was similar to Berry and McFague. Merton was more restrained than Berry and McFague, however, on the implications of his approach.110 Monica Weis appears to be most prominently carrying the environmental flag among Merton scholars. Weis admired his demand for ecological balance stemming from his “deepening realization that heaven and earth are not separate entities and that our actions should flow from and express the dynamic balance and interconnectedness of life.” He implicitly advanced the desirability of a transformation to an ecocentric community in several of his ruminations.111 There are also a number of unresolved or partially resolved issues about Merton’s relationship to science and technology. The relationship of Merton to certain intellectual influences that were prominent in his study of technology and science such as Lewis Mumford and Jacques Ellul are still relatively unexplored territories.112 Finally, how was Merton’s approach to issues of science and technology drawn from, compatible with, or influential on his religious community, the Trappists? My attempts to find answers on such issues have revealed the need for additional explorations of his ideas.

NOTES 1. Bernard Doering, “Silent Dissenter: Jacques Maritain and Contraception,” Commonweal (May 18, 2001): 14–19; Barre, Jacques and Raissa Maritain: Beggars for Heaven, trans. Bernard E. Doering (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 2004), 426, 427. 2. De Lubac portrayed Teilhard’s theology as consistent with many of the traditional streams of Catholic thought. Henri de Lubac, Teilhard de Chardin: The Man and His Meaning (New York: Hawthorn Books, 1965). 3. Lonergan had fewer problems than his fellow transcendental Thomist, Karl Rahner, who delved into the volatile issues of mariology, the virgin birth, and concelebration. Rahner was denied an imprimatur on his book, Mariology, in 1951. Giuseppe Albergio, ed., History of Vatican II, vol. 1 (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1995), 454–57; Lonergan, “Isomorphism of Thomist and Scientific Thought,” in Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, vol. 4, ed. Frederick E. Crowe and Robert M. Doran

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(Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1967), 133–41; Lonergan, “Aquinas Today: Tradition and Innovation,” in Bernard Lonergan, A Third Collection, ed. Frederick Crowe (New York: Paulist Press, 1985),” 36–46. 4. Crowe, Lonergan (London: Cassell Publishers, 1992), 19; Lonergan, “Insight Revisited,” in Lonergan, A Second Collection, ed. Ryan and Tyrell (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1996), 264. 5. Thomas Merton, “Letter to James Forrest” (January 5, 1962), in The Hidden Ground of Love, ed. William H. Shannon (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1985), 260–61; Thomas Merton, “Letter to Lawrence Ferlinghetti” (August 2, 1961), in The Courage for Truth, ed. Christine M. Bochen (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1993), 267. 6. Thomas Merton, “Answers for Hernan Lavin Cerda: On War, Technology and the Intellectual,” The Merton Annual 2 (1989): 5–9; Thomas Merton, Learning to Love (April 16, 1966) ed. Christine M. Bochen (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1967), 41. 7. Mott, The Seven Mountains of Thomas Merton (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1993), 373; Merton, Witness to Freedom, ed. William H. Shannon (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1994), 17–18. 8. John XXIII, Gaudet Mater Ecclesia, 213; Alberigo, ed., History of Vatican II, vol. 1, 139. 9. Timothy G. McCarthy, The Catholic Tradition (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1994), 53–54. 10. Shanley, The Thomist Tradition (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2002), 1. 11. Francisco Suarez, Disutationes Metaphysicae Opera omnia (Paris: Vives, 1877), Dist. I, Sect. iv, 13; Jose Ferrara Mota, “Suarez and Modern Philosophy,” Journal of the History of Ideas 14 (1953): 528–47; Richard Blackwell, “The Structure of Wolffian Philosophy,” The Modern Schoolman 38 (1961): 203–18; Fernard Renoirte, Cosmology: Elements of a Critique of the Sciences and Cosmology (New York: Joseph H. Wagner, 1950), 175–81; A. G. Melsen, The Philosophy of Nature (Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1953), 94–97. This Scotian tradition also had affinities with Leibnitz, Descartes, and the Augustinian Platonic tradition. Benedict Ashley, “The River Forest School,” in Philosophy and the God of Abraham, ed. R. James Long (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1991), 5. 12. Desire Joseph, Cardinal Mercier, Cours de Philosophie (Paris: Institut Superieur de Philosophie, 1905), vol. 1, 26–30. 13. Benedict Ashley, “Review of Jacques Maritain, Philosophy of Nature,” The Thomist 16 (1953): 127–31. 14. Ashley, “The River Forest School,” 8–13. Ashley is chiding transcendental Thomists for substituting experience for reasoned philosophy. 15. See Benedict Ashley and Kevin D. O’Rourke, O.P., Health Care Ethics (St. Louis: Catholic Health Association, 1989); Albert Moracewski became the president of the Pope John XXIII Medical-Moral Research and Education Center and was the editor of Ethics and Medics. Benedict Ashley notes that the views of the school have made only a ripple in the American Catholic Philosophical Association. 16. Charles de Koninck, “The Unity and Diversity of Natural Science,” in The Philosophy of Physics, ed. Vincent E. Smith (Jamaica: St. John’s University Press, 1961), 5–24

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17. Leslie Armour, “The Philosophy of Charles De Koninck,” in The Writings of Charles de Koninck, ed. Ralph McInerny (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 2008), 62; Vincent Smith, Science and Philosophy (Milwaukee: Bruce Publishing Company, 1965), 187–90. 18. De Koninck, “The Unity and Diversity of Natural Science,” 24. 19. Armour, “The Philosophy of Charles De Koninck,” 4–5, 54–55; Jean Richard, “Analogie et symbolism chez Saint Thomas,” Laval Theologique et Scientifique (October 1974): 390–95. 20. O’Leary, Roman Catholicism and Modern Science, 126–33. 21. O’Leary, Roman Catholicism and Modern Science, 133–40. 22. McCarthy, The Catholic Tradition (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1998), 56–58; Pius XII, Humani Generis, n. 5, 6, 7, 11; Pius XII, “Preaching the Word of God,” The Pope Speaks 3 (September 14, 1956): 388–90. 23. Pius XII, Humani Generis, n. 10, 13, 31, 36, 37; Pius XII, “Address to the University Students of Rome” (1952), in Modern Science and God, ed. Paul J. McLaughlin (New York: Philosophical Library, 1952), 5. 24. Pius XII was fascinated by physics, astronomy, geology, and medicine. Pius XII, “The Perennial Philosophy and Modern Science” (address to the International Thomistic Congress, September 14, 1955), The Pope Speaks 3 (autumn 1955): 224; McLaughlin, ed., Modern Science and God, 17–18; Pius XII, “Science and Philosophy,” The Pope Speaks 3 (summer 1955): 113–16; Pius XII, “The Day the Lord Hath Made” (Easter Message, April 21, 1957), The Pope Speaks 4 (autumn 1957): 144–45. 25. Pius XII, “The Perennial Philosophy and Modern Science,” 217–25; Pius XII, “Science and Philosophy,” 113–20; Pius XII, “Technology and the Christian Life” (address to the 78th Congress of German Catholics, August 17, 1958), The Pope Speaks 5 (spring 1959): 200. 26. Pius XII, “The Heavens and the Glory of God,” The Pope Speaks 4 (autumn 1957): 164. 27. Pius XII, “Automation: Its Problems and Its Prospects” (address to a National Convention of the Christian Association of Italian Workers, June 7, 1957), The Pope Speaks 4 (autumn 1957): 147–55; Pius XII, “The Scientist: Man With a Destiny” (address to Delegates Attending the Tenth General Assembly of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics, September 24, 1954), The Pope Speaks 2 (autumn 1954): 253–57. 28. John XXIII, “Praising God Through Scientific Progress” (address to the Pontifical Academy of Science, October 5, 1962), The Pope Speaks 8 (1963): 394–96; John XXIII, Mater et Magistra, n. 210. 29. John XXIII, “Praising God through Scientific Progress,” 395; John XXIII, “Science and Education” (address to a Convention at Utrecht, Holland, of the International Office of Catholic Education, December 30, 1959), The Pope Speaks 6 (spring 1960): 214; John XXIII, Pacem in Terris, n. 98–100. 30. John XXIII, Mater et Magistra, n. 176, 209, 215; John XXIII, Pacem in Terris, n. 109–119; John XXIII “Science,” in The Teachings of Pope John XXIII, ed. Michael Chinigo (London: George G. Harrap, 1967), 144. 31. John XXIII, Mater et Magistra, n. 176, 215. 32. John XXIII, Gaudet Mater Ecclesia (October 11, 1962), The Pope Speaks 8 (1963): 211–12.

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33. Merton, The Hidden Ground of Love, 486. Unfortunately, only a portion of the letter to John XXIII still survives; William Shannon, “The Year of the Cold War Letters,” 166–71. 34. Gaudium et Spes, n. 4, 33, 62. 35. Key intellectual gatekeepers in England included The Times Literary Supplement, New Statesman, and French Studies. Michael Kelly, “The Reception of French Catholic Intellectuals in Britain after the Second World War,” French Cultural Studies 17 (2006): 285–302. 36. Gaudium et Spes, n. 5, 34, 36. 37. The opposition to Teilhard was exhibited in preliminary skirmishes before the Council. One of the initial documents of the Theological Commission, written before the Council opened, condemned evolutionary proposals associated with Teilhard. Alberigo, ed., The History of Vatican II, 243; Henri Fesquet, The Drama of Vatican II (New York: Random House, 1967), 116, 620; Alfons Auer, “Man’s Activity Throughout the World,” in Commentary on the Documents of Vatican II, ed. Herbert Vorgrimler, vol. 5 (New York: Herder And Herder, 1969), 194–96. 38. Pope John XXIII told some French Seminarians that the monitum against Teilhard was regrettable. Fesquet, The Drama of Vatican II, 19, 444–45, 451, 711; Rene Fourrey, Bishop of Belley, France, “Faith, Science and the Meetings of Minds” in Third Session Council Speeches of Vatican II, ed. William K. Leahy and Anthony T. Massimini (Glen Rock, NJ: Deus Books, 1966), 175–78. 39. Jose Guerra Campos, Auxillary Bishop of Madrid, “Man’s Vocation to Renew the Earth,” in Third Session Council Speeches of Vatican II, 163; Aurelio Sorrentino, Bishop of Bova, Italy, “Participation of Catholics in Scientific Works,” in Third Session Council Speeches of Vatican II, 181–84. 40. Lonergan, “Respect for Human Dignity,” 415–18; Second Vatican Council, Gaudium et Spes, n. 57. 41. Alberigo, ed., History of Vatican II, vol. 1, 139; George Andre Beck, The Archbishop of Liverpool, “Justice: The Foundation of Peace,” in Third Session Council Speeches, 250–52. 42. Cardinal Montini, “The Implications of the Council for the World” (April 1962), in Pope Paul VI, The Mind of Pope Paul VI, ed. James Walsh (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1964), 259–67. 43. Cardinal Montini, “What the Church is and What She is Not” (1960), in Paul VI, The Mind of Paul VI, 34–38. 44. Paul VI, Octogesima Adveniens, n. 10–21, 38–41. 45. Wilton Wynn, Keepers of the Keys (New York: Random House, 1988), 247–48. 46. Pope Paul VI, Humanae Vitae, n. 6, 14–16. 47. Paul VI, “Scientific Progress and the Natural Revelation of God” (address of Pope Paul VI to a General Audience), The Pope Speaks 21 (1976): 108. 48. W. Norris Clarke, “Thomism and Philosophical Pluralism,” in The Future of Thomism, ed. Deal W. Hudson and Dennis W. Moran (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1992), 93. 49. Richard Ingardia, ed., Thomas Aquinas International Bibliography (Bowling Green: Philosophical Documentation Center, 1993), 1. 50. Phillip L. Quinn and Charles Taliafero, A Companion to Philosophy of Religion (Boston: Blackwell, 1999), 162.

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51. Yves R. Simon, Foresight and Knowledge (New York: Fordham University Press, 1996), ix–xiii; See also Yves R. Simon, The Great Dialogue of Nature and Space (South Bend: St. Augustine’s Press, 2003); Vincent Edward Smith, The General Science of Nature (Milwaukee: Bruce Publishing Co., 1958); John Wild, Introduction to Realistic Philosophy (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1948); Henry B. Veatch, “Some Suggestions on the Respective Spheres of Science and Philosophy,” The Thomist 3 (1941): 177–21. 52. William Wallace, The Modeling of Nature (Washington, DC: Catholic University Press, 1996), 227. 53. Cf. Gerald McCool, From Unity to Pluralism: The Internal Evolution of Thomism (New York: Fordham University Press, 1992), 120–21; and John F. X. Knassas, “Thomist Methodology and Critical Realism,” in Jacques Maritain and the Many Ways of Knowing, ed. Douglas A Ollivant, (Washington. DC: Catholic University Press, 2002), 66–77. 54. James Arraj, The Mystery of Matter (Chiloquin Oregon: Inner Growth Books, 1996). 55. Anthony Rizzi, The Science Before Science (Bloomington, IN: Institute for Advanced Physics, 2004). 56. Shanley, The Thomist Tradition, 16–20. 57. Mircea Eliade, “Cultural Fashions and the History of Religions,” in The History of Religions, Essays in Divinity, vol. 1, ed. Joseph M. Kitagawa, Mircea Eliade, and Charles H. Long (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1967), 32. 58. Winifred McCulloch, A Short History of the American Teilhard Association (Chambersburg, PA: Anima Publications, 1979), 1–4; Pieter Smulders, “The Optimism of Teilhard and Vatican II,” Pax Romana Journal 2 (1967): 17–19; Abdo Khalife, “Teilhard et Vatican II,” Revue Teilhard de Chardin 58/59 (1974): 5–11; John Kobler, “The Priest Who Haunts the Catholic World,” The Saturday Evening Post (October 12, 1963), 43–51. 59. Arthur Fabel and Donald St. John, eds., Teilhard in the 21st Century (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 2004). 60. Ernan McMullin. “Teilhard as Philosopher,” Chicago Theological Seminary Register 60 (December 1964): 15–28. 61. James Birx, Interpreting Evolution: Darwin and Teilhard de Chardin (Buffalo: Prometheus Books, 1991); P. B. Medawar’s denied that increased biological complexity increases consciousness. P. B. Medawar, “Review of The Phenomenon of Man, by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin,” Mind 70 (1961): 99–106. The battle between The Phenomenon of Man and certain neo-Darwinians was rejoined in a series of running skirmishes in England in 1995. See Michael Poole, “A Critique of Aspects of the Philosophy and Theology of Richard Dawkins,” Science and Christian Belief 6 (1995): 41–59; Richard Dawkins, “A Reply to Poole,” Science and Christian Belief 7 (1995): 43–50; Michael Poole, “A Response to Dawkins,” Science and Christian Belief 7 (1995): 51–58. The questioning of the idea of orthogenesis from a scientific perspective was displayed in Michael Ruse, “Confirmation and Falsification of Theories of Evolution,” Scientia 104 (1988): 329–57. 62. Michael Heller, “Teilhard’s Vision of the World and Modern Cosmology,” Zygon 30 (March 1995): 11–24; Jacques Monod, Le hazard et la necessite (Paris: Seuil, 1970), 44; On the challenges from the Vatican-sponsored conferences see Robert

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John Russell, Nancey Murphy, and William R. Stoeger, eds., Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action (Vatican: Vatican Observatory Publications, 2008), 185. 63. Theodosius Dobzhansky, The Biology of Ultimate Concern (New York: New American Library, 1967), 121; Paul Chauchard, Man and Cosmos: Scientific Phenomenology in Teilhard de Chardin (New York: Herder and Herder, 1965); Lodovico Galleni, “How Does the Teilhardian Vision of Evolution Compare With Contemporary Theories,” Zygon 30 (March 1995): 25–45; Rafal Serafin, “Noosphere, Gaia, and the Science of the Biosphere,” Environmental Ethics 10 (1988): 121–37. 64. Edward D. Dodson, “Teilhard and Mendel,” Teilhard Studies 12 (1984); in 1965, there was a UNESCO Colloquium on Einstein and Teilhard. UNESCO, Science and Synthesis: An International Colloquium Organized by UNESCO on the Tenth Anniversary of the Death of Albert Einstein and Teilhard de Chardin, trans. Barbara M. Crook (New York: Springer-Verlag, 1971). The Albert Schweitzer Institute for the Humanities conducted meetings in 1994 on ways to explore the relationship of Teilhard and the great physician. John Grim, “Project on Albert Schweitzer and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin,” Teilhard Perspective 28 (February 1995): 12; Andre Daleux, Teilhard de Chardin: Science et foi reconciliees (Lille: Editions Gabriandre, 1994); Edward O. Dodson, The Phenomenon of Man Revisited (New York: Columbia University Press, 1984); on Lakatos, see Galleni Lodovico and Marie-Claire Groessens-Van Dyck, “A Model of Interaction Between Science and Theology Based on the Scientific Papers of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin” in Religion and the Challenge of Science, ed. William Sweet and Richard Feist (Hampshire: Ashgate, 2007), 55–72. 65. For Teilhard’s traditional roots in mysticism see R. C. Zaehner, The Convergent Spirit (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1963), 16; Eric Doyle, “Teilhard and Theology,” Irish Theological Quarterly (April 1971): 103–4; Ursula King, The Spirit of One Earth: Reflections on Teilhard de Chardin and Global Spirituality (New York: Paragon House, 1989), 7, 89; Ursula King, Towards a New Mysticism: Teilhard de Chardin and Eastern Religions (New York: Seabury Press, 1981), 153, 199; Henri de Lubac, The Religion of Teilhard de Chardin, 102–4. 66. Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, vol. 3 (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1963), 5. 67. Ian G. Barbour, Issues in Science and Religion (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1966), 399–408. 68. For a favorable review see Charles Earle Raven, Teilhard de Chardin: Scientist and Seer (New York: Harper and Row, 1962). 69. Philip Hefner, The Promise of Teilhard (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1970). 70. John Macquarrie, “The Natural Theology of Teilhard de Chardin,” Studies in Christian Existentialism (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1965); C. Van Til, Evolution and Christ (Nutley, NJ, Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1966); Ernest Benz, Evolution and Christian Hope: Man’s Concept of the Future from Early Fathers to Teilhard de Chardin (London: Victor Gallanz, 1967), 222. 71. David Lane, The Phenomenon of Teilhard: Prophet for a New Age (Macon: Mercer Univeristy Press, 1996), ix–iv. Lane cites Marilyn Ferguson, The Aquarian Conspiracy: Personal and Social Transformations in the 1980’s (Los Angeles: J. P. Tarcher, 1980), 420 For the proposition that Teilhard was the author most cited by New Age thinkers.

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72. Grumett, Teilhard de Chardin, 2–12, 63. Grumett explores new ground in examining how Paul’s four principles of actions of life are keys to Teilhard’s communion with God in action. 73. Teilhard, The Making of a Mind, trans. Rene Hague (New York: Harper & Row, 1961), 190–91. 74. Lubac, The Faith of Teilhard de Chardin (London: Burns and Oates, 1964), 5–6, 13, 16–22, 47, 62–68. 75. Lubac, The Faith of Teilhard de Chardin, 24–26, 53, 59–60. 76. Lubac, The Faith of Teilhard de Chardin, 29–32, 37. 77. King, Teilhard’s Mass (New York: Paulist Press, 2005), xi, xii. 78. Teilhard, The Activation of Energy, trans. Rene Hague (New York: Harper, Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1971), 150. 79. Christopher Mooney, Christ in the Thought of Teilhard de Chardin (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1968), 117, 127–38. 80. Alfred P. Stiernotte, “An Interpretation of Teilhard as Reflected in Recent Literature,” Zygon 3 (December 1968): 415; Ian Barbour, “Five Ways of Reading Teilhard,” Soundings 51 (spring 1968): 115–45; Grumett, Teilhard de Chardin, 4–6. 81. Philippe de la Trinité, Rome et Teilhard de Chardin (Paris: Librairie Artheme Fayard, 1964); Perhaps the first broadside was Pere Garrigou-Lagrange, “La Theologie nouvelle, ou va-t-elle?” Angelicum (1946): 135ff; see William A. Wallace, “The Cosmology of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin,” New Scholasticism 36 (July 1962): 353–67; Etienne Gilson, “Trois lecons sur la Thomisme et sa situation presente,” Seminarium 4 (1965): 716–17; King, Teilhard’s Mass, x. 82. John Paul II, Gift and Mystery: On the Fiftieth Anniversary of my Priesthood (New York: Doubleday, 1996), 73. Cardinal Jospeh Ratzinger, “Preface,” in Evolutionismus und Christentum, ed. Robert Spaemann, Reinhard Loew, and Peter Kosplowski (Weinheim: Acta Humaniora), iii, iv. Cardinal Agostino Casaroli, “Centenary of Teilhard de Chardin’s Birth,” Origins 11 (July 16, 1981): 114–15; Cardinal Josef Ratzinger, The Spirit of the Liturgy, trans. John Saward (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2000), 29. 83. Among the students attracted to Wildiers was the son of the mayor of San Francisco, Joseph Alioto. Mayor Alioto subsequently sponsored in his city a conference on Teilhard in 1971. McCulloch, “A Short History of the Teilhardian Conference,” 28–29. 84. Anne Lonergan and Caroline Richards, eds., Thomas Berry and the New Cosmology (Mystic, CT: Twenty-Third Publications, 1991), 1–4, 107–8. Brian Swimme, The Universe Is a Green Dragon (Santa Fe: Bear & Co., 1983); Ian Carter, “Teilhard de Chardin: An Ecological Spirituality,” in The Earth Beneath, A Critical Guide to Green Theology, ed. Ian Ball (London: SPCK, 1992), 87–103; James F. O’Brien, “Teilhard’s View of Nature and Some Implications for Environmental Ethics,” Environmental Ethics 10 (1988): 329–46. 85. Leo Zonneveld and Robert Muller, eds. The Desire to Be Human (Wassenaar: Mirananda, 1983), 17–18. 86. Christopher F. Mooney, “Cybernation, Responsibility and Design,” Teilhard Studies 24 (summer 1991): 1–28.

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87. Lonergan and Richards, Thomas Berry and the New Cosmology, 107–8; John W. Cooper, “Teilhard, Marx and the Worldview of Prominent Liberation Theologians,” Calvin Theological Journal 24 (November 1989): 241–62. 88. Arthur Fabel and Donald St. John, eds., Teilhard in the 21st Century (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 2004). 89. Speakers at the conference included Jacques Arnould, author of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (Paris: Perrin, 2005); and Lodovico Galleni, co-author of Lodovico Galleni and Marie-Claire Groessens-Van Dyck, “A Model of Interaction Between Science and Theology Based on the Scientific Papers of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin” in Religion and the Challenge of Science, ed. William Sweet and Richard Feist (Hampshire: Ashgate, 2007), 55–72. One scheduled speaker who could not make the conference was Georges Chantraine, who wrote the article “Teilhard de Chardin lu par H. de Lubac,” in Un monde en evolution: Foi, Science et Théologie (Paris: Aubin, 2004). 90. Russell, Murphy, and Stoeger, eds., Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, 185; Hess and Allen, Catholicism and Science (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2008), 139–41; Haught, Science and Religion: From Conflict to Conversation (New York: Paulist Press, 1995) , 15. A similar focus to Haught’s on the desire to know is expressed by the physicist Stephen Barr in Modern Physics and Ancient Faith (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 2003), 15, 262. 91. Keller, Reflections on Gender and Science (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996), 4–12, 177–79. 92. Keller, Reflections on Gender and Science, 116–17. 93. Vertin, “Gender, Science and Cognitional Conversion,” 57–61; Shute, “Emergent Probability and the Ecofeminist Critique of Hierarchy,” in Lonergan and Feminism, ed. Crysdale, 153–54. 94. Anamnesis in psychology is a recollection and in medicine a complete case history. Robert Roy, M.D., “Bioethics as Anamnesis,” ed. Fred Lawrence, Lonergan Workshop 12 (1995): 326. Another article on Lonergan bioethics is Miguel Bedolla, “Process Medical Ethics: A Contribution toward an Adequate Lonerganian Position on Medical Ethics,” METHOD: Journal of Lonerganian Studies 15 (1997): 21–28; Lonergan, Insight, 625. 95. David J. Roy, “The Severely Defective Newborn,” in Health and Christian Life (Ottawa: Catholic Health Association of Canada, 1978), 22. 96. Lonergan, Insight, 217–44, 625–28. 97. William F. Sullivan, Eye of the Heart: Knowing the Human Good in the Euthanasia Debate (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 2005), 3–23. 98. Daniel H. Mansour, ed., Ethics and the New Genetics: An Integrated Approach (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2007). 99. John Haught, Is Nature Enough (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 29–33, 208. 100. Philip McShane, “Insight and the Strategy of Biology,” Continuum 2 (autumn 1964): 375–88; Charles John Buckley, O.S.B., “Method in Mathematics: Bernard Lonergan’s Theory of Cognition and Its Application to Mathematical Education” (Ph.D. diss., Columbia University, 1977); this was a paper presented at the Hinsdale Conference in 1991; Patrick Byrne, “Relativity and Indeterminism,” Foundations of Physics 11 (December 1981): 913–32; Patrick Heelan, Quantum Mechanics (The Hague: M. Nijoff, 1965).

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101. Michael Bretz, “Letter,” in Physics Today 55 (2002): 12; Another physicist, John Polkinghorne, finds Lonergan useful for the insight of the ultimate grounding of reality is intelligibility. John Polkinghorne, “The Quantum World,” in Physics, Philosophy and Theology, ed. Russell, Stoeger, and Coyne, 336. 102. Matthew Lamb, “Discussion: Toward A Synthesization of The Sciences,” Philosophy of Science 32 (April 1965): 182–91; Patrick A. Heelan, “Horizon, Objectivity and Reality in the Physical Sciences,” International Philosophical Quarterly 7 (1967): 375–412; James R. Pambrun, “Philosophical Foundations of Theological Attitudes toward Science,” Eglise et Theologie 18 (1987): 29–53; Joseph Kroger, “Theology and Notions of Reason and Science: A Note on a Point of Comparison in Lonergan and Polanyi,” The Journal of Religion 56 (1976): 157–61 103. Rosemary Juel Bertocci and Francis H. Rohlf, “A Lonerganian Kritik of the Evolutionary Sciences and Religious Consciousness: The Isomorphism of Structures, Activities and Analyses,” Method: Journal of Lonerganian Studies 20 (2002): 1–19. 104. Patrick Kerans, “Hope, Objectivity and Technical Culture,” Continuum 7 (1969): 570–82; Geoffrey Price, “The Nuclear Issue and Human Sciences,” in Religion and Culture: Essays in Honor of Bernard Lonergan, S.J., ed. Timothy P. Fallon and Philip Boo Riley (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1987), 277–91; William S. Watson, “The Engineer as Responsible Broker Between the Community and Economics,” Proceedings of the International Symposium on Technology and Society (1991): 1–7; Patrick Byrne, “Research: An Illustration form Galileo Studies,” Method: Journal of Lonerganian Studies 20 (2002): 21–32. 105. Joseph Fitzpatrick, Philosophical Encounters: Lonergan and the Analytic Tradition (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 2005); Andrew Beards, Method in Metaphysics: Lonergan and the Future of Analytical Philosophy (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 2008); Philip McShane, “Lonergan and the Philosophy of the Lower Sciences.” 106. On Merton’s implications for understanding the technological city, see Gloria Kitto Lewis, “Thomas Merton’s Myth for Modern Times,” The Merton Seasonal 13 (spring 1988): 10–15; William H. Shannon, “Can One Be a Contemplative in a Technological Society,” The Merton Seasonal 22 (spring 1997): 12–20; William H. Shannon, “Christian Living in an Age of Technology,” 179–90; Paul R. Dekar, “What the Machine Produces and What the Machine Destroys: Thomas Merton on Technology,” The Merton Annual 17 (2004): 216–34; John Wu, Jr., “Technological Perspectives: Thomas Merton and the One-Eyed Giant,” Merton Annual 13 (2000): 80–104; Ross Labrie, Thomas Merton and the Inclusive Imagination (Columbia: University of Missouri, 2001). 107. Thomas Merton, Seeking Paradise: The Spirit of the Shakers, ed. Paul Pearson (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2003); Judith Flournoy, “Thomas Merton and the Shakers,” The Merton Seasonal 22 (spring, 1997): 7–11; Brother Patrick Hart, O.C.S.O., “Photography and Prayer in Thomas Merton,” The Merton Seasonal 10 (autumn 1985): 2–5; John Howard Griffin, A Hidden Wholeness: The Visual World of Thomas Merton (Boston: Houghton-Mifflin, 1970); Greg Ryan, “Thomas MertonComputer Hacker (A Cyber Fantasy),” The Merton Seasonal 23 (spring 1998): 8–13; Edward Deming Andrews and Faith Andrews, Religion in Wood: A Book of Shaker Furniture (Bloomington: Indiana University Press), xii.

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108. Thomas Del Prete, “On Mind, Matter and Knowing, Thomas Merton and Quantum Physics,” in The Vision of Thomas Merton, ed. O’Connell (Notre Dame: Ave Maria Press, 2003), 119–33. 109. Ronald E. Powaski, Thomas Merton on Nuclear Weapons (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1988); James J. Farrell, “Thomas Merton and the Religion of the Bomb,” Religion and American Culture 5 (winter 1995): 77–98; for a review of Merton’s view of the nuclear issue that is generous, but critical, see George Weigel, Tranquilitas Ordinis The Present Failure and Future Promise of American Catholic Thought on War and Peace (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987); William A. Au, The Cross, The Flag and the Bomb: American Catholics Debate War and Peace (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1984), 42–43. 110. Dennis O’Hara, “`The Whole World . . . Has Appeared as Transparent Manifestation of God’s Love’: Portents of Merton as Eco-Theologian,” The Merton Annual 9 (1996): 90–117. 111. Monica Weis, S.S.J., “Living Beings Call Us to Reflective Living,” The Merton Seasonal 17 (autumn 1992): 4–9. She explores the evolution of Merton’s concept of nature as well. Monica Weis, “Dancing with the Raven, Thomas Merton’s Evolving View of Nature,” in The Vision of Thomas Merton, ed. Patrick O’Connell (Notre Dame: Ave Maria Press, 2003), 135–53. 112. In addition to Shannon’s work, a general book of some assistance in this effort is Robert Inchausti, Thomas Merton’s American Prophecy (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998).

7 ✛

The Path of Critical Openness

GUIDEPOSTS FOR THE JOURNEY

T

he legacy of Maritain, Teilhard, Lonergan, and Merton reveals the depth and breadth of the evolving relationship of the Church with science and technology in the twentieth century and provides valuable insight for current reflections. These intellectuals confronted the daunting challenge of negotiating a difficult terrain permeated by suspicion between the Church and science and technology. Operating with very different methodologies and theoretical approaches, they still shared a deep commitment to free and open exchanges between religion and science, a sense of the need to respect the rightful autonomy of science in its proper sphere of explaining natural phenomena, and a commitment to the belief that religion and science must be mutually engaged in fostering the creation of a humane world. There were other similarities including a distaste for materialism and a host of narrow moral anthropologies extant in the twentieth century. Instead, these intellectuals advocated a temporal and transcendent vision, one in which conversion, sacrifice, contemplation, reflection, and ultimately love are essential for human flourishing and salvation. The pontificate of John Paul II drew on the intellectual evolution of Catholic positions supported by these intellectuals in outlining a new engagement with science and technology. He exhibits their spirit of dialogue and open engagement. Cardinal Avery Dulles claimed that John Paul II’s work on religion and science “seems to encourage the adventurous spirit that motivated the great French paleontologist [Teilhard].”1 181

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With the passing of John Paul II, the Church, as Benedict XVI has noted, is consolidating his considerable legacy. So, it is perhaps a good moment to consider the value of John Paul II’s position of “critical openness” for the future of science and religion. A single chapter cannot adequately explore such a concept, but perhaps a preliminary outline can reveal some general principles, useful examples, and provide a framework for additional explorations. This analysis will draw heavily on the traditions of the Church, the work of the intellectuals discussed in this book, and the insights of John Paul II to formulate a preliminary outline of a proper form of dialogue. I will be employing as a foundational text in this exploration John Paul II’s “Letter to George V. Coyne, Director of the Vatican Observatory” in 1987. In this choice for my analysis, I concur with Ernan McMullin and Cardinal Avery Dulles that the letter was “without a doubt the most important and specific papal statement on the relations between religion and science in recent times.”2 Principle #1 The Church must engage in a vigorous, but respectful dialogue with science and technology. This dialogue is essential because both provide enormous benefits to humankind and are a vital aspect of human culture. John Paul II hoped, “As dialogue and common searching continue, there will be growth towards mutual understanding and a gradual uncovering of common concerns which will provide the basis for further research and discussion. . . . What is important, as we have already stressed, is that the dialogue should continue and grow in depth and scope. In this process, we must overcome every regressive tendency to a unilateral reductionism, to fear, and to self-imposed isolation.”3 In the wake of a cautious and circuitous engagement, the tension between the Church and science has eased considerably during the course of the twentieth century. The Church no longer perceives itself besieged by a host of enemies as illustrated by the crisis of Modernism. The current dialogue has not eliminated differences, even sharp differences, but there have been important gains. There has developed a robust dialogue that owes its existence in part to the work of the intellectuals in this book. For example, as Walter Ong observed, Maritain “predigested” much of twentieth-century science for subsequent American Catholic consumption.4 Teilhard and Lonergan in their distinctive ways explored the enormous value of scientific approaches and prepared Catholics and other faiths for a new type of engagement with science. Merton expressed a set of concerns shared by many other faiths and parts of the world today about Western science and technology. These efforts combined with many others have fostered the current free and candid exchanges with science and technology. 5 John Paul II had an abiding and long-standing interest in the sciences and technology. The young people that he met during his university chaplaincy formed Catholic study groups in physics and engineering that

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continued while he remained in his native land. He offered philosophy and metaphysics to them as a way to “speak coherently and in a connected way about everything.” Even as archbishop, there were meetings of study groups four or five times a year and the reading of papers followed by discussions.6 The experience of vital exchanges with the broader culture in Poland prepared Karol Wojtyla for vibrant intellectual exchanges with the sciences in his pontificate. These exchanges assumed a genuine recognition of the value of the sciences. In a 1979 address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, the tone of praise for science was set: Pure science is a good, worthy of being very well loved, for it is knowledge and therefore a perfection of man in his intelligence. Even before its technical applications, it ought to be honored for itself as an integral part of culture. Fundamental science is a universal good, which all people must cultivate in full liberty.7

Science is not merely a positive, but boutique form of knowledge. Its scope and range inspire wonder for its creative and transformative powers in the Baconian sense of knowledge when rightly used as a proper form of power. Still ebullient on the scope and positive achievements of science in 1992, the pontiff proclaimed its connection to human flourishing, One could rightly say that today, as never before, the universality of methodology, of language and of the scientific mentality has helped to change the human world. The universality of knowledge stems partly from the indomitable attraction human beings have to know the truth and partly from their need to communicate with one another to pass on their achievements or to use them for the benefit of an ever greater number of people.8

The combination of a history of engagement with scientists and a recognition of the value of science for human development led to concrete steps that signaled a new relationship. One of his first initiatives as pontiff was the revitalization of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences. The Vatican Observatory constructed a state of the art telescope in Arizona. John Paul II attempted to salve old wounds. There was a recognition that Galileo had suffered a great deal at “the hands of Churchmen and Church institutions.” A commission on the Galileo affair recognized the valuable contribution of Galileo and some errors in his case by members of the Church. John Paul II also addressed another sore point—the Church’s disdain for and seeming opposition at times to the theory of evolution. John Paul II proclaimed that evolution was “more than a hypothesis.”9 It was perhaps a propitious moment for the pontiff’s move to a new engagement with science. There was a growing appreciation for the

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value of science to aid the quest for knowledge and the relief of human suffering. In a speech at the Pontifical Gregorian University, John Paul II recognized that the Church had to engage science in a series of open exchanges because theology had a “fundamental urge to take into account all the progress made by science in things pertaining to man and the context of his life.” In addition, the perception that all scientists are adverse to religion is a vastly overstated myth. Part of the reason for this perception of an opposition to religion is that the strident polemicists such as Richard Dawkins and Steven Weinberg get most of the headlines. Weinberg, a professor of physics, declared that religion is “an insult to human dignity.” Professor Weinberg’s blunt dismissal is countered by those like Neil Turok, a professor of applied mathematics and theoretical physics at Cambridge University, who counters that a dialogue “with theology and religion is something most scientists are serious about.” Francis Collins, an evangelical Christian and former head of the Human Genome project, openly defends his faith in The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief. A 1997 survey of American scientists found that 39 percent believed in “a God to whom one may pray in expectation of receiving an answer,” a comparable figure with a 1916 survey that used an identical sampling procedure. So, a persistent strain of religious belief continues in one of the most scientific and technological countries in one of the most scientifically and technologically dominated periods of human history.10 A growing body of writings on the subject of religion and science confirmed the openness to dialogue and discussion. The average number of books published under the heading of religion and science tripled from the 1950s to the 1990s. This explosion has been precipitated in part by expanding philanthropic support in the development of conferences and publications on religion and science. In this age of freer exchanges, the Vatican has sponsored a series of conferences with diverse audiences. There have been two major ongoing research projects that deserve mention. These began with a series of Vatican-sponsored conferences in the 1980s on the historical figures of Galileo and Newton. Following John Paul II’s famous letter on religion and science in 1987, the head of the Vatican Observatory, George Coyne, S.J., initiated a partnership with the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences in Berkeley, California, that produced a series of conferences and books exploring the connections of theology with science in the fields of physics, evolutionary biology, and the neurosciences. This was followed by another initiative beginning in 2000 of a series of conferences, lectures, and classes associated with the Science, Theology and Ontological Quest initiative (STOQ). Now in its third phase, STOQ is sponsored by affiliating institutions such as the pontifical universities, the University of Notre Dame, and the Pontifical Council for Culture. Its objective is to “build a bridge between science and

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theology in such a way as to make a real contribution to confronting the urgent concerns of our day.“11 For its part, some of the scientific community showed signs that it was aware of a new era with John Paul II although it was at times uncomfortable with some of the ethical constraints advocated in the life sciences.12 Still, the principle in the Church of a respect for science and an earnest dialogue that was signaled by the quartet in this book has been at least partially achieved and many in the sciences have recognized this achievement. In regard to his friend’s engagement with science and technology, archbishop Jozef Zycinski observed that it “would be hard to point to another pontificate in modern times in which dialog with the world of science was as intense as is the dialog conducted by John Paul II.”13 Principle #2 A history of conflict can be partly overcome by accurately understanding the historical relationship between science and religion. John Paul II declared the appropriate view of this history as follows: “We [the Church and science] have come into contact often during these centuries, sometimes in mutual support, at other times in those needless conflicts, which have marred both our histories.”14 In the last two centuries, influential texts have depicted the Renaissance and Enlightenment so that they are, in the words of John Polkinghorne, “mythically represented as a paradigm period of great conflict between science and religion.”15 The discontinuity thesis that there was a huge gulf separating the positive events in the Renaissance and the scientific revolution from the preceding “dark” ages following the fall of Rome has been challenged in the last few decades. Ernan McMullin has observed that careful historical research has “transmuted the complexities of black and white into more realistic (although no less dramatic) shades of grey.” While there is no denying that the rate and scope of scientific discovery has advanced significantly since the Renaissance, the role of the Church before and during this process needs some reevaluation. Supplementing the position of Duhem, Stanley Jaki argues in Christ and Science (2000) that an omniscient and all-powerful creator removed pagan deities from the world and allowed for the real possibility of autonomous natural laws. These autonomous laws, the natural product of an all-powerful deity, were thus rational and intelligible. Duhem’s view that modern science had strong medieval connections and antecedents stemmed in part from the role of the Christian doctrine of creation ex nihilo and the condemnation of certain Aristotelian propositions that formulated a deterministic view of creation. If the universe according to these statements is a contingent choice of the divine then it has to undergo an a posteriori examination. For Jaki, the assumptions of a freely chosen creation ex-nihilo and a rejection of Aristotelian determinism prompted a search for the fixed laws of nature in the works of John Buridan and Nicholas Oresme in the

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fourteenth century. There is also compelling evidence that the Church provided more financial and social support to the study of astronomy from the late Middle Ages through the Enlightenment than any other institution. This point is important even if the primary motive was to correct the Easter calendar.16 What about the claim though that the Church blocked scientific advances after the Galileo trial? The weight of recent historical research suggests that the problems of the Church with Galileo derived from many other factors than concerns with a sun-centered universe. These included the incomplete scientific proofs of Galileo, the institutional interests of the Aristotelians and the Jesuits, the mercurial personalities of Urban VIII and Galileo, patronage conflicts, curial intrigue, and perhaps the issue of atomism and the doctrine of the Eucharist.17 Even more important in my opinion than these concerns was the issue of biblical exegesis because of its role in the struggles between Catholics and Protestants. As the prominent historians of science, David Lindberg and Ronald Numbers at the University of Wisconsin concluded in 1986 that Galileo was the victim of “an intramural dispute within Catholicism over the proper principles of biblical interpretation—a dispute won by the conservatives at Galileo’s expense.”18 Whatever the motives of the key players in the Galileo affair, it was wrong and it did have some dampening impact on Catholics in the sciences. The impact was greatest in Italy while Urban VIII was still alive since many intellectuals interpreted Galileo’s punishment as a personal reprimand for disloyalty to the pope rather than a condemnation of a heliocentric universe. During the course of the succeeding decades, astronomers were careful to describe the Copernican view as merely a useful hypothesis and did not question the scriptural authority of the Church. By 1700 any book that carefully couched its argument in hypothetical terms, however, could pass an official censorship review. Catholic thinkers did not disappear from the sciences and by the middle of the seventeenth century in France, Descartes, Mersenne, and Gassendi were innovators in the creation of a mechanical philosophy to replace the Aristotelian system. With the advance of Newtonian physics, the Church’s position became increasingly untenable although internal politics blocked an official removal of Galileo from the Index until 1835.19 The difficulty of the Church’s relations with science was revealed in the attempts of John Paul II to finally resolve the Galileo case. As early as 1979 he signaled a desire to wrestle with this issue when he acknowledged that Galileo had suffered “at the hands of men and organizations of the church.” Three years later the so-called Galileo commission investigated the matter in order to “put an end to the mistrust to which this affair still gives rise in many minds.” The Commission’s work produced a report in

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1992 that admitted error on the part of theologians and praised Galileo’s contribution to the sciences. Critics of the Commission like Ernan McMullin and George Coyne declared that the Commission did not sufficiently probe the problems with his trial or advanced dated defenses for doubting Galileo’s science and for imposing a particular view of scripture.20 The complexity thesis of the relationship of the Church toward science that was present in the Galileo case becomes even more pronounced in the cases involving the Church’s relationship to evolution. New research resulting from the opening of a section of the Vatican Archives of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith regarding evolution in 1998 is shedding light on this important historical issue. In these documents from 1877 to 1902, the Church confronted again an evolving theory that was developing additional evidence, from fields like genetics with each passing year. As with Galileo, there was no official position on this evolving science, as a matter of dogma. There were differences, however, including the fact that the Church relied more on science to defeat the theory of evolution. This reliance meant, however, that as science progressed, the theological objections to evolution began to diminish. Nonetheless, there were harsh appraisals of evolution by some in the Congregation of the Index, the Holy Office, the Council of Bishops of Cologne, and the persistent condemning articles of the prominent journal La Civilta Cattolica. Evolution troubled many Church officials with its • denial of the validity of the special creation of Adam and Eve; • denial of the literal reading of scripture; • threat to foundational doctrines like original sin and an immortal spiritual soul. Afraid of the past and wishing to avoid too rigid a response without secure grounding in Church dogma, the official responses to evolution were very complex and followed few consistent patterns. The only consistent points were no official condemnations of the theory of evolution, and each investigation was initiated by an external complaint. The form and degree of discipline could include the placing of a book or books on the Index and sometimes a publication of this prohibition, depending on the speed, and form of any retraction, the skill of the negotiators working on behalf of the offender, and the composition of the investigators and the members of the Index. The rulings and deliberations in this period witness to some significant diversities in processes and pronouncements.21 Whatever the issues remaining in the historical relationship of the Church and science, the Church has attempted to correct the historical record and seek a less pedantic understanding of controversial events. It has admitted historical errors. Citing Gaudium et Spes, John Paul II confessed

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that errors had been made in the past by Christians who had not observed the “rightful independence of science.” Indeed, Christians, on occasion, had exploited science in order to “bolster religious beliefs.”22 The Catholic dimension of historical revisions is one aspect of a broader push for accuracy within the history of religion and science.23 Other historical events like the Scopes trial have also seen new interpretations based in current scholarship. Freed from the burdens of historical errors, tensions should ease and allow for more exchanges based in good faith and a careful examination of the evidence. John Paul II summarizes the criteria for historical research by concluding that the Church must not be afraid of the truth that emerges from history and is ready to acknowledge mistakes wherever they have been identified, especially when they involve the respect that is owed to individuals and communities. She is inclined to mistrust generalizations that excuse or condemn various historical periods. She entrusts the investigation of the past to patient, honest, scholarly reconstruction.24

Principle #3 The Church and science must not seek a seamless integration, but a respectful recognition of disciplinary boundaries and differences. John Paul II observed, “The Church does not propose that science should become religion or religion science. . . . To be more specific, both religion and science must preserve their autonomy and their distinctiveness. Religion is not founded on science nor is science an extension of religion. Each should possess its own principles, its pattern of procedures, its diversities of interpretation, and its own conclusions.”25 John Paul II’s warning against a false integration is echoed in their distinctive fashions by Maritain, Lonergan, and Merton. They viewed science as having a tendency to make judgments beyond its disciplinary reach. Whether it is Maritain’s concern for distinguishing the levels of knowledge, Lonergan’s fears of a materialistic reductionism in science, or Merton’s concern with modern man being enslaved by technique, they shared a desire to properly recognize differences and delimit any intellectual imperialism from science and technology. Hence, any form of scientific reductionism is a concern because it can become a form of scientism. In the encyclical Fides et Ratio, John Paul II condemned scientism for refusing to admit the validity of forms of knowledge other than those of the positive sciences; and it relegates religious, theological, ethical and aesthetic knowledge to the realm of mere fantasy. In the past, the same ideas emerged in positivism and neo-positivism, which considered metaphysical statements to be meaningless. . . . [Scientism] dismisses values as mere products of the emotions and rejects the notion of being in order to clear the way for pure and simple facticity.26

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Having demarcated the possibilities for a false antagonism or a facile integration, there emerges the possibility of a third option. Each discipline, science and theology, is essentially compatible within their roles in the order of knowledge. No conflict “can exist between reason—which tends toward truth through its God-given nature, and is ready to acknowledge the truth and faith, which devotes itself to the always divine source of truth.”27 Assured of their complementary roles, each party is guaranteed real autonomy. John Paul II reconfirmed on the centenary of the birth of Albert Einstein the independence of science. This autonomy protects overreaching from the Church as well as economic and political interests. The only accounting of science should be to itself and to God, the source of all truth.28 In contrast to John Paul II’s recognition of a qualified autonomy, Teilhard promoted an integration model with science and technology. Teilhard’s view on integration was subtle. He recognized that religion and science represent two different mental spheres or meridians and their separate natures and roles must be acknowledged. Yet they must be joined or merged “at a pole of common vision (coherence)” or the whole structure of knowledge and thought would collapse. This requirement of integration, however qualified, posed a problem for Merton and Maritain. They sensed in its structure a Pelagian anthropology and, in Merton’s words, a “fantastic progressivism.” In a century of indescribable inhumanity, it is hard to accept even under the most benevolent interpretation, like Teilhard, any constructive role of events like the First World War. Perhaps Teilhard’s views would be more compelling if they were tempered by a full recognition of the role of human brokenness and falsity. A moral anthropology adequate to an age of unspeakable carnage must fully and faithfully account for such destruction, whether it is Maritain’s critique of totalitarianism and individualism, Lonergan’s “flights from understanding,” or Merton’s criticism of a mindless acceptance of technique.29 Scientific advances weakened some claims of scientism. For example, in the realm of physics and astronomy, a number of discoveries such as Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, quantum physics, chaos theory, and the discovery of dark matter have dampened excessive claims to absolute certainty and objectivity. Scientism has discovered new champions, however, in biological materialists. The Harvard entomologist and sociobiologist E. O. Wilson has declared that a consilience of knowledge within the natural sciences is progressing very rapidly, so why stop at the borders of the natural sciences? After all, he declared, as if it is selfevident that “nothing fundamental separates the course of human history from the course of physical history.”30 His house of knowledge has biological foundations and is erected on the following three principles, which aver that human beings

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1) are nothing more than material creatures, 2) operate according to certain Darwinian evolutionary imperatives, that is, strategies that help them to survive, and 3) are the sum of their biology directed by and passed on through their genes. If we adopt uncritically this trinity of sociobiological dogma, Wilson’s consilience of all forms of knowledge makes sense. All fields of endeavor including the arts and religion have biological explanations and will be reduced one day to “brain circuitry and deep, genetic history.” Religions only exist because they are useful in providing a strategy for dealing with certain kinds of dilemmas such as human mortality. As we extend life indefinitely and biology explains religion, religions will wither like defunct products at the end of their cycle of birth, growth, and death. For those who will live eternally, “anything” that gives an individual meaning and extends his or her existence will serve as a substitute religion.31 The unabashed certainty and universality of Wilson’s sweeping vision that reduces religion to an evolutionary strategy with a limited life cycle is perhaps understandable in an age of rapid biological advances, particularly in genetics. Wilson errs, however, in not realizing that our intelligence, foresight, and evaluation are independent abilities and our biology only provides a framework in which we make a free set of choices. Let me explain through an example. Biology according to Wilson might contend with some efficacy that male primates desire frequent copulation with many partners in order to increase the chances for genetic progeny. But, how do we explain faithful behavior or periods of faithful and unfaithful behavior in human beings? Is evolutionary biology an adequate description for the development of our moral choices? If you begin to doubt Wilson’s position from the experience of a faith tradition or the stirrings of moral conscience like Newman or the restless pull of a divine love like Augustine, he denies your escape from immanence. Wilson labels you in his dualistic typology a “transcendentalist,” a person who relies on mere feelings and myths instead of empirical criteria. Your escape plan might begin with the rejection of the assumptions of such a dualism. Recent research suggests that reason and emotion are not independent and disconnected realms. António R. Damásio, a neurologist, concludes in Descartes’ Error that research in neurobiology suggests “certain aspects of the process of emotions and feeling are indispensable for rationality.” In addition to Damásio’s work on emotions, there is scientific research that challenges the determinism of Wilson’s sociobiology. For example, new research is finding that the opportunity for mental stimulation from wealthy adoptions as opposed to a poor family has a large impact on identical twins. Hence,

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the full expression of one’s genetic abilities is strongly linked to environmental stimulants.32 Wilson also errs in applying the wrong method (biology) to his subject (religion); it is like employing biological categories and methods to physics.33 If we apply Lonergan’s notion of self-transcendence, primary biological drives cannot be denied for they provide the data, but the faculty of deliberation unifies and differentiates the experiences presented by the senses, develops possible meanings of the experience, and then judges the accuracy of the speculations of understanding. Ethics raises the question of values relative to assessing the data. At the religious level or the experience of absolute transcendence, the lower levels such as the biological are reassessed according to ultimate values at the level of conscience. With our conscience, Lonergan observes that we can “deliberate, and evaluate and decide and act with the easy deliberation of those that do all good because they are in love.”34 Wilson’s category of the transcendentalist as emotional and mythical is hard to reconcile with Lonergan’s subtle form of systematic analysis. The suggestion of intellectual restraint extended to Wilson is also applicable to the intelligent design debate. For Catholics, the intelligent design controversy exists within a specific historical trajectory. While evolution had never been explicitly condemned, Catholic scientists from John Zahm to Teilhard de Chardin have been disciplined for their adherence to this scientific theory and for exploring its theological implications. As late as Pius XII’s encyclical, Humani Generis, there were statements that the doctrine of evolution is “an open question.” John Paul II examined once more the issue of evolution in his 1996 address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences. In the address, “Theories of Evolution,” he declared that the contemporary state of scientific evidence had finally reached a point of critical mass that allowed the pontiff to move from Pius XII’s consideration of evolution as a serious hypothesis to a statement that evolutionary theories presented “more than a hypothesis.” The pontiff was careful in his acceptance, noting that there are “several” theories of evolution and he did not accept that evolution could challenge certain fundamental theological propositions.35 Contra John Paul II, a central thesis of the intelligent design position is that evolutionary theory is an inadequate form of scientific explanation since it does not explain the “irreducible complexity” of certain biological processes or systems that could not be created through the slow process of natural selection. A mousetrap, for example, could not self-organize from its pieces, because the pieces have no meaning or purpose independent of the final complex product. The pieces can only be joined in this complex structure by means of a designer. In addition to this notion of “irreducible complexity,” intelligent design raises the issue of how life itself develops from inert materials. The intelligent design theory has ignited a firestorm

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of righteous indignation among many Darwinian biologists. They have explained irreducible complexity by the fact that the components of a system can serve more than one purpose and that these systems do not coalesce, therefore, from scratch.36 One manifestation of the intelligent design controversy in Catholic circles was ignited by the 2005 editorial in the New York Times of Cardinal Christoph Schonborn, “Finding Design in Nature.” Cardinal Schonborn contended that John Paul II’s recognition of evolution as more than a hypothesis was not a denial of design in nature. In contrast, neo-Darwinism was “invented to avoid the overwhelming evidence for purpose and design in modern science.” The Schonborn editorial sparked vigorous exchanges between Catholic intellectuals.37 The Schonborn controversy illustrates that two issues must be separated— the science of evolution and the philosophy of some neo-Darwinians. There are not just two camps—the neo-Darwinians who espouse a materialist science and an ontological naturalism and the intelligent designers who support a divine intervention in the process of living development by a creator. There is at least one additional possibility. A Vatican-sponsored international theological Commission with Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger as its president published in 2004 Communion and Stewardship: Human Persons Created in the Image of God, which accepted the “mounting support for some theory of evolution to account for the development and diversification of life on earth.” The Commission did not accept the position of some neo-Darwinians like Richard Dawkins that there is no point or design to life. Contingency in the process of evolution does not exclude a designer. The Commission concluded that true contingency in the created order is not incompatible with a purposeful divine providence. Divine causality and created causality radically differ in kind and not only in degree. Thus, even the outcome of a truly contingent natural process can nonetheless fall within God’s providential plan for creation. . . . In the Catholic perspective, neo-Darwinians who adduce random genetic variation and natural selection as evidence that the process of evolution is completely unguided are straying beyond what can be demonstrated by science. Divine causality can be active in a process that is both contingent and guided. Any evolutionary process that is contingent can only be contingent because God made it so.38

The controversy about intelligent design is instructive in highlighting two errors from opposite ends. On the one hand, the findings of the theological Commission rejected a Darwinian materialism that would exclude the possibility of divine causality, because contingency is compatible with a divine plan. In an ironic twist, intelligent designers, like their counterparts among the sociobiologists, however, also claim too

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much from the phenomena of science. Science cannot prove or disprove a divine reality through divine intervention. One lesson of many historical debates on science and religion is that the shifting winds of scientific theories have damaged the Church when it is too closely wed to a particular scientific perspective. This instructive history, if nothing else, should make us leery of formulating proofs of divine operation in contingent, material realities. Principle #4 The Church must engage science and technology to assess their potential for unpacking unrealized possibilities for deepening the Christian faith. John Paul II was open to analyzing science for these unrealized possibilities, but he noted that this exploration was a point of “delicate importance” and theology was not to “incorporate indifferently each new philosophical or scientific theory.”39 Why is there a concern about incorporating indifferently scientific theories? Partly, the problem is that theology operates on shifting sands when it relies too much on the sciences whose very scope and nature are prone to significant changes whether it is Ptolemaic astronomy or Newtonian physics. Hence, scripture, the teaching of Church tradition, and other disciplines such as philosophy and theology should cautiously appropriate scientific knowledge into their theologies. How far John Paul II was prepared to appropriate science for theology is not entirely clear. In Fides et Ratio (1998), he positively cites Pius X for his criticism of the immanentism of Modernism and Pius XII’s warning in Humani Generis about evolution.40 These concerns are real, but so is John Paul II’s desire to have science and religion draw upon each other’s form of knowledge. Theology requires a vital understanding of contemporary science. Theology has been defined as an effort of faith to achieve understanding as fides quaerens intellectum. As such, it must be in vital interchange today with science just as it has always been with philosophy and other forms of learning. Theology will have to call on the findings of science to one degree or another as it pursues its primary concern for the human person, the reaches of freedom, the possibilities of Christian community, the nature of belief and the intelligibility of nature and history. The vitality and significance of theology for humanity will in a profound way be reflected in its ability to incorporate these findings.41

In this cautious appropriation, John Paul II stopped well short of urging a complete unification of the two disciplines although he admits that the present situation suggests that recent developments in science “challenge theology far more deeply than did the introduction of Aristotle into Western Europe in the thirteenth century.” Science provides insights for unpacking biblical truths, but the Church cannot affirm the absolute truth of

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science. As an example of the former, the pontiff observed that the early chapters of Genesis draw upon the cosmologies of the ancient Near East and noted that Aquinas appropriated Aristotelian philosophy to assist in the exploration of the sacraments and the hypostatic union.42 For John Paul II, the insights of science pose both risks and opportunities. Cardinal Avery Dulles concurs and contends that the pope’s critical openness paradigm suggests that “it is proper for theologians to state whether and under what conditions, they could accept or welcome new scientific hypotheses, and to explore the ways in which such hypotheses can provide new imagery and vocabulary for speaking about Christian doctrine.” With a mixture of caution and optimism, the theological possibilities can be fully explored under critical openness. John Paul II has already outlined some areas for reflection such as the role of the Big Bang theory in confirming the scriptural basis for creation or how cosmology has implications for creation and eschatology. Evolutionary theory might have insights for the doctrine of imago dei, theological anthropology, or Christology. In addition, the Church may be able to appropriate concepts and ideas from scientific methodology and the philosophy of science. Particularly interesting and important avenues of research that will probably become more important in future years are the neurosciences and the processes of the mind.43 In addition to the areas listed for exploration by John Paul II, science has assisted theology in analyzing other issues such as exegesis. The natural sciences confirm that theology should not utilize only a literal reading of scripture. Spurred by science, theology can also explore the doctrines of evolution and cosmology to unveil the true size and scope of creation. There are other possible reflections from science like the anthropic principle’s suggestion of a fine-tuning of the universe to create humanity. This fine-tuning suggests a master technician. Werner Heisenberg’s principle of indeterminacy in quantum physics could provide insights on the dilemma of freedom and necessity while Neil Bohr’s principle of complementarity, according to which light exhibits both wavelike and corpuscular characteristics, could provide valuable clues on how to deal with the issues of mystery and paradox in religion.44 A series of Vatican Observatory– and CTNS-sponsored conferences on religion and science from 1988 to 2001 covered a wide range of theological issues concerning the operation of God in the universe in the context of the developing bodies of knowledge in areas such as physics, the neurosciences, and evolutionary biology. These conferences covered topics that included but were not limited to the metaphysics employed in understanding the nature of God, the interplay between general divine action and special divine action, as well as between God’s activity in nature and in history, the status of natural theology, the limits of science, physical

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evil, the understanding of quantum indeterminacy, a reductionist versus an emergent philosophy of nature, and many others. Such conferences are essential to the process of a nuanced discernment by theology of the connection of the faith to the natural sciences.45 Science for its part might learn something for its substantive pursuits from a dialogue with Christian theology. There has been mounting evidence of the role of tradition in science according to the work of Max Planck, Michael Polanyi, and others. Might not a religious tradition provide science with insights on the role of tradition? In addition, science should allow Christian scientists to pursue, because of their faith, lines of investigation that would not otherwise have occurred to them.46 The relevance of the Catholic intellectual life for secular academic life including science could include methodological and institutional insights. The historian James Turner, in an essay “Catholic Intellectual Traditions and Catholic Life,” argues that secular scholars might examine Catholic scholarship and notice the highly rational and argumentative character typical of intellectual life through the centuries; its pluralistic nature and indeed multicultural bases; the hierarchic character of its approach to knowledge, anti-reductionist almost in principle; its tendency, especially in more recent centuries, to stress development over time; and its powerfully institutional orientation, which has produced a rich body of thinking about the nature of institutions, their relations to individuals and vica-versa, the tissues of duty and right. These qualities . . . collectively provide its own intellectual tool kit—one, I would argue, of value for many areas of scholarly work.47

In addition to the areas adumbrated by John Paul II, Cardinal Dulles, and James Turner, another potential fruitful avenue for the religion and science dialogue are limits questions. David Tracy, a theologian at the University of Chicago, finds an area of mutual exploration when the explanations of reason and science reach their explanatory limits as in the issue of death or the moment of creation. Classical religious texts and the structures of human experience, as indicated by Lonergan, provide some grounding for a useful exploration of limits questions.48 In this dialogue between science and theology, there will be a temptation for an intellectual merger. According to John Paul II, Catholicism must avoid transforming scientific knowledge into an “unconscious theology.” This “unconscious theology” seeks to dispel the dark clouds of dogma in favor of the positivist assertions of scientifically recognized truths. One problem with such an approach is that technological progress offers a “market based logic” and the “temptation of a quasi-divine power over nature and even the human being.” This “scientistic mentality,” has led many to assume that “if something is technically possible, it is

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therefore morally admissible.” John Paul II’s caution echoes in Lonergan, Maritain, and Merton’s warnings against a facile or thoughtless adopting of the latest intellectual fads in contemporary thought or the secular world.49 Principle #5 Science and technology are subject to the prophetic and ethical critique of the Church. As John Paul II observed, the different principles, procedures, and interpretations of the Church allow it to reach its own ethical judgments. Thus, the Church can be both open to and critical of its partner when science or technology exceeds its area of competence in a way that adversely affects the ethics of the broader culture. Hence, the Church must not be afraid, for example, to “purify science from idolatry and false absolutes.”50 In the realm of how to foster a just and humane culture, John Paul II asserts that the Church should recognize both common ground and profound disagreements. There are many possibilities for common efforts to combat disease, poverty, and ecological destruction. As was demonstrated in Teilhard’s long-term interaction with scientists and Merton’s brief connection with Leo Szilard, the Church must affirm “those who face difficult moral decisions in matters of technological research and application” and “integrate the worlds of science and religion in their own intellectual and spiritual lives.”51 While critical openness must be prepared for and seek cooperation when possible between the secular and religious realms, the Church must also provide a prophetic critique on the creation or use of science or technologies that threaten a fully human life. Merton observed that if our “eyes and ears are open” people of faith serve as modern prophets and cannot help but recognize their “obligation to shout very loud about God’s will, God’s truth, and the justice of man to man.”52 There are important historical precedents for this prophetic role. For example, the Church in the first few decades of the twentieth century provided one of the few voices strongly opposing the euthanasia of deformed infants and the involuntary sterilizations of thousands deemed unworthy of procreating. The statutory employment of involuntary sterilizations on behalf of the eugenics movement had broad support in the United States among almost all aspects of American society. Noted progressives such as Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt fully supported these laws. Official Constitutional imprimatur for the passage of involuntary sterilization laws was granted in the stunning case of Buck v. Bell (1927) in which the opinion written by the revered Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., compared the sterilizations mandated by Virginia law to compulsory vaccinations because eugenics laws protected society from the scourge of incompetence. Holmes’s conclusion, based on a specious science of eugenics and a paucity of evidence of mental retardation in the facts of the case, was that such sterilizations were permissible because

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“Three generations of imbeciles is enough.” The sole dissenter to the decision was by the only Catholic justice on the court.53 Advances in the science of genetics and the employment of massive involuntary sterilizations against “defectives” by the Nazis eventually discredited the specific means if not the goals of Holmes and his legal heirs.54 In this historical instance, the Church, with its deep tradition of ethical reflection and its claim to the authority to judge faith and morals, correctly denounced against the weight of contemporary public opinion and science this egregious violation of human dignity. Buck v. Bell demonstrates that there is a prophetic role for Catholicism in judging science or technology when it serves a false vision of human flourishing.55 In such a prophetic role, there are many traps and dangers in discerning and expressing the divine will and truth. We cannot ignore such issues, however, unless we select an “Amish option” and isolate ourselves from the world. If we try to isolate our faith, the world will come in anyway. So, the real question before the Church is the form and content of its cultural participation, and John Paul II recognized that this participation can be done either “critically or unreflectively, with depth and nuance or with a shallowness that debases the Gospel and leaves us ashamed before history.”56 A full and adequate exploration of this prophetic role today would certainly require a new book, so I will select an instructive example to suggest why the Church must pass judgment on our choices at the intersection of culture, science, and technology. A continuation of the current decline would be particularly unfortunate when we need all of our capacities, mental and spiritual, to deal with the complex and sublime ethical issues confronting us in biotechnology. The impact of genetics was dawning even in 1967 as Merton warned that there was a “very real possibility of drastic genetic change in the near future, whether deliberate or accidental” so there must be “some concerted action by the best minds everywhere to control this power in view of the interests of man.”57 Today, what was speculation for Merton is close to becoming reality and it raises profound questions. What if we could fundamentally alter human nature through advances in biotechnology? What then of our reason and free will? Let me be clear that I am not commenting on new medical advances like gene therapies that could cure diseases. Such treatments, putting aside for a moment the ethical issues of the means of their creation in some instances, are of enormous benefit in preserving health. In their application, they will present standard medical ethics concerns like equal access and discrimination.58 I will also eschew any discussion of the fantastic visions of extreme alarmists who envision armies of human clones or who foresee the combination of advances of biology and

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nanotechnology leading to the creation of new machine organisms that will dominate the world.59 As Francis Fukuyama has observed, obvious dangers like robotic hegemony are likely to be prevented by regulations in our own self-interest. The real danger, I believe, in the future is not as routine as new therapies or as obviously dangerous as headless clones or robotic humanoids. Between the quotidian and the fantastic lies the real and disturbing possibility that there will be significant advances that will radically alter what it means to be human over the next century. A list of anticipated advances that could radically alter human experience and even our natures would include but not be limited to 1) neuropharmacological drugs that will alter our neurology to impact our emotional life like a drug to erase the pain of traumatic or negative events, 2) the genetic designing of children for certain physical and emotional qualities, and 3) genetic and other therapies that elongate human life and perhaps extends it indefinitely.60 Common justifications for a posthuman future include the following: 1) (utility) Since there is no human nature per se, our natures are malleable and only reflect our reasonable desires or choices of the moment such as avoiding pain and improving ourselves and our progeny. We will change our selves regularly as our tastes and preferences mutate in new directions. 2) (evolutionary progress) Biological evolution is a good thing. If we can expedite it, we can and should take charge of the march of evolution and improve ourselves. 3) (autonomy) The right to choose is the prime directive as personal autonomy trumps any claim of the common good. 4) (fatalism) Even if there were a problem with the march to the posthuman, there is absolutely no prospect for stopping the march of scientific and technological progress represented by these advances, so we must adopt to the changes. 5) (regulatory control) All that is needed are standard forms of regulatory control to insure social concerns such as safety and availability.61 At the heart of the debate on posthumanism are profound differences in moral anthropologies. The posthumanist Princeton biologist Lee Silver asserts that our society will inevitably enter “an age in which we as humans will gain the ability to change the nature of our species.”62 Francis Fukuyama counters in Our Posthuman Future, the most significant threat posed by contemporary biotechnology is the possibility that it will alter human nature and thereby move us into a “posthuman stage of history.” This is important, I will argue, because human nature

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exists, is a meaningful concept, and has provided a stable continuity to our experience as a species. It is, conjointly with religion, what defines our most basic values.63

On the question of a moral anthropology, the extreme posthumanists assume that humanity at its core is God-like in its capacity for self-perfection, a message that resonates in our age. With supreme confidence, these posthumanists pursue the perfecting of the human species and eventually its abolition as Homo Sapiens are transformed into a more perfect entity. This confidence is based on the assumption that there is not a defined and absolute human nature. A plastic human reality should be subject to manipulation and ultimately perfection under a proper regulatory framework in a frenetic quest for new identities. These efforts of the posthumanists benefit from a common view in our culture that human identity is a matter of personal choice. Each person constructs their identity pursuant to our uninhibited right to enhance our cognitive capacities, mental states, and physical features. In the future, research in neuropharmacology suggests that we may also be able to prevent or alleviate through beta-blockers the symptoms of unpleasant memories that produce effects like Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome. Hence, for the first time in human history, we can separate our experiences and emotional responses in order to maintain a desirable mental state.64 Another vehicle for perfecting humanity is through germ line (eggs or sperm cells) interventions in embryos that would permanently alter our genetic structures for future generations. Not only can we prevent diseases by such means, we will be able to fundamentally enhance physical or mental features. Gregory Stock, director of the Program on Medicine, Technology, and Society at UCLA Medical School, has declared that such germ line technologies are on the horizon and will signal the “beginning of human self-design.”65 As we perfect our physical and mental features and life experiences, many posthumanists desire to conquer death as well. Aging and hence our life span is at least partly the result of the fact that most cells have a limited ability to continuously divide and create new cells. There is a vigorous race among biotechnology companies to develop therapies from stem cell research or other sources to overcome this limitation. At a minimum, this research may extend an average human life span by several decades over the next century, and some, like Ray Kurzweil, are already predicting no limits on life expectancy in the near future.66 On the issue of eugenics and posthumanism, the watchdogs at the gates, the bioethicists, avoid the complications of a thick moral anthropology or metaphysics common to foundational ethical theories and apply middle-level ethical values like justice and autonomy. They occasionally

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express tepid measures of concern with the posthuman future, but in the final analysis do not oppose in principle these transformations. For example, the prominent bioethicist Arthur Caplan opines that “in so far as coercion and force are absent and individual choice is allowed to hold sway, then presuming fairness in the access to the means of enhancing our offspring, it is hard to see what is wrong with trying to create more perfect babies or more perfect adults.”67 Most bioethicists will present little, if any, obstacle to the push to posthumanism in an American culture primed for a race to expand and enhance individual choices. Other forces will join them in pushing forward a posthumanist agenda. The business of designing human beings, alleviating emotional stress, and extending the human life span offers a huge economic opportunity. As a point of comparison, the treatment of infertility alone generated 3 billion dollars in revenues in the United States in 2004.68 A bioindustrial complex of corporations, academic researchers, and bioethicists appeal to individual choice, economic prosperity, and a mild regulatory schema that will make opposing the possibility of improving human life through these technologies a very difficult proposition. Of course, this path will initially arouse some opposition to certain biotechnological manipulations such as human cloning. This is partly because cloning has little obvious utility at this point and too close an association with science fiction outcomes in the public imagination. It should be remembered that in-vitro fertilization (IVF) once suffered from significant opposition as well, but once IVF procedures became associated with solving the denial of personal choice resulting from infertility, any significant opposition dissolved despite some disturbing results.69 The road to posthumanism is also strengthened by new social assumptions from the advance of reproductive technologies. The process of birth has moved from a gift (a conception) to a process of production (reproduction) in which the creation and birth of children can be designed and manipulated on many levels not unlike the creation of other products. A parallel can be observed in the failure of a doctor to warn of a design flaw in the product (the child) that can lead to a products liability claim, that is, a wrongful birth lawsuit that is permitted in about one-half of the states.70 Despite the confluence of factors pushing toward posthumanism, there are voices even among supporters of reproductive rights who are now raising serious doubts about the drift of these biotechnologies. The director of the institute for Science, Law, and Technology at Chicago-Kent College of Law, who has long advocated reproductive rights, Lori Andrews, poses a key question, “Should anything be allowable so long as a lawyer can come up with a scheme to deal with it? Or are there some scientific ‘advances’ that would so change the nature of our society (or so waste money or damage the participants) that they should be prohibited?”71

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Similarly, the Church in its prophetic witness must also raise troubling questions about whether these biotechnologies are consistent with human flourishing in a divine creation. In answering such questions, the Church’s assumptions are very different from the posthumanists. Human nature is the product of divine creation; it is not random and it is not merely the product of evolution. Human beings are made in the image and likeness of God, are a gift, and our nature is not assumed to be infinitely malleable.72 Maritain asserted that human beings operate between a material and a spiritual pole in their natures. There is the individual or material reality that is subject to the determinism of the physical world and a personality that “is a metaphysical center deeper than all of the qualities and essences.” As a person we have a soul “capable of knowing, loving and of being uplifted by grace to participation in the very life of God so that, in the end, it might know and love Him as He knows and loves Himself.” The problem is not that we are partly material, because a purely spiritual nature risks adopting the “austere mask of the Pharisee.” Rather, the problem is adopting only one pole of our nature. The posthumanists, for their part, know only a material reality that moves inevitably toward “the detestable ego whose law is to grasp and absorb for itself.”73 John Paul II shares with Maritain the desire for a thick moral anthropology. Science cannot answer, for example, the question of the “value and end of existence” because it cannot detect the “depth and grandeur” of a human soul that is immediately created by God and confirmed in and though the risen Christ. He concludes that the ultimate questions of moral anthropology must rely on a “higher vision,” one that can overcome “cultural conditioning or ingrained prejudice.” In this “higher vision,” the dignity of the human person is preserved through the intellectual, moral, and spiritual uniqueness of the human species, which can form a relationship of “communion, solidarity, and self-giving” with one another.74 The disparity in the analysis of many evolutionary theorists and the Church begins, as Maritain had posited many years before, with epistemological differences. Science can measure physical changes, but science is not competent to discern the “metaphysical knowledge, of self awareness, and self reflection, of moral conscience, freedom, or again, of aesthetic and religious experience.”75 The resulting ethical duties of philosophy and theology are not the product of material processes and cannot be ignored by the individual scientist. To ignore the ultimate end of each human being is to leave the scientist open to manipulation by forces inimical to the dignity of the human person despite the protestations of progress. As Pope Benedict XVI declared in Spe Salvi: First, we must ask ourselves: what does “progress” really mean; what does it promise and what does it not promise? . . . We have all witnessed the way

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in which progress, in the wrong hands, can become and has indeed become a terrifying progress in evil. If technical progress is not matched by corresponding progress in man’s ethical formation, in man’s inner growth (cf. Eph 3:16; 2 Cor 4:16), then it is not progress at all, but a threat for man and for the world.76

The moral anthropology of the posthumanists makes an assumption contra the Church that the focus should be on the collective, on where the advance of science will take the species. The mere fact of permitting autonomous choice in this schema does not eliminate the enshrining of a collective mentality in individual choices because science is ultimately concerned with the collective. In contrast, as Maritain and Merton would aver, the Church is concerned with the eternal fate of each person as demonstrated in the goals of a community of faith and not a false individualism lost in collective material concerns. The intrinsic value and ineffable mystery of each human life serves as a warning about altering human nature in the quest for perfection through chemical manipulation or genetic alteration. The value of each person obliges every Catholic to respect each person regardless of differences in class, race, age, abilities, religion, etc. There is no need to attempt a “perfection” or radical alteration in the human species because we are a divine gift.77 The Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith summarized the importance of affirming human life as a gift of creation. Human life is the basis of all values; it is the source and indispensable condition for every human activity and all society. While the majority of human beings regard life as sacred and maintain that no one can dispose of it at will, the followers of Christ see it as being even more excellent: a loving gift from God, which they must preserve and render fruitful.78

In affirming the primacy of the human person and our intrinsic dignity, those forms of human technology that expedite, block, terminate, or even unnecessarily prolong human life are problematic. Moreover, drugs that might eliminate traumatic memories alter the normal course of human experience. Pain has a place in the Catholic tradition of redemptive suffering, and can also be an opportunity for personal reflection and transformation. It can nurture humility, compassion, patience, and faith in those suffering and those assisting the afflicted. Natural processes for healing must be assisted to be sure, but not to the extent that they would violate the dignity and end of human life and “go beyond the limits of a reasonable dominion over nature.”79 How then to pursue true human flourishing in a biotechnological age? Turning to posthuman technologies, the natural processes of birth and

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certain therapies may be enhanced by genetic research, but the purpose cannot be a eugenic one. As John Paul II has observed, technologies that serve a utilitarian calculation may all too easily support a “racist and materialist mentality aimed at a human well-being that is in reality a form of gross reductionism.” Human life cannot be reduced to “an object,” and is worthy of respect despite its limitations.80 In the search for how to engage the common culture on these sensitive ethical issues, the Church seeks a path that is thoughtful, nuanced, and remains true to its moral reasoning and traditions. The bioethicist Kevin Wildes, S.J., provides us with a map for navigating this terrain in his book, Moral Acquaintances: Methodology in Bioethics. On ethical issues, there will of course be allies with whom one regularly has a common perspective because of shared foundational principles. In addition, it is worth being pragmatic enough to seek “moral acquaintances,” that is, persons or entities with whom one can forge tentative and furtive alliances on specific issues, programs, or cases. The level of cooperation with a moral acquaintance depends on a number of factors including how one answers the following questions: 1) Is the consensus located in principles, cases, or consent? 2) How do agreements with others help us to understand our disagreements? 3) What is the moral justification for our agreement? These questions provide analytical grist for assessing potential allies. If for example the cooperation is a momentary procedural consideration, then there is less need for any cooperation on the level of principle. When tentative alliances are based more in principle, however, the agreement is stronger and probably more binding. Wildes’ schemata can assist the Church to navigate a pluralistic world between an Amish option that ignores the world and a “unitarian option” that concedes too much to secular culture or other faith traditions. Depending on the issue, the Church may unite with unusual allies on a single issue. For example, there can be support for New York Medical College professor Stuart Newman and the radical social activist Jeremy Rifkin’s filing of a research patent claim on a human/animal chimera in order to deny others the legal right to develop such creatures.81 In the role of critic, the Church must be perceptive, reflective, and intelligently navigate the complex political waters of our common culture. The stakes are high on these issues and our duty, as Gabriel Marcel remarked, “is to defend man against himself: to defend man against that extraordinary temptation toward inhumanity to which—almost without being aware of it—so many human beings today have yielded.”82

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NOTES 1. Cardinal Avery Dulles, “Science and Theology,” in John Paul II on Science and Religion, ed. Russell, ed. Robert John Russell, William R. Stoeger, and George V. Coyne (Vatican: Vatican Observatory Publications, 1988), 12. 2. Dulles, “Science and Theology,” in John Paul II on Science and Religion, ed. Russell, Stoeger, and Coyne, 9; Ernan McMullin, “Religious Book Week: Critics’ Choices,” Commonweal 116 (March 10, 1989): 149. 3. John Paul II, “Letter to George V. Coyne,” M 7. 4. Walter Ong, S.J., Frontiers in American Catholicism (New York: MacMillan, 1957), 113–14. 5. John Paul II “Science and Christianity,” in Is God a Creationist, ed. Roland Mushat Frye (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1983), 143. 6. George Weigel, Witness to Hope (New York: HarperCollins, 1999), 100, 211; Jozef Zycinski, “Evolution and Christian Thought in Dialog According to the Teaching of John Paul II,” Logos 9 (2006): 13–14. 7. John Paul II, “Science and Christianity,” 142. 8. John Paul II, “The Nobility of Science” (address to the University of Trieste, May 2, 1992), The Pope Speaks 38 (1993): 6. 9. John Paul II, “Faith, Science and the Search for Truth,” Origins 9 (November 29, 1979): 389–92; John Paul II, “A Dynamic Relationship Between Theology and Science,” Origins 18 (November 17, 1988): 375–78; John Paul II, “Message to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences on Evolution,” Origins 26 (December 5, 1996): 415. 10. Vincent Kiernan, “Can Science and Theology Find Common Ground?” The Chronicle of Higher Education (April 30, 1999), A 17; For an optimistic account of some merging of science and religion, see Gregg Easterbrook, “Science Sees the Light,” The New Republic (October 12, 1998), 25–29; Weigel, Witness to Hope, 356–58; Edward J. Larson and Larry Witham, “Scientists Are Still Keeping the Faith,” Nature 386 (April 3, 1997): 435–36. 11. Robert John Russell, Nancy Murphy, and Arthur Peacocke, eds., Chaos and Complexity: Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action (Vatican: Vatican Observatory Publications, 1995), xiii, xiv; Science Theology and Ontological Quest website: www.stoqnet.org/mission. 12. Ian Barbour, When Science Meets Religion (New York: HarperCollins, 2000), 1; Peter Greco, “Ratzinger and Science,” Journal of Science Communication 4 (June 2005): 1–2. 13. Zycinski, “Evolution and Christian Thought in Dialog According to the Teaching of John Paul II,” Logos 9 (2006): 13. 14. John Paul II, “Letter to George V. Coyne,” M2. 15. Polkinghorne, Science and the Trinity (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004), 3. 16. Stanley Jaki, The Road of Science and the Ways to God (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986); Stanley Jaki, Christ and Science (Royal Oak, MI: Real View Books, 2000), 23; J. L. Heilbron, The Sun in the Church (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999), 3–5. 17. Richard Westfall, ed., Essays on the Trial of Galileo (Vatican City: Vatican Observatory Press, 1989).

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18. Lindberg and Numbers, “Introduction,” 12. 19. Heilbron, The Sun in the Church (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999), 3; Ernan McMullin, “Introduction,” in Ernan McMullin, ed., The Church and Galileo (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2005), 2; John L. Heilbron, “Censorship of Astronomy in Italy after the Fall of Galileo” in The Church and Galileo, ed. McMullin, 279–314. 20. Ernan McMullin, “Introduction,” and George V. Coyne, “The Church’s Most Recent Attempt to Dispel the Galileo Myth,” in The Church and Galileo, ed. McMullin, 340–55. 21. Mariano Artigas, Thomas Glick, and Rafael A. Martinez, Negotiating Darwin: The Vatican Confronts Evolution 1877–1902 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 2006), 276–83. 22. John Paul II, “The Collaboration of Religion and Science,” Origins 21 (October 10, 1991): 283; John Paul II, “Science and Christianity,” 142–44. 23. Two books are helpful assets in revising the historical record to reflect this call for nuance and depth. They cover respectfully the nineteenth and early twentieth century. John Hedley Brooke, Science and Religion (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991); P. J. Bowler, Reconciling Science and Religion (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001). 24. For an excellent and balanced book on the Scopes trial, see the Pulitzer prize–winning Edward J. Larson, Summer for the Gods (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1996). 25. John Paul II, “Letter to George V. Coyne,” M 8. 26. John Paul II, Fides et Ratio (1998), n. 88. 27. John Paul II, “Science and Christianity,” 142–44. 28. John Paul II, “Science and Christianity,” 142–44; Gaudium et Spes, n. 36, n. 59. 29. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “La Pensée du Père Teilhard de Chardin par lui-même,” Les Etudes Philosophiques (1955): 57–81. For those who find Augustine too negative about human nature or prospects, I would recommend a reading of City of God, book XXII, which is one of the most extraordinary paeans to the value of human life. 30. E. O. Wilson, Consilience (New York: Vintage Books, 1999), 11. 31. Wilson, Consilience, 9, 280, 281, 285. Others taking up the standard of sociobiology like Richard Dawkins see the only meaning of human life in passing on our genetic inheritance. Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006). 32. António R. Damásio, Descartes’ Error (New York: Harper Collins, 1998), xiii; David L. Kirp, “After the Bell Curve: New Research Strengthens the Case Against Genetic Determinism,” The New York Times Magazine (July 23, 2006) 15, 16. 33. My analysis of Wilson has drawn on the works of Stephen J. Pope and Philip Hefner. Stephen J. Pope, “E. O. Wilson as Moralist,” Zygon 36 (June 2001): 233–40; Philip Hefner, “Understanding Religion: The Challenge of E. O. Wilson,” Zygon 36 (June 2001): 241–48. 34. Bernard Lonergan, “The Response of the Jesuit as Priest and Apostle in the Modern World,” in Second Collection, ed. William F. J. Ryan and Bernard J. Tyrell (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1996), 166–75; Rosemary Juel Bertocci and Francis H. Rohlf, “A Lonerganian Kritik of the Evolutionary Sciences and

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Religious Consciousness: The Isomorphism of Structures, Activities and Analyses,” Method: Journal of Lonerganian Studies 20 (2002): 1–19. 35. Pius XII, Humani Generis, n. 36; John Paul II, “Message to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences on Evolution,” Origins 26 (December 5, 1996): 415–18. John Paul II had already indicated in a message to a 1986 conference on evolution that contemporary evolutionary theories could be reconciled with Augustine. Zycinski, “Evolution and Christian Thought in Dialog According to the Teaching of John Paul II,” 14–15. 36. Cf. Michael Behe, Darwin’s Black Box (New York: The Free Press, 1996), 39; Kenneth Miller, Finding Darwin’s God: A Scientists’ Search for the Common Ground Between God and Evolution (New York: Cliff Street Books, 1999). 37. Christoph Cardinal Schonborn, “Finding Design in Nature,” New York Times (July 7, 2005), A12; Stephen Barr, “The Design of Evolution,” First Things 156 (October 2005): 9–12; Christoph Cardinal Schonborn, “The Designs of Science,” First Things 159 (January 2006): 34–38. 38. International Theological Commission, Communion and Stewardship: Human Persons Created in the Image of God (2004), n. 70. The Commission traces this position to Aquinas. 39. John Paul II, “Letter to George V. Coyne,” M 10–13. 40. John Paul II, Fides et Ratio, n. 54. 41. John Paul II, “Letter to George V. Coyne,” M 10. 42. John Paul II, “Letter to George V. Coyne,” M 10, M 11; Ernan McMullin, “A Common Quest For Understanding,” 55–57; Cf. Lonergan, “Aquinas Today,” 35–53. 43. Dulles, “Science and Theology,” 12, 13; John Paul II, “Letter to George V. Coyne,” M 10–13; John Paul II, “Science and God.” (address to participants in symposium sponsored by the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, October 4, 1991) The Pope Speaks 37 (1992): 69–73; on the cognitive sciences, see Andrew B. Newberg and Bruce Y. Lee, “The Neuroscientific Study of Religious and Spiritual Phenomena: Or Why God Doesn’t Use Biostatistics” Zygon 40 (June 2005): 469–89. 44. Dulles, “Science and Theology,” 12–15. 45. Russell, Murphy, and Stoeger, eds., Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, x. 46. Dulles, “Science and Theology,” 12, 13; Werner Heisenberg, Tradition in Science (New York: Seabury, 1983); Max Planck, Where is Science Going? (New York: W.W. Norton, 1932); Michael Polanyi, The Tacit Dimension (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1967), 63. 47. James Turner, “Catholic Intellectual Traditions and Contemporary Scholarship” (Notre Dame; Cushwa Center, 1997), 13. 48. David Tracy, Blessed Rage for Order (New York: Seabury, 1975). 49. John Paul II, Fides et Ratio n. 46, n. 88; John Paul II, “Letter to George V. Coyne,” M 14. 50. John Paul II, “Letter to George V. Coyne,” M 13. 51. John Paul II, ”Letter to George V. Coyne,” M 12. 52. Merton, “Letter to Daniel J. Berrigan” (June 26, 1963), in The Hidden Ground of Love, 78; On Merton’s Blakean rebellion and prophetic witness against modern culture, see Michael Higgins, “Monasticism as Rebellion: The Blakean Roots of Merton’s Thought,” American Benedictine Review 39, no. 2 (June 1988): 178–87.

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53. To be precise the Catholic opposition to eugenics and euthanasia was not monolithic and evolved over time, but it was the view of most Catholic writers, theologians, and clerics by the late 1920s. Christine Rosen, Preaching Eugenics (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 139–64. On the reaction of the Church to infant euthanasia, see Martin S. Pernick, The Black Stork: Eugenics and the Death of “Defective” Babies in American Medicine and Motion Pictures since 1915 (1996), 3–8, 190–91; Buck v. Bell, 274 U.S. 200 (1927). 54. The means and not the ends have been fully discredited. Eugenics as a principle still has plenty of advocates. David Plotz, The Genius Factory (New York: Random House, 2005); Nicholas Agar, Liberal Eugenics: In Defense of Human Enhancement (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2004). 55. For an analysis of how the case of Buck v. Bell was a contrived case and the Catholic response to such laws, see Phillip M. Thompson, “Silent Protest: A Catholic Justice Dissents in Buck v. Bell,” The Catholic Lawyer 43 (2004): 125–48. 56. John Paul II, “Letter to George V. Coyne,” M 13. 57. Thomas Merton, Learning to Love (June 6, 1967), 244. 58. Lori Andrews, Future Perfect: Confronting Decisions About Genetics (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001). 59. For a pessimistic view, see Bill Joy, “Why the Future Doesn’t Need Us” Wired 8 (2000): 238–46; A more optimistic assessment is presented in Ray Kurzweil, The Age of Spiritual Machines: When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence (New York: Viking, 1999). 60. Francis Fukuyama, Our Posthuman Future (New York : Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2001), 8, 9; Gregory Stock, Redesigning Humans: Our Inevitable Genetic Future (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2002), 9–10. 61. Silver, Remaking Eden, 11–13, 17; Gregory Stock, Redesigning Humans, 9–10; Arthur Caplan, “What’s Morally Wrong With Eugenics?” in Controlling Our Destinies, ed. Phillip R. Sloan (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 2000), 209–22. 62. Lee Silver, Remaking Eden : How Genetic Engineering and Cloning Will Change the American Family (New York: Avon Books, 1998), 13. 63. Fukuyama, Our Posthuman Future, 7. 64. Fukuyama, Our Posthuman Future, 40–46; President’s Council on Bioethics, Beyond Therapy: Biotechnology and the Pursuit of Happiness (New York: Harper Collins, 2003), 72–85, 223; Carl Elliot, Better Than Well: American Medicine Meets the American Dream (New York: W.W. Norton and Co, 2003), 3–14. 65. Stock, Redesigning Humans, 3. 66. President’s Council on Biotechnology, Beyond Therapy, 172–80; Raymond Kurzweil and Terry Grossman, M.D., Fantastic Voyage: Live Long Enough to Live Forever (New York: Rodale, 2004). 67. Caplan, “What’s Morally Wrong with Eugenics?” 222. 68. Debora L. Spar, The Baby Business: How Money, Science and Politics Drive the Commerce of Conception (Cambridge: Harvard Business School Press, 2006), 3. 69. For an overview replete with many anecdotes regarding the troubling aspects of IVF and the new genetic technologies, see Lori Andrews, The Clone Age: Adventures in the New World of Reproductive Technology (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1999).

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70. On the issue of gift versus product see Leon Kass, Life, Liberty, and the Defense of Dignity (San Francisco: Encounter Books, 2002), 151–53, and Michael Sandel, The Case Against Perfection (Cambridge: Belknap Press, 2007), 85–100; Andrews, The Clone Age, 3; Elizabeth Weil, “A Wrongful Birth?” New York Times Magazine (March 12, 2006), 50, 51. 71. Andrews, Clone Age, 5. 72. For an overview on the quest for immortality, see S. Jay Olshansky and Bruce A. Carnes, The Quest for Immortality: Science at the Frontiers of Aging (New York: W.W. Norton, 2001); John Paul II, Fides et Ratio, n. 46, n. 88. 73. Jacques Maritain, The Person and the Common Good, trans. John Fitzgerald (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1966), 42–49. 74. John Paul II, “Theories of Evolution,” 29; John Paul II, “The Nobility of Science,” The Pope Speaks 38 (1993): 7–8. 75. John Paul II, “Theories of Evolution,” 29; John Paul II, “The Nobility of Science,” 6–7. 76. Benedict XVI, Spe Salvi (2007), n. 22. 77. This “paradise consciousness” or original blessing was a quality of Shaker spirituality that Merton admired deeply. Merton, Seeking Paradise, 17. 78. Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, “Euthanasia” (May 5, 1980), The Pope Speaks 25 (Winter 1980): 290–91. 79. John Paul II, “Discourse to Those Taking Part in the 81st Congress of the Italian Society of Italian Society of General Surgery,” (October 27, 1980), AAS 72 (1980): 1126; Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Instruction on Respect for Human Life in its Origin and in the Dignity of Procreation (Washington, DC: USCC, 1987), 5–7. 80. John Paul II, “Law and Medicine,” (address to the National Conference of Italian Catholic Jurists, December 5, 1987), The Pope Speaks 33 (1988): 79–81; John Paul II, “Dangers of Genetic Manipulation” (address by John Paul II to the World Medical Association, December 29, 1983), The Pope Speaks 29 (1984): 19–22. 81. Kevin Wildes, S.J., Moral Acquaintances (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 2000), 133–49; the Patent Office denied the chimera patent to Newman because human beings cannot be patented, a tactical victory for Newman and Rifkin. Rick Weiss, “U.S. Denies Patent for a Too-Human Hybrid?” Washington Post (February 13, 2005), A3. 82. Gabriel Marcel, Man Against Mass Society (Chicago: Henry Regnery, 1962), 257.

Concluding Reflections

Scientists and believers can form a great spiritual family and construct a culture which is genuinely searching for the truth. Without a doubt, after a separation, even an opposition, between science and religion, the joining of different types of knowledge and wisdom, which is so necessary today, will produce a decisive renewal of culture. Religion and science will have to answer to God and humanity, for how they have tried to integrate human culture, thus avoiding the risk of fragmentation, which would mean its destruction.1

H

aving arrived at the end of this book, the reader might ask, is the glass half empty or half filled in regard to the Catholic engagement with science and technology? The answer is yes. There has been a lowering of tensions and a level of exchange and cooperation not present for centuries, but there remain strong historical memories of conflict and sharp divergences on many ethical issues. So where to now? The dialogue of the Catholic Church with science and technology in the future deserves to be a dialogue filled with reflection, nuance, and depth. The paradigm of critical openness assumes this as the appropriate goal. The lineaments of critical openness discussed in the previous chapter also suggest that such a dialogue will expose differences and disagreements, particularly on ethical issues. Internally, the Church must educate the faithful on its own terms, perhaps through new ministries. Externally, the Church must develop strategies for effectively operating in pluralistic political and cultural systems. The ultimate goal of these efforts according to John Paul II is to insure a vital integration of science into human culture. The “fragmentation of 209

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knowledge” caused by scientific specialization threatens to divide our ontological unity. We are not just mind or body or genes or chemistry. Any tendency to adopt a reductionist form of scientism will severely strain the unity of science and religion in a common culture. Culture as used by John Paul II is “everything of which man is at once the center, the subject and the object.” A culture employs all human talents and it “humanizes persons, manners, and institutions.”2 The failure to harmonize science with these humane goals of culture would be disastrous for human societies as it was in the twentieth century. Early in that century there were voices suggesting the imperative of a positive engagement. The philosopher and scientist Alfred North Whitehead warned, “When we consider what religion is for mankind, and what science is, it is no exaggeration to say that the future course of history depends upon the decision of this generation as to the relations between them.”3 The twentieth century failed to meet this challenge and millions perished from technologies of death and destruction. The problem was not only issues like the co-opting of scientists and engineers in the Third Reich or Stalin’s Soviet Union. Many respected scientists in the United States promoted theories like eugenics that justified the sterilization of the helpless and provided support for the racial theories of Nazi Germany.4 The United States witnessed nontherapeutic experimentation such as the syphilis experiments at Tuskegee. Researchers and Medical researchers used vivisection against the least defended members of society including women, children, and minorities.5 In an age that sterilized hundreds of thousands and murdered millions, the Church and science both were unable to prevent these acts of inhumanity. Ironically, the chastening of religion and science from their mutual impotency in these crises has improved the chances for a positive dialogue. Whitehead’s challenge remains relevant for a new century as significant problems and possibilities confront the Church at this moment in history. In making difficult choices, there can be no retreat into isolation or the forcing of a seamless integration. Instead, critical openness accepts the reality of a messy or ambiguous dialogue. It accepts a form of the complexity thesis that explores the many factors influencing the relationship of religion and science. No narrowly defined approach will work in describing the historical or contemporary relation of religion and science. The adoption of complexity in a dialogue form of engagement may dismay some integrationists who will reject the more modest, but more feasible, objective of seeking greater levels of cooperation and exchange between science and religion. In the current cultural fragmentation, Ernan McMullin aptly states the broad objective as “a tentative relationship in a constant slight shift.”6

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The possibility of such a tentative yet constructive dialogue would not have been possible without an evolution of the relationship of science and Catholicism in the twentieth century. The intellectuals in this book along with many other men and women of good faith mediated in their distinctive fashions the often-hostile positions of the opposing parties. As a result, there is now a vibrant dialogue with candid exchanges and broad areas of cooperation and mutual assistance. Applauding the advances and yet aware of continuing differences, John Paul II summarized the path to the current dialogue by concluding that “there has been a definite though still fragile and provisional movement towards a new and more nuanced interchange.”7 There are still individuals and entities who would return the relationship to old paradigms and, unfortunately, the conflict specialists grab most of the headlines in the popular press. The very titles of certain works reveal the disdain of scientists who desire to eliminate religion as a superstition, a pathological drive, an evolutionary anachronism, etc. Richard Dawkins’ most recent tome is God Is a Delusion and there is Daniel Dennett’s Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomena.8 Despite such unfortunate rhetorical shots across the bow, there is an expanding nexus of vigorous but respectful discussion between science and religion. Recent historical research and fruitful exchanges have undermined the ideal of science and religion as implacable enemies or completely independent of one another.9 Within the Church, there remain fears of new forms of Modernism in the last few decades. For example, Paul VI acknowledged in his first encyclical, Ecclesiam Suam, the threat of Modernism and in a general audience in January of 1972 declared that Modernism was still extant in the Church. John Paul II in Fides et Ratio stressed the relevance of Pius X’s warnings of certain forms of Modernism.10 There also remain many profound questions to answer for the paradigm of critical openness. For example, these questions could be asked: • How does the Church operate with the community of world religions to engage science and technology? • How does the teaching authority of the ordinary magisterium appropriately develop doctrine and moral instruction to engage advances in science and technology? • What is the Church’s teaching on issues related to a stewardship of nature such as global warming and sustainability? • How do we evaluate economic considerations influencing science and technology? • How can the Church encourage the development of technologies that tend to enhance community or effectively assist the poor and marginalized in the world?

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• What insights, if any, are to be drawn from more recent intellectual constructs such as feminism, postmodernism, multiculturalism, globalism, post-structuralism, etc.? These questions deserve a thorough analysis and serve as a reminder that there are many issues related to the future of the religion and science dialogue not covered in this book that others are working on and are certainly worthy of serious reflection. These discussions are critical to the project of building a common humane culture. While Vatican II proclaimed the need for such an engagement with the broader culture, the form and content of that engagement remains elusive. John Paul II perceived culture as a sphere for mutually pursuing the common good. This cultural task must subject scientific and technological achievements to a careful ethical critique.11 Despite John Paul II’s interest in the issue of cultural engagement, he did not delineate with specificity many aspects of this engagement. For example, what aspects of the modern world must be accommodated in the Church according to which principles? In pursuing such important issues related to critical openness, Pope Benedict XVI seems to be following the outlines of the legacy of John Paul II. As is demonstrated in his views on evolution, he is leery of the integrationists, but is open to a dialogue with science. There are other hints at his approach. In a preface to a series of essays from a conference on evolution a number of years ago, then Cardinal Ratzinger announced that Teilhard had contributed some useful impulses and intuitions to the dialogue on science and religion, but he had improperly extended genetic and material processes to philosophical and theological concept formation. The current pontiff was leery of scientific reductionism and rejected evolutionary philosophies of science that attempted to expunge all other modes of conceiving of human and cosmic development. In the coming years Benedict XVI and all Catholics will live in a world of unprecedented transformation. Advances in biotechnology, nanotechnology, robotics, telecommunications, and many other fields will probably transform current human technical possibilities in a generation.12 In this era of exponential advances, the stakes are very high for the common culture. Can we adequately address our ethical obligations to the natural world and each other? Are we prepared for the ambiguities and frustration of a dialogue that does not assume either constant antagonism or full integration?13 Nonetheless, there are a variety of resources and opportunities. There are elements of secular culture in art, music, film, and literature that can provide intellectual nourishment for the faithful. In the common culture of the United States, the Church may have an opening because of an uneasiness spawned by the advance of new technologies and a yearning

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for transcendent meanings. In intellectual circles, diverse voices are sympathetic to many of the concerns of the Church. Thus, we should draw insights from a deep well of human and divine wisdom. As Jean Elshtain has observed, “No complex tradition is ever exhausted,” and Christians would be guilty of a grave error if they ignored their tradition. The drawing on a tradition is not a call to blind obedience, for the modern mind requires a faith that seeks understanding by relentless questioning and probing. I am reminded here of the historian Louis Dupré’s description of how the theologian Romano Guardini reflected “the restlessness of the modern mind, constantly shifting its perspectives, endlessly questioning its conclusions. Yet underneath the moving thought the reader feels the stable peace of a mind secure in a timeless faith.”14 In this timeless faith, we confront challenges that will strain our intellectual and spiritual capacities, but a key resource is always present. For he [God] is the guide of wisdom and the director of the wise, For both we and our words are in his hands, as well as all prudence and knowledge of crafts. For he gave me sound knowledge of existing things, that I might know the organization of the universe and the force of its elements, The beginning and the end of the midpoint of times, The changes in the sun’s course and the variations of seasons. Cycles of years, position of the stars, nature of animals, temper of beasts, Powers of the winds and thoughts of men, uses of plants and virtues of roots— Such things as are hidden I learned, and such as are plain; For Wisdom the artificer of all, taught me. For in her is a spirit intelligent, holy, unique. Book of Wisdom 7:15–22

NOTES 1. John Paul II, “Science and Religion Can Renew Culture,” L’Osservatore Romano (October 14, 1991): 3. 2. John Paul II, “Science and Religion Can Renew Culture,” L’Osservatore Romano (October 14, 1991): 3. 3. Alfred North Whitehead, Science and the Modern World (New York: Free Press, 1925), 181–82. 4. For two recent explorations of eugenics and science, see Edward Black, War Against the Weak: Eugenics and America’s Campaign to Create a Master Race (New York: Four Walls Eight Windows, 2003); Richard Weikart, From Darwin to

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Hitler: Evolutionary Ethics, Eugenics, and Racism in Germany (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004). 5. James H. Jones, Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphylis Experiment (New York: Free Press, 1993); Susan E. Lederer, Subjected to Science: Human Experimentation in America Before the Second World War (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1995). 6. Ernan McMullin, “How Should Cosmology Relate to Theology?” in The Sciences and Theology in the Twentieth Century, ed. Arthur R. Peacocke (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1984), 52; John Hedley Brooke, Science and Religion (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 5. 7. John Paul II, “Letter to George V. Coyne,” M 4. 8. Richard Dawkins. The God Delusion (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2006); Daniel Dennett, Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomena (New York: Viking, 2006). See also Peter Watson, “What’s the Big Idea?” New York Times Magazine (December 11, 2005), 31. 9. John Polkinghorne, Science and the Trinity (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004), 8. 10. Yves Chiron, Saint Pius X: Restorer of the Church (Kansas City: Angelus Press, 2002), 205. 11. John Paul II, “Letter to George V. Coyne,” M 9. 12. Ray Kurzweil, The Singularity is Near (New York: Viking, 2005), 6–33. 13. On the definitive ability of science to prove a religious position, compare the certainty of Pius XII on science proving a creation ex nihilo, with John Paul II’s more humble position on the capacity of science to establish the theological doctrine of creation. Pius XII, “Address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences (1951), Catholic Mind 50 (1950): 190; John Paul II, “The Path of Scientific Discovery,” Origins 11 (October 15, 1981): 277–80. 14. Jean Elshtain, Who are We? (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), xiii, 5; Louis Dupre, “Introduction,” in Romano Guardini, Letters from Lake Como Explorations in Technology and the Human Race (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1981), xii.

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Index

Action Française, 20, 47 Ad beatissimi, 144 Aeterni Patris, 5, 8 Allitt, Patrick, xii. Amato, Josef, xvi–xvii, 47 Americanism, 11–12, 14 Andrews, Lori, 200 Aquinas, St. Thomas, 7–8, 13, 35– 37, 75, 83–84, 144–49, 157, 194 Aristotle, xix, 15, 40, 84, 91, 145, 147, 185, 193 Ashley, Benedict, 145–47 Augustine, x, 13, 36, 75, 86–87, 190 Barbour, Ian, ix, 160 Bateson, William, 21 Benedict XV, 18–19, 144 Benedict XVI, 164, 182, 192, 201, 211 Benigni, Umberto, 18 Bergson, Henri, 33–34, 60 Berry, Thomas, 171 Berry, Wendell, 171 Bertz, Michael, 169 bioindustrial complex, 200

Blondel, Maurice, 23–24 Bloy, Leon, 34 Bohr, Neils, 48, 116, 170, 194 Bonaparte, Napoleon, 3 Boquillon, Thomas, 12 Born, Max, 120 Buber, Martin, 132 Buck v. Bell, 196–97 Buridan, John, 22, 185 Butterfield, Herbert, 22 Caplan, Arthur, 200 Carson, Rachel, 120, 126, 127, 170 Cassoroli, Agostino, 164 Catholic Action, 20 Chicago World Fair (1933–1934), 129 Civilta Catolica. See La Civilta Catolica Clarke, W. Norris, 157 Cobb, John B., xvi Collins, Francis, 184 Columbia University, 113, 116, 125 Combes, Emile, 3, 11–12 Comte, Auguste, 5 243

244

Congar, Yves, 144 Cornoldi, Giovanni, 8 Coyne, George V., 182–84, 187 critical openness, ix, 181–208 Crowe, Frederick, 86 Cunningham, Lawrence, 112 Damásio, António Rosa, 190 Dantec, Felix Le, 33 Darwin, Charles, 4, 17, 34, 100, 199 Dawkins, Richard, 183, 192, 211 Dawson, Christopher, 85–86 Dei Filius, viii Dennehy, Raymond, 45 Dennett, Daniel, 211 Descartes, René, 38–40, 45 d’Hulst, Maurice, 11 Dorlodot, Henri de, 149 Draper, John, 2 Driesch, Hans, 34–35, 149 Duhem, Pierre, 21–22, 185 Dulles, Avery, 181, 18, 194 Dupré, Louis, 213

Index

Fourrey, René, 154 Fukuyama, Francis, 198 Galileo, xvi, 2, 85, 146, 169, 183, 186–87 Gallicans, 5 Garrigou-Lagrange, Reginald, 74, 141, 144 Gaudium et Spes, 129, 153–54, 156, 187 Gelm, Richard, 20 Gilson, Etienne, 164 Gleason, Philip, xiv n8, 12, 20 Gmeiner, John, 12 Griffin, John Howard, 127 Grumett, David, 161–64 Guardini, Romano, 113, 128, 213

Ecclesiam Suam, 211 Einstein, Albert, 116, 165 Eliade, Mircea, 158 Eliot, T. S., 125 Ellul, Jacques, 118–19, 170–71 Elshtain, Jean, 213 E Supremi Apostolatus, 17 Euclid, 85 evolution, 12–16, 51–53, 59–61, 149–50, 190–93

Harvey, William, 91 Haught, John, x, 165–66, 168 Hefner, Philip, 160 Heisenberg, Werner, 116, 170, 189, 194 Heller, Michael, 159 Helwig, Matthias Trennert, xvii Hemingway, Ernest, 125 Hewlett, Paul F., 12 Hitler, Adolph, 20 Hittinger, John, 43 Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 196 Hügel, Friedrich Von, 9, 17 Huizinga, Johan, xi Humanae Vitae, 156 Humani Generis, 74, 149–50, 191, 193 Huxley, Thomas, 11

Favre, Genevieve, 31 Favre, Julian, xviii, 31 Febronians, 5 Fides et Ratio, 188, 193, 211 France, Anatole, 47 France: and Catholicism, 3–6

Imitation of Christ, 59 Index of Forbidden Books, 10, 19, 186–87 Ionesco, Eugène, 132 Inscrutabili, 8 Institut Catholique, 11 intelligent design, 191–93

Index

Jaki, Stanley, 22, 185 James, Constantine, 4 John XXIII, 143, 151–53, 164 John Paul II, xvi, 164, 182–89, 191– 97, 201, 203, 209–12 Journet, Charles, 141 Joyce, James, 113 Kahn, Herman, 122 Kane, William, 145–46 Kant, Immanuel, 7, 39–40 Keller, Evelyn Fox, 166 Kelly, Michael, 153 King, Thomas, 163 Kleutgen, Joseph, 8 Knasas, John F., 42 Koninck, Charles de, 147 Koyré, Alexander, 22 Kurzweil, Ray, 199 La Civilta Catolica, 15, 18 Lacrimabili statu, 17 Lakatos, Imre, 160 Lamarck, Jean Baptiste, 14 Lane, David, 161 Laughlin, James, 143 Lemaître, Georges, 20 Leroy, Edouard, 23 Leo XIII, 5, 7–8, 15–16 Leopold, Aldo, 126–27 Lindberg, David, 186 Loisy, Alfred, 10–12, 19, 23 Lonergan, Bernard, x, xix, xx, 83–105, 142–43, 152, 158, 166–69, 182, 189, 191, 196; on Aquinas, 83, 84, 86–91; on bias and science, 104; on common sense, 103–4; on emergent probability, 95–96; on flights from understanding, 102; on functional specialization, 97–98; on grace, 86, 87; on heuristic structures for knowing,

245

93–98; on insight, 92–98; on metaphysics, 96, 101; progeny, 166–69; on role of cultural community, 102–3; on science as a community of learners, 98–100; on scientism, 100–2; on technology, 103–4 Lubac, Henri de, 70–71, 117, 144, 162–63 Luther, Martin, 38–39 Marcel, Gabriel, 130, 203 Maistre, Joseph de, 3 Maritain, Jacques, x,xi, xvii, xviii, 31–56, 141–42, 151–53, 155, 157–58, 164–69, 182, 189, 196, 201, 202; background, 31–35; on evolution, 51–53; on levels of intellection, 36–37, 41–46; on medieval synthesis, 35–39; on philosophy of nature, 39–46; progeny, 166–169; on science and society, 51–56; on Teilhard, xviii, 52; troubles with Church, 141–42 Maritain, Raissa, 32 Maritain, Paul, 31 Maurras, Charles, 47 McFague, Sallie, 171 McMullin, Ernan, 159, 182, 185, 210–11 McNamara, Robert, 121 McShane, Philip, 169 Mendel, Gregor, 21 Mercier, Cardinal Desire Joseph, viii, 145, 149 Merry del Val, Raphael, 23 Merton, Thomas, x, xi, xx, xxi, 111–34, 142–43, 152–53, 155, 182, 189, 196–97, 202; on air flight, 119; on angels, 119; on automobiles, 119; on balancing technology with religion,

246

Index

125–33; on camera, 127–28; on Christian humanism, 130–32; on Cold War, 170; on collectivity and community, 133; on computers, 120; on conversion to contemplation, 131–32; on ethical analysis of technology, 129–34; on factories, 124; on Flannery O’Connor, 120; on genetics, 123; on Louisville vision,115; on medicine, 123–24; on “mental ecology,” 127; on nature, 125; on nuclear war, 121–22; problems with superiors, 143–44; progeny, 157–58; on prophetic role of Christians, 113, 133, 134; on Rachel Carson, 120; on science, 116; on Shakers, 128,170; on St. John of the Cross, 116; on technology at Gethsemani, 113– 14; on technology generally, 118–22; on Teilhard de Chardin, 116–18; on television, 119–20; on quantum physics, 116; on vitalism, 130; on war, 121–23; on work, 124; on Zen Buddhism, 125 Messenger, Ernst, 149 Mivart, St. George Jackson, 12 modernism, 1–30 Monod, Jacques, 160 Mooney, Christopher, 70, 162–65 Mortier, Jeanne, 158 Muller, Robert, 165 Mumford, Lewis, 118, 170–71 Neitzche, Friedrich, 33 Newman, Cardinal John Henry, xix, 5–7, 40, 60, 85–86, 122, 190 Newman, Stuart, 203 Nicholas of Cusa, 91

Numbers, Ronald, 186 Nyssa, Gregory, 13 O’Connell, Marvin, 3 O’Connor, Flannery, 120 O’Hara, Dennis, 171 O’Leary, Don, ix Ong, Walter, 182 Oresme, Nicolas, 22, 185 Ortega Y Gasset, Jose, xx, xxi Pascal, Blaise, 75 Pascendi Dominici Gregis, xv–xvi, 9, 18 Paul, Saint. See St. Paul Paul VI, 155, 156, 211 Peguy, Charles, 33, 60 Percy, Walker, xii Perret, Jacques, 75 Plank, Max, 195 Plato, xix, 34, 84–85, 145 Pius IX, 2–4 Pius X, xvi, 9–12, 16–19, 190 Pius XI, 47, 144 Pius XII, 74, 141–42, 149–51, 164, 191–92 Polanyi, Michael, 169, 195 Polkinghorne, John, 185 Posthumanism, 197–203 Prat, Ferdinand, 161, 163 Prete, Thomas Del, 170 Quadragesimo Anno, 19 Renan, Ernest, 4 Renoirte, Fernard, 145 Rerum Novarum, 16, 19 Reuther, Rosemary Radford, 171 Revue des Questions Scientifiques, 4, 15 Richard, Jean, 149 Rickover, Hyman, 130 Rifkin, Jeremy, 203

Index

Rizzi, Anthony, 158 Rivere, Jean, 19 Roosevelt, Theodore, 196 Rousseau, Jacques, 38 Roy, David J., Dr., 167–68 Russell, Bertrand, 169 Sabatier, Auguste, 9 Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith, 202 Schute, Michael, 100 Science, Theology, and Ontological Quest initiative. See STOQ scientism, 46–47 Scopes trial, 188 Scotus, Duns, 145 Shanley, O. P., Brian, xi, 144 Shonborn, Christoph, 192 Shull, A. Franklin, 86 Silver, Lee, 198,199 Simon, Yves, 157 Social Darwinism, 14 Sortais, Dom Gabriel, 123 Spencer, Herbert, 11 Spinoza, Baruch, 33 St. Paul, 125 Stern, Alfred, 48 Stewart, J. A., 85 Stock, Gregory, 199 STOQ, 184 Suarez, Francisco, 145 Sullivan, William F., 168 Syllabus of Errors (1907), xv Syllabus of Errors (1864), 3, 16 Szilard, Leo, 122–23, 196 Talamo, Salvatore, 8 Taylor, Charles, 2 Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre, x, xviii,xix, 57–82, 142, 152–54, 158–65, 181, 182, 189, 211; Benedict XVI on Teilhard, 211; on Church discipline, 70–75;

247

on ecclesiology, 71–73; family of, 58; on Maritain, xviii, 52; Merton on Teilhard, 116–18; on noogenesis, 69; role of Omega point, 67; on pleroma, 59, 62–63, 163; progeny, 158– 65; on radial energy, 65–67; on Sacred Heart, 58; on scientists, 76–78; on tangential energy, 65–67; on technology, 68–69; on Thomsim, 73; Vatican II, 154; view of cultural differences, 67–70; World War I, 60 Teller, Edmund, 122 Termier, Pierre, 34 Testem Benevolentiae, 12 Thomism and Science, 145–49; Louvain, 145; River Forest School, 145–47; University of Laval, 147–49 Tillich, Paul, 160 Tracy, David, 195 Treasure Island, 85 Trinité, Phillipe de la, 164 Turok, Neil, 184 Tuskegee experiments, 210 Tyrell, George, 19 Tzu, Chuang, 125,127 Urban VIII, 186 Van Melsen, A. G., 145 Vatican Council, First, 5,8 Vertin, Michael, 166 Wallace, William, 147, 158 Ward, Wilfrid, 5, 22–23 Weber, Max, 125 Weinberg, Steven, 184 Weis, Monica, 171 Weisheipl, James, 145–46 White, Andrew Dickson, 2

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Index

Whitehead, Alfred North, 169, 210 Wildes, Kevin, 203 Wildiers, Max N., 165 Wilson, E. O., 189–91 Wilson, Woodrow, 196

Wiseman, Cardinal, 4. Wolff, Christian, 145 Zahm, John, 12–16 Zycinski, Josef, 185

About the Author

Dr. Phillip M. Thompson is the executive director of the Aquinas Center of Theology at Emory University. He directed the Leadership Certificate Program in the School of Public Policy at the Georgia Institute of Technology from 2005 to 2008. From 1999 to 2005, he was the Patricia A. Hayes Professor of Ethics and the director of the Center for Ethics and Leadership at St. Edward’s University in Austin, Texas. He has a Ph.D. in the History of Culture from the University of Chicago, a J.D. from the University of Georgia, and an LL.M. in Health Law from DePaul University. His writings and research are in the fields of religion and science, medical ethics, law and religion, and business ethics.

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