Christopher Clavius，大老的典範
嗯！大爆炸理論是身兼物理學家神父提出的……
看來，自那件事之後，不但教會的天文學家們真的是發憤圖強的雪恥，教會現在也很明智的不站邊…
我個人對於許多看事情毫無【歷史脈絡】的評論都非常不耐。特別是伽利略那件事。其實，到底地球在中心還是太陽在中心，在那個時代來說，是件只有科學家能懂的知識，也只有他們才在乎。這跟當今的天文學界或物理學界對於黑洞成因之類的事之於我們的生活毫無影響是差不多的事。教會領導層的錯誤，在於沒有極快速生出一套論點將此【真相】跟【教會教導】融在一起。當然，這樣說也有點苛責，因為以當今為例來說吧，能挑戰霍金的人其實也沒幾隻，因此，這的確也不是你說要去找幾人來研究一下就馬上能生出來的。
但是，羅馬教會處理這事的後續還是值得學習的。百多年後，平反伽利略，百多年後教內學者開始檢討教會在面對學術衝擊時的反應，百多年後，教廷的科學家已經進入外星人研究領域，並定期召開學術研討會。這樣一旦科學界再推出啥驚天動地的【新發現】時，教廷才不會反應不過來，無法應變。
跌倒不丟臉，重點是，要知道自己為啥會跌倒，然後，重新站起來，繼續往前走。
其中，在哥白尼伽利略引起的那場科學風暴期間，最了不起的科學家是當時領導山貓學院的耶穌會士科學家，伽利略拜訪過他並跟他討論，一流的人聽聽就知道對方是天才，而自己身為一個頂尖科學家的俗世榮耀應該是不用多久就會被推翻了。他知道禁壓學術自由是沒有用的，他知道優秀後輩不是你想擋人家出頭就擋得了的，真正的聰明人知道該怎麼面對另一個聰明人。
於是，這位當時代的科學界權威在他能做的範圍內，為這位後輩年輕科學家的研究以非常嚴謹又含蓄的方式背了書。我想，他很知道他這一肯定下去，也就等於是自己親手為自己的時代劃下句點了，長江後浪推前浪，他是永遠失去歷史地位了。但是，在這種時候，他做了一個大老、一個前輩該做的事: 我為你開路。事實上，這也是他唯一能做的事了，自己快快滾，不要當人家的擋路石頭。這樣未來還能得到一點敬意，因為，聰明人當知，有些人與事，你擋不了。
這位偉大的科學家叫 Christopher Clavius。
7 of History’s Most Brilliant Scientists People Forget Were Catholic
The next time someone accuses the Church of discouraging intellectual exploration that could benefit humanity, one would do well to bring the following thinkers to bear upon the discussion:
1) Louis Pasteur – Inventor of Pasteurization
Louis Pasteur, inventor of the process pasteurization (one of the biggest breakthroughs ever for preventing disease), was once praying the Rosary on a train when a young man criticized his devotion as a manifestation of scientific ignorance. Pasteur simply had to introduce himself to dispel this spurious charge of superstition.Apocryphal or not, the anecdote is confirmed by Pasteur’s many quotes in favor of the life of faith:
“A little science takes you away from God
but a lot of science takes you back to Him… Question your priorities
often, make sure God always comes first… Posterity will one day laugh at
the sublime foolishness of the modern materialistic philosophy. The
more I study nature, the more I stand amazed at the work of the Creator.
“I pray while I am engaged at my work in
the laboratory… Blessed is he who carries within himself a God, an
ideal, and who obeys it: ideal of art, ideal of science, ideal of the
gospel virtues, therein lie the springs of great thoughts and great
actions; they all reflect light from the Infinite… Do not let yourself
be tainted with a barren skepticism… Could I but know all, I would have
the faith of a Breton peasant woman.”
2) Gregor Mendel – Father of Genetics
Augustinian monk and pioneer of genetics, Gregor Mendel, calculated the odds of inheritance in his monastery garden. In a German sermon, he preached the following homily, seamlessly intertwining scriptural interpretation with his scientific investigations:
“Jesus appeared to the disciples after
the Resurrection in various forms. He appeared to Mary Magdalene so that
they might take him for a gardener. Very ingeniously these
manifestation of Jesus is to our minds difficult to penetrate. He
appears as a gardener. The gardener plants seedlings in prepared soil.
The soil must exert a physical and chemical influence so that the seed
of the plant can grow. Yet this is not sufficient. The warmth and light
of the sun must be added, together with rain, in order that growth may
result.
“The seed of supernatural life, of
sanctifying grace, cleanses from sin, so preparing the soul of man, and
man must seek to preserve this life by his good works. He still needs
the supernatural food, the body of the Lord, which received continually,
develops and brings to completion of the life. So natural and
supernatural must unite to the realization of the holiness to the
people. Man must contribute his minimum work of toil, and God gives the
growth.
“Truly, the seed, the talent, the grace
of God is there, and man has simply to work, take the seeds to bring
them to the bankers. So that we ‘may have life, and abundantly.’”
3) St. Giuseppe Moscati – Pioneer in Treating Diabetes with Insulin
Doctor Moscati was one of the first physicians to use insulin in the treatment of diabetes, but his deep intellectual gifts were always at the service of an even deeper belief in the healing power of the Divine, as this quote goes to show:
“Only one science is unshakeable and
unshaken, the one revealed by God, the science of the hereafter! In all
your works, look to Heaven, to the eternity of life and of the soul, and
orient yourself then much differently from the way that merely human
considerations might suggest, and your activity will be inspired for the
good.”
4) Louis de Broglie – Nobel Prize winner in Quantum Mechanics
Devout Catholic Henri de Broglie earned the Nobel Prize for his landmark achievement in the realm of quantum mechanics with the wave-particle equation that bears his name. Given his piety, he attributed the voyage of discovery to a desire to know and serve:
“Science itself, no matter whether it is
the search for truth or merely the need to gain control over the
external world, to alleviate suffering, or to prolong life, is
ultimately a matter of feeling, or rather, of desire – the desire to
know, or the desire to realize.”
5) Fr. Georges Lemaître – Father of the Big Bang Theory
Fr. Georges Lemaître, a Roman Catholic priest and professor of physics at Leuven, generated what has come to be called the Big Bang Theory. As to the perennial feud between reason and religion, he states:
“Once you realize that the Bible does not
purport to be a textbook of science, the old controversy between
religion and science vanishes…
“The doctrine of the Trinity is much more
abstruse than anything in relativity or quantum mechanics; but, being
necessary for salvation, the doctrine is stated in the Bible. If the
theory of relativity had also been necessary for salvation, it would
have been revealed to Saint Paul or to Moses.”
6) Jerome Lejeune – Discovered Cause of Down Syndrome
Doctor Jerome Lejeune discovered trisomy 21, the genetic defect that causes Down syndrome. While he labored with the intent to find a cure, he decried the pervasive usage of his discovery in prenatal testing for abortion. His pro-life stance may have cost him a Nobel Prize, but St. John Paul II appointed him as the first president of the Pontifical Academy of Life instead.With his cause for canonization open in Rome, Lejeune’s eloquence in defense of life deserves as much consideration today as ever before:
“Human genetics can be summarized in this
basic creed: In the beginning is the message, and the message is in
life, and the message is life. And if the message is a human message,
then the life is a human life…
“The enemies of life know that to destroy
Christian civilization, they must first destroy the family at its
weakest point—the child. And among the weakest, they must choose the
least protected of all—the child who has never been seen; the child who
is not yet known or loved in the usual meaning of the word; who has not
yet seen the light of day, who cannot even cry out in distress.”
7) Galileo Galilei – Father of Modern Astronomy
Yes, the Renaissance polymath Galileo Galilei was put under house arrest for stating his solar theories as indisputable fact. But St. Robert Bellarmine was amenable to the genius’ innovative discoveries.And, nevertheless, Galileo remained a practicing Catholic until the day he died. His own daughter became a nun. His personal testimony would not conflict with this assessment:
“The Bible shows the way to go to heaven,
not the way the heavens go… I give infinite thanks to God, who has been
pleased to make me the first observer of marvelous things… I do not
feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense,
reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.”
* * *Ergo, from basic genetics to interplanetary physics, the Church collectively has made more contributions to knowledge about our universe than any one entity in history. The litany of faithful scholars goes on and on!
原文出處: 7 brilliant scientists who people forget were devout catholics (credit: ChurchPOP)
