Observing the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birth, the Vatican’s Council for Culture, the Gregorian Univ. and the Univ. of Notre Dame gather a diverse group of intellectuals to discuss the matrix of faith and science, especially evolution. Watch the video clip.
A story from before the congress published by The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life: Religion News, is informative.
A press conference at the Vatican yesterday, considered the forthcoming conference on Darwin & theology. The presentation can be viewed at the Vatican’s YouTube site. Here’s the H2O News report.
The March 3-7 conference will take place in Rome on “Biological Evolution, Facts and Theories” and was presented by Archbishop Gianfranco Ravasi, president of that pontifical council. The conference will mark the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin and the 150th anniversary of the publication of his “Origin of the Species.” The University of Notre Dame, the Gregorian University and the Pontifical Council for Culture are co-sponsoring the event on faith and reason (science) to demonstrate that faith and reason are complementary NOT at odds with each other as is commonly thought.
Jesuit Father Marc Leclerc said: “It’s not in the least about a celebration in honor of the English scientist; it’s simply about analyzing an event that marked for all time the history of science and that has influenced the way of understanding our very humanity.”
The organizers said on the website: There will be nine sessions where academics will treat the “idea that science, on the one hand, and theology, on the other, represent different fields of analysis and interpretation, though often they are incorrectly overlapped, causing confusion and ideological controversies.”
More information on Biological Evolution, Facts and Theories: www.evolution-rome2009.net.
Biological Evolution: Facts and Theories: A Critical Appraisal 150 Years After
“The Origin of Species”
In September I announced this conference devoted to a critical review of Charles Darwin’s
work. You can get more information by visiting the conference website or by email: evolution@unigre.it.
The Rome conference looks very promising with top professors collaborating in evaluating this famous work.
The conference is sponsored by the Pontifical Gregorian University in colloaboration with University of Notre Dame, and with the high patronage of the Pontifical Council for Culture with a grant of monies from the Templeton Foundation and the Associazione Scienza e Fede.
An international conference “Biological Evolution: Facts and Theories. A Critical
Appraisal 150 years after ‘The Origin of Species,'” will be held in Rome 3-7 March 2009.
This conference is jointly organized by the Pontifical Gregorian University (Rome) and the University of Notre Dame (Indiana) coordinated by the Pontifical Council for Culture as a project of STOQ (Science, Theology and the ontological Quest).
Seeking to foster a dialogue between science and religion, between science and
faith, three universities in Rome (Italy), under the coordination of the Pontifical Council for Culture, have launched an initiative entitled “Science, Theology and the Ontological Quest” (STOQ), a project that unites professionals from the fields of theology, philosophy and scientific investigation, in the common search for the truth.
STOQ, following the teaching of the Church as found in documents like Fides et Ratio (Faith and Reason), published by Pope John Paul II in 1998.
“The Church needs science and science needs religion. Science purifies religion of error and superstition; religion purifies science of idolatry and false absolutes,” Cardinal Paul Poupard, President-emeritus of the Pontifical Council for Culture.
STOQ seeks to promote this dialogue by means of formative courses, in-depth investigations, publications, congresses and a student exchange program. Targeting professors and students alike, the project has three centers of investigation in each of the universities collaborating in the initiative:
–The Pontifical Gregorian University will concentrate on the foundations of philosophy of science.
–The Pontifical Lateran University will focus on the relation between the scientific and humanistic disciplines, especially Logic and Epistemology.
–The Pontifical Athenaeum Regina Apostolorum will focus on the relations among the fields of philosophy, theology and the science of life, especially through its faculty of Bioethics.
The STOQ project seeks to create a new mentality within the Catholic Church that is open to the challenges that science presents to society and our faith of today, while promoting a new outlook in the realms of science, seeking the truth and at the same time open to the mystery of transcendence of the human person.