Society of Catholic Scientists promotes faith and science

Is evolution compatible with Catholic teaching? Should Catholic scientists separate their faith from their research? How should Notre Dame approach apparent conflicts between faith and science?

The Society of Catholic Scientists (SCS) chapter at Notre Dame, established in 2022, strives to answer these questions and to promote the harmony of faith and science. From November 3 to 7, SCS hosted Faith and Science Week on campus, with programming that included the eighth annual Gold Mass, a keynote lecture, and an “Ask Me Anything” professor panel. Each day of the week also began with Morning Prayer in Geddes Hall.

Senior Elliott Kirwan, SCS President, explained to the Rover that the week is mostly geared toward Notre Dame students, to “remind the science students here at the university that you’re absolutely not outside of your wheelhouse as a Catholic scientist, that the pursuit of truth through the physical sciences is something that the Church has always done and always been a patron of and a guardian of.” 

“To be an excellent scientist and a Catholic … those two things can go together,” he continued.

The centerpiece of the week was the eighth annual Gold Mass, celebrated in the Basilica of the Sacred Heart on Wednesday, November 5. Fr. Terrence Ehrman, C.S.C., President of the Faculty Board of SCS and Professor of Theology, presided over the Mass.

Fr. Ehrman explained his reasoning for bringing the Mass as primarily educational. “One of the major reasons why people leave the church or don’t enter the church—‘disaffiliation’ is the term we use nowadays—is because of perceived conflicts between science and faith, that science is true and religion is opinion or fanciful and can’t be true.” To combat this misunderstanding, he proposed the Gold Mass as “a signature event for the College of Science … a way just to promulgate or to display the Catholic position on how [Faith and Science] go together.” 

Following Mass, the keynote lecture was held in Jordan Hall of Science, Room 101. The speaker, Dr. Karin Öberg, Thomas Dudley Cabot Professor of the Natural Sciences at Harvard University, delivered a talk titled “Cosmic Origins and Christian Creation.” Over 200 people were in attendance.

Kirwan reflected, “One of my favorite points [Öberg] made was she talked about how, as Catholics, we don’t necessarily need to have as much of a vested interest [in scientific questions] as we sometimes do. We don’t have to have as much skin in the game, because we know that the Catechism says truth can’t contradict truth, and so science that’s done well is never going to conflict with the truths that have been revealed through divine revelation and through the teaching of the Church.”

“That’s something I want to reflect on a lot more,” he continued. “As a scientist, how can I pursue truth authentically and fully without being afraid of what we’re going to discover?”

For the third year, SCS also hosted an “Ask Me Anything” panel of Notre Dame professors to answer questions about faith, science, and their relationship. The panelists were Dr. Michael Seelinger, Dunn Family Teaching Professor of Engineering and Director of Undergraduate Studies for Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering; Dr. Chris Baglow, Professor of the Practice in Theology and Director of the McGrath Institute for Church Life’s Science and Religion Initiative; Heather Foucault-Camm, Program Director of the Science and Religion Initiative; and Dr. Kevin Lannon, Professor of Physics and Astronomy.

Seelinger told the Rover, “The panel was intimate, providing a friendly and open discussion between the panelists and the students. With the broad background of the four panelists, I believe we enjoyed learning from each other’s perspectives as much as the students enjoyed the panel overall.”

Fr. Ehrman reflected on the panel as an example of professors’ openness about their faith: “We get the statues of people [around campus], then I think what’s really important are the living people. How well do students know their professors to be able to have a conversation about faith? … Scientists and professors can’t hide their faith, they can’t put it under a bushel basket.”

Kirwan mentioned the hesitancy that students often have about asking these questions: “These are complex ideas and difficult topics, and especially when it’s something as near and dear to us as the Faith, I think there can sometimes be a little bit of uncertainty there over asking these really deep, fundamental questions about something that’s so important to us.”

Junior Lynley Pace, who serves as vice president of the SCS chapter, agreed: “Not everyone’s always super keen to talk about [Faith and Science].”

Pace continued, “I think specifically as like Notre Dame scientists and engineers, we got to be able to hold our ground in those types of conversations, and not have people discredit us and think we’re bad scientists, but also not have people think our faith is invalid because we do believe that our reason and our experiments can lead to truth.”

“I think that Notre Dame is honestly the perfect place to be for Catholic scientists, Christian scientists in general. Just because I feel like this is probably the place where you will find the highest concentration of faith-filled people who not only think that science is true, but know about it, and know enough to talk about it.”

Kirwan also discussed the possibility of a broader university education on these topics, and he emphasized the importance of the theology core requirements, which “expose[s] [students] to a better epistemology.”

He continued, “I would definitely appreciate seeing from the administration all the way down an effort to emphasize that what we’re doing here as a Catholic University is not a contradiction in terms, but rather that actually being Catholic helps us to pursue truth more fully. [A] Catholic University is exactly the place where innovations in medicine, physics, [and] efforts in solving mathematical theorems should be happening.”

Kirwan also reiterated the openness of SCS to new members: “We’re always in need of people who are passionate about this to join and to help support the effort to hold these kinds of dialogues on campus. … It’s never too early or too late to get involved with our work on campus.”

Michael Canady is a senior from Falls Church, Virginia, majoring in classics with a minor in constitutional studies. One of his current research topics is the intersection of bears, evolution, and classical music. You can ask him more about this at mcanady2@nd.edu.

Photo Credit: Society of Catholic Scientists

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