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DOGMAS, SCIENTIFIC AND RELIGIOUS
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We are told that there likely are multiple “universes” beyond our own, some of which might be “parallel universes,” with all the different choices of our own place being made and followed through. We learn that there are possible “wormholes,” portals through which we might be able to travel virtually instantaneously from one portion of our universe to another, or perhaps from one universe to another (I think of the travels “Between” as described in Ann McCaffery’s novels, or the Wood Between the Worlds from C S Lewis’ The Magician’s Nephew).
We are told that electrons spinning around an atomic nucleus are moving so fast that they are never in any given spot in their energy level, but instead they occupy ALL places in that level, effectively making an electron shell and not an orbit. We also learn that when stimulated by a photon beam, electrons can jump from one energy level to another without moving through the space between those levels.
We seem to be discovering that certain sub-atomic particles can, when stimulated, actually travel faster than the (once thought of cosmic speed limit) speed of light. And we learn that light is made up of photons which are simultaneously waves and particles.
The universe is expanding—but in what and where?
Is the “Big Bang” just one pulse in the heart-beat of our cosmos? How many were there before, and how many will there be again?
Euclidian geometry tells us that parallel lines will never intersect; non-Euclidian geometry says perhaps they do… Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity says that what we call motion is really just the curvature of space based on gravitational pull.
We proclaim Jesus Christ as fully human and fully divine—two natures in one Person. We proclaim the reality of the Crucifixion and the Resurrection, with its promise of life eternal for us. We celebrate the Communion of Saints and affirm that those who have gone before us “marked with the sign of faith” are in a position to help us with their prayers. We believe that the Eternal Word was indeed “eternal,” turning a famous theological tag upside-down: “There was never a time when He was not.” We declare that God is simultaneously (yet distinctly) Father/Son/Spirit, ever three and ever one: not one God wearing three different masks; not 3 separate deities, but one-in-three and three-in-one.
Dogmas are tricky things. St Anselm famously defined theology as “faith seeking understanding.” I suggest two things today: science is also “faith seeking understanding,” and scientific faith is no more credible than religious faith. If we can embrace quantum theory, we can embrace Trinitarian theology. The world is far more complicated than we sometimes want to believe; so is God. If the essence of God were understandable, it would not be God but an idol.