Morality and Justice Chapters 1-3

What is the Catechism of the Catholic Church?

The organized presentation of the essential teachings of the Catholic Church in regards to both faith and morals

What is the USCCB? What does it do? Where is it headquartered?

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, which is an assembly of the hierarchy of bishops to jointly exercise pastoral functions on behalf of the Christian faithful of the United States and the US Virgin Islands. It supports the ministry of Catholic Bishops in the US and supports the Church’s work of evangelization. It is headquartered in Washington D.C.

What is epistemology?

The philosophical study of the nature, origin, and limits of human knowledge

What is scientism?

The belief that only natural sciences can lead us to knowledge and understanding

What is ontology?

The study of being; it asks what kinds of things exist and what is real

What is phenomenology?

Understanding and describing how people experience the world through their own senses and thoughts

Are science and religion mutually exclusive?

No, and it is possible that the study of religion is broader than the study of science

What is the streetlight effect?

A drunk man was found by a police officer searching for his house key under a street light. The officer decides to help him, and after some time passes asks where he dropped the key. The drunk man says he dropped it in the park and was searching there because there was more light. When someone is in a difficult situation, they try to find the solution in a comfortable place, even if it is somewhere else.

Are the big bang theory and the Bible mutually exclusive?

No, the man primarily responsible for its creation was a Belgian Catholic priest named Georges Lemaitre

Who was Werner Heisenberg and what did his findings reveal?

A German physicist who came up with the uncertainty principle, which states that you cannot know both the position and speed of a photon or electron. This shows that science has limits, raising an epistemological question of whether or not we can know everything.

Quote from Werner Heisenberg

"The first gulp from the glass of natural sciences will turn you into an atheist, but at the bottom of the glass God is waiting for you.”

Who was Max Planck, and what did he say (quote)?

The originator of quantum theory. “Science cannot solve the ultimate mystery of nature. And that is because, in the last analysis, we ourselves are a part of the mystery that we are trying to solve.”

Who was Robert Jastrow and what did he say (paraphrased)?

An astrophysicist who said that astronomical evidence leads to a biblical view of the world, and that the Big Bang theory and creation story are different descriptions of the same thing

Who was Louis Pasteur and what did he say (quote)?

He was one of the most important founders of medical microbiology. He said “A little science distances you from God, but a lot of science brings you nearer to Him.”

Who was M. Scott Peck and what did he say (quote)? Where is this quote from?

A psychiatrist and author who said, “Humility is the very basis of the scientific method,” in his book, Glimpses of the Devil

What did Albert Einstein say (quote)?

“Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”

What did Charles Darwin say (paraphrased)?

He never denied God’s existence, saying that evolution is compatible with God and that it is impossible that man is the result of chance.

What did Pope John Paul II say regarding faith, reason, and truth?

“Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth; and God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the truth.”

What did Pope Benedict XVI say regarding faith, reason, and truth?

“The highest truths cannot be forced into the type of empirical evidence that only applies to material reality.”

What does Catechism of the Catholic Church #39 say?

In defending the ability of human reason to know God, the Church is expressing her confidence in the possibility of speaking about him to all men and with all men, and therefore of dialogue with other religions, with philosophy and science, as well as with unbelievers and athiests.

What is a Paradigm shift?

A fundamental change in the basic concepts and practices of a field, replacing an established way of thinking with a new perspective, often triggered by new discoveries or ideas