Creationism dismissed as 'a kind of paganism' by Vatican's astronomer

By Aussiegirl

The good Brother Consolmagno should read Gerald Schroeder's brilliant books -- "Genesis and the Big Bang", "The Science of God" and "The Hidden Face of God". Schroeder is a nuclear physicist and biologist as well as Hebrew biblical scholar. The account of Genesis, when properly understood, is an uncanny and accurate representation of the sequence of events as described in the Big Bang. Genesis, for the first time in man's history, proclaimed that the universe was created ex nihilo by the Eternal God -- who is both outside of, inside of and immanent throughout nature. Up until then the prevalent notion had been that the universe was eternal and infinite -- that it had no beginning and no ending. This was the Platonists idea as well -- an idea which seems most logical if one relies on one's objective observations. Indeed it seems quite illogical to describe creation out of nothing. Given the theories of quantum mechanics, the days are accurate, relatively speaking, since time itself was created at the moment of the Big Bang and time is dilated and differently experienced depending on one's speed and relative position in the universe. Read the books -- the Bible is more accurate than we could imagine. And you don't have to be superstitious to believe it. I will try to do a more comprehensive review of these books in the next week or so. Stay tuned.

Scotsman.com News - International - Creationism dismissed as 'a kind of paganism' by Vatican's astronomer

BELIEVING that God created the universe in six days is a form of superstitious paganism, the Vatican astronomer Guy Consolmagno claimed yesterday.

Brother Consolmagno, who works in a Vatican observatory in Arizona and as curator of the Vatican meteorite collection in Italy, said a "destructive myth" had developed in modern society that religion and science were competing ideologies.

He described creationism, whose supporters want it taught in schools alongside evolution, as a "kind of paganism" because it harked back to the days of "nature gods" who were responsible for natural events.

Brother Consolmagno argued that the Christian God was a supernatural one, a belief that had led the clergy in the past to become involved in science to seek natural reasons for phenomena such as thunder and lightning, which had been previously attributed to vengeful gods. "Knowledge is dangerous, but so is ignorance. That's why science and religion need to talk to each other," he said.