Interdisciplinary Documentation on Religion and Science

- Contains more than 80 anthological texts from classical and contemporary authors
- Contains approximately 60 articles of the Interdisciplinary Encyclopedia of Religion and Science
-Contains various teachings of Pope John Paul II on Christian Revelation, culture, and scientific thought
- Approximately 200,000 pages are viewed monthly on this site

“The scientist’s urge to investigate, like the faith of the devout or the inspiration of the artist, is an expression of mankind’s longing for something fixed, something at rest in the universal whirl: God, Beauty, Truth. Truth is what the scientist aims at.”
(Max Born, The Restless Universe, Doubleday, New York 1951, p. 278)

Break Time

Documents for the 2009 Anniversary:
International Year of Astronomy
and II Centenary
of Darwin’s birth

Finalism,
by Philip Dalleur

The Interdisciplinary Documentation on Religion and Science website seeks to help scientists frame their work within a philosophical and humanistic context. It also seeks to aid people trained in theology to approach, through the humanistic reflections of scientists, the rationale of scientific activity. The website presents an ample anthology of selected documents and also offers, in a separate section, the Interdisciplinary Encyclopedia of Religion and Science (ISSN: 2037-2329), a dynamic, online-only database. The Interdisciplinary Documentation on Religion and Science website is a nonprofit project associated with the Chair of Fundamental Theology at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome, Italy.

March 16

On this day in history in 1878, Clemens August von Galen was born at the Dinklage castle in Oldenburg. He was a priest, the Bishop of Munster, and in 1946 made a cardinal. He was among a group of bishops whom Pope Pius XI invited to Rome in January 1937 in order to discuss their situation in Germany and to prepare the encyclical Mit Brennender Sorge, which expressed alarm about the Nazi regime long before world public opinion in general did. In his homilies, von Galen energetically opposed the State’s violent actions, emphasizing the right to life and the inviolability and liberty of Germany’s citizens. He strongly opposed the euthanasia of those deemed by the Nazi regime to have unproductive, pointless lives, including those who were disabled. He died March 22, 1946 and was beatified by the Roman Catholic Church on October 9, 2005.

In order to make certain documents better known in the scientific community, the Anthology and Documents section provides key materials for study and reflection concerning the dialogue among science, philosophy, and theology. It includes scientists’ essays, masterpieces on the history of science, works of philosophers and theologians, and documents from ancient, medieval, and Renaissance authors, as well as Sacred Scripture and official documents of the Catholic Church and other Christian churches.

The Interdisciplinary Encyclopedia of Religion and Science (ISSN: 2037-2329), published by the Centro di Documentazione Interdisciplinare di Scienza e Fede operating at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome, provides new, scholarly articles in the rapidly growing international field of Religion and Science. Most of these articles were written primarily by European authors and are available here for the first time in English. They offer a unique window into the approaches and perspectives of the European community toward what has become a field of immense cultural significance throughout the world. Each article provides a very readable and comprehensive summary of what is currently being discussed in religion and science on specific topics as well as how these topics have been discussed historically.

© Interdisciplinary Documentation on Religion and Science 2003 - 2009