Why do I like this Pope.
From
Vatican Radio. Benedict XVI to the international conference promoted by the foundation
"Centesimus annus pro pontifice", created by John Paul II in 1993:
In altre parole, occorre evitare che il profitto sia solamente individuale o che forme di collettivismo opprimano la libertà personale. L’interesse economico e commerciale non deve mai divenire esclusivo, perché verrebbe a mortificare di fatto la dignità umana. Poiché il processo di globalizzazione, in atto nel mondo, investe sempre più il campo della cultura, dell’economia, delle finanze e della politica, la grande sfida oggi è 'globalizzare' non solo gli interessi economici e commerciali, ma anche le attese di solidarietà, nel rispetto e nella valorizzazione dell’apporto di ogni componente della società
That I would translate as (my apologies for my mistakes):
In other words, it is necessary to avoid that the profit be only individual or that forms of collectivism oppress personal freedom.
The economic or commercial interest must not become exclusive, because it could de facto hinder human dignity.
Since the process of globalisation, acting in the world, is related ever more to the field of culture, economy, finance and politics, the great challenge today is 'globalising' not only economical and commercial interests, but also the expectations of solidarity, respecting the contribution of every component of society.
Labels: Social doctrine of the Church, The Pope
Rational readings.
In this interesting article on the
Catholic Herald about prof. John Haldane I read:
"I do feel, I'm afraid, that Christians have de-intellectualised over the last few decades," he says. "The current intellectual resources that Christians have available to them are very limited. We are just not able to present very good arguments. Not that the arguments aren't there, but we don't know what they are very often or how to articulate them."
I agree with the assertion, and I think the problem does not belong to British Catholicism alone, however I put myself among those the lay people who are still in search of a framework to argument exaustively on Catholicity, I think the article could have been written quoting at least some of the arguments prof. Haldane would present to make our de-Christianised culture more rational.
Thank to
Zadok I read from Christoph Cardinal Schönborn, O.P:
Instead of notional,perfectly simple “atoms,” we have discovered
the extraordinarily complex, beautiful, and mathematical “particle zoo” of the Standard Model of physics, hovering on the border of existence and intelligibility (as Aristotle predicted long ago with his doctrine of prime matter). And order, complexity, and intelligibility exist “all the way up” as well. We see a teleological hierarchy and chain of emergence from quantized physics, giving rise to stable chemistry, enabling the nearly miraculous properties of carbon and biochemistry, providing the material basis for the emergence of life with its own ontological hierarchy of metabolic (plant), sensitive (animal), and rational (human) existence.
Although I have only had a brief introduction to quantum mechanics I would say that some form of teleology is already found in the description of the energy balance of subatomic particles, so it would be interesting to know more about Aristotle's doctrine of prime matter.
There should be more Christians in science and maths and technology, however I suspect there are serious barriers for whoever believes in God to advance in career in these fields.
Labels: God's Mind
Starry sky update...
How frustrating: finding some information about the assyrian-babylonian star lore seems a task proper of
astrology rather than some serious study of history of astronomy.
I would willingly accept a good book suggestion on the subject.
Meanwhile the
Stellarium wiki makes clear that in order to add other constellation cultures is necessary to change the .fab files.
Yes, but it does not say
how.
Labels: Astronomy, Scripture study support.
The starry sky above me...
I have been looking for some astronomy program that could be used as a study support for the Scriptures, that is a program that would embed several different constellation lores (Egyptian, Babylonian apart from the obvious Greek one).
Stellarium is the obvious response to that. It's a planetarium (a
real planetarium) and allows to trace the sky structure of several cultures, although the Babylonian is missing.
The
Worldwide telescope looks inspired by the same ideas that led to the creation of
Google Earth. Great images but poor support. At least for the moment.
I shall investigate further the possibility of adding new layers to both.
Labels: Astronomy, Scripture study support.
