The following comes from an August 10 story from the Catholic News Agency.
A new film by philosopher, priest, and producer Father Robert Spitzer aims to integrate faith and reason by making the claim that God’s existence can be proved through scientific evidence.
“We thought the whole story wasn’t being told in the media about the evidence for God from physics,” the Jesuit priest told CNA.
“We’re utterly convinced that the evidence from physics shows the existence of God and certainly does not take away from it.”
The 49-minute documentary, titled Cosmic Origins, features eight physicists who discuss the big bang theory, theories of modern physics, and eventually discuss the need for a creator.
Along with Father Spitzer, a former Gonzaga University president and founder of the Magis Center for Faith and Reason [located in Irvine, California], the film features Michael Heller of the Vatican Observatory, Nobel Laureate Arno Penzias, and a slew of professors from Harvard and Cambridge.
In choosing the physicists for the film, Father Spitzer made sure that every scientist was “absolutely top in their field, world class, they had to be a Nobel prize winner, a Templeton prize winner, or come from Harvard or Cambridge or from the top ranks of NASA.”
The scientists “come pretty much out of the closet,” and affirm that it is impossible for the universe to be random and without purpose, he said.
In the film, after discussing the Big Bang theory and affirming it scientifically, the physicists say there still must be a beginning or cause of the universe, even with theories of modern physics.
“When the universe was nothing, it could not have moved itself from nothing, something else had to do it, and that something else was a transcendent creator,” Father Spitzer said.
He claims that this creator would have to exist outside space and time because before the Big Bang, nothing existed, including space and time….
Cosmic Origins is currently available on the Magis Center website and the Ignatius Press website, and will be available on Amazon in mid-August.
A parish screening program is also available for purchase on the “Cosmic Origins” website, www.cosmicoriginsfilm.com.
“For those who believe, no proof is necessary. For those who don’t believe, no proof is possible.”
another version, i believe is this:
“for those who have faith, no proof is needed; for those who have no faith, no proof is sufficient”
I like better your second one max because the first one reminds me of something much more important, that with God all things are possible. : )
I haven’t seen this film, but hope to see it sometime soon. The above unattributed quote that “We’re utterly convinced that the evidence from physics shows the existence of God…” is much much more strident than the trailer’s first two voice-overs:
The fact that an idea is hard not to believe doesn’t make it true in an objective sense. For example, as I eat breakfast and sip my morning tea, it is hard not to believe that everyone else in the world does something similar. But it isn’t true; something like a billion people don’t have any full meals at all and are hungry 24/7.
Rev. Polkinghorne is “utterly convinced” but here he states (as he has many times) that his conviction does not rise solely from science.
This should be an interesting film, and I expect it will challenge a lot of Christians to re-examine the basis of their faith.
Francis,
I would be shocked if anything Fr. Spitzer produces would challenge anyones basis for faith. Evidently you do not know Fr. Spitzer!
God bless, yours in Their Hearts,
Kenneth M. Fisher
Kenneth:
I think your basis of faith is much more sophisticated than average.
From Wikipedia (and other sources as well; this one is convenient to cut and paste): “When asked for their views on the origin and development of human beings, between 40% and 50% of adults in the United States say they share the beliefs of young Earth creationism, depending on the poll.”
That means the film will challenge between 40 and 50 percent of adults to change they way they believe.
Francis,
Challenging the way some people think and act is exactly why Our Lord suffered on the Cross and why he founded His Church!
God bless, yours in Their Hearts,
Kenneth M. Fisher
I am a science teacher, and I always thought our Evangelical brethren made a mistake trying to fight the unbelievers over biology (or the misapplication of evolution to philosophy) rather than over physics. In physics the laws are simpler, the evidence for creation more clear-cut, and because physics is the foundation of all other sciences, a win here makes evolutionary arguments against God moot. My only caution is that material science cannot directly prove the the existence of spiritual entities. Physics may demonstrate that God is not contrary to physics or that physics cannot indicate ultimate origins. We need philosophy to go further.
I am a convert and was attracted to Catholicism because it is logical. It is preposterous to imagine that somehow everything came together by accident. If one chooses to believe in evolution, then what or who created that first bit of matter? Scientists are still trying to understand how the human body works. When they “create” a new life in vitro, they still have to have use a sperm and an egg that already exists. I cannot imagine how any scientist can deny the existence of God. At the Lourdes shrine, the miracle cures are examined and investigated by non-Catholic (and often by atheist physicians) and they can find no natural explanation of why there is a sudden, complete and lasting cure. Who or what causes these cures?
God bless you Sarah
Sarah:
Why is it “preposterous to imagine that somehow everything came together by accident”? The “multiverse hypothesis” originally proposed by William James more than 100 years ago, together with the anthropic principle, explains plausibly why we find ourselves in a world that supports life as we know it, without invoking a divine plan. This doesn’t disprove God’s existence, but it disproves the idea that God’s non-existence is preposterous.
As for “how any scientist can deny the existence of God,” that depends very much on how one understands “God.” Fr. Barron said well, that if the god Richard Dawkins denies were the only god available, Fr. Barron would rather be an atheist.
This is why I earlier wrote that I expect the film will challenge assumptions that underlie many Christians’ reasons for faith. It will be interesting indeed to see how the film addresses this.