The Hand of God: Thoughts and Images reflecting the Spirit of the Universe
by Sharon Begeley and Michael Reagan
 Download PDF
 Return to Master Book Reviews Table of Contents
Philadelphia: Templeton Foundation Press 1999
160pp. $15.95
This is a wonderful, inspirational book. It is beautifully crafted, with a wealth of glorious color photos of galaxies thousands of light-years away from earth, paired with quotations from scientists, astronauts, and others who have been touched by spiritual awarenesses.
|
Lagoon Nebula 6523 - A pair of interstellar "twisters"-funnels and twisted-rope structures - inhabit the brilliant "hourglass" heart of the Lagoon Nebula, which lies 5,000 light years away towards the constelation Sagittarius. The twisters are created much the way tornadoes are produced on Earth, by a strong horizontal "shear" caused by a large difference in temperature between the hot surface and cold interior of the clouds. The central star, Herchel 36 (middle left), is the primary source of radiation for the brightest region of the nebula, called "the hourglass." (p.111)
|
|
Sharon Begley’s essay is a perfect opening for this experience. She points out that science and religion agreed on a “mutual nonaggression treaty” in the 17th century. Science agreed it had nothing to say about religion, while religion agreed its domain was outside the domains of science. Nevertheless, religion provided explanations of how the world was created and how it worked.
For centuries theologians had appealed to “the God of the gaps.” This God is the one whom you offer in explanation for phenomena that otherwise have none. (p. 13)
However, when science developed theories about evolution, when in reached out to the beginning of time with the big bang, it crossed the established and accepted boundaries, stirring the hostility of religion.
The more science invaded the turf traditionally reserved for religion, offering a natural explanation for what had previously been regarded as divine, the less the God of the Gaps seemed to show Himself. He was no longer even necessary to explain Creation itself.
(p. 15)
Science, however, has begun to sense that there are patterns within nature that suggest a plan on an awesome cosmic scale. The laws of nature, as best we can understand them, are so precisely tuned and are interwoven with such complexity that it seems virtually inconceivable they would have arisen simply by chance. For instance, if the force of gravity were stronger, suns would collapse in on themselves and form black holes; if gravity were weaker, planets would not be held in their orbits. If subatomic neutrinos did not exist or have the properties they do, heavy elements like carbon, oxygen and iron would not have been available to coalesce out of cosmic dust to form the planet earth. Alan Sandage, a famous astronomer, states this nicely:
It was my science that drove me to the conclusion that the world is much more complicated than can be explained by science… It is only through the supernatural that I can understand the mystery of existence. (p. 21)
 |
Star formation in Ara - Red glowing hydrogen gas, hot blue stars, and dark obscuring dust clouds are scattered throughout this dramatic region of the Milky Way in the southern constellation of Ara (the Alter), which is about 4,000 light years away. Visible within the dark dust nebula in the bottom center is a small cluster of newborn stars. (p.90) |
I share here only two more of these marvelous quotes – actually a difficult choice to make, as there are many that feel well worth sharing
After close on two centuries of passionate struggles, neither science nor faith has succeeded in discrediting its adversary. On the contrary, it becomes obvious that neither can develop normally without the other. And the reason is simple: the same life animates both. Neither in its impetus nor its achievements can science go to its limits without becoming tinged with mysticism and charged with faith.
(p. 90)
– Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
The Phenomenon of Man
For after all what is man in nature? A nothing in relation to infinity, all in relation to nothing, a central point between nothing and all and infinitely far from understanding either. The ends of thing and their beginnings are impregnably concealed from him in impenetrable secret. He is equally incapable of seeing the nothingness out of which he was drawn and the infinite in which he is engulfed. (p. 76)
– Blaise Pascal, Pensées”
This book would make a lovely gift for the spiritually resonant scientist, for the spiritual person interested in science, or for anyone whose imagination can take them out to the furthest reaches of the known universe.
Return to Master Book Reviews Table of Contents
|
![International Journal of Healing and Caring [IJHC] facebook page](sitegraphics/facebook_icon.png "International Journal of Healing and Caring [IJHC] facebook page"){kind=icon}
