{"id":40230,"date":"2024-06-18T10:04:50","date_gmt":"2024-06-18T08:04:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.omnesmag.com\/?p=40230"},"modified":"2026-01-09T13:19:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-09T12:19:07","slug":"consolmagno-interview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.omnesmag.com\/en\/actualidad\/entrevista-consolmagno\/","title":{"rendered":"Guy Consolmagno: \"We have a very small idea of God\"."},"content":{"rendered":"

U.S. astronomer Fr. Guy Consolmagno, director since 2015 of the Holy See's astronomical observatory, the Specola Vaticana<\/a>chaired the presentation of an event to be held June 17-21 at Castel Gandolfo, entitled \"Black Holes, Gravitational Waves and Space-Time Singularities\".<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Consolmagno, Ph.D. in Planetology at the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory <\/em>from the University of Arizona, taught at Harvard College Observatory and MIT. In 1989 he entered the Society of Jesus and in 1991 he took vows as a Coadjutor Brother.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After the presentation in the Press Room of the Holy See, the American astronomer assured Omnes that this event \"is very important for the world of science.\" <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Among other reasons, the astronomer pointed out, \"because it provides an opportunity to discuss so many points of view, so many questions: the true nature of Space and Time; how to reconcile the laws of Quantum Mechanics with Einstein's General Relativity, which governs the behavior of the gravitational field in the first moments of the Universe; space-time singularities; and the nature of our Universe\". <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Moreover, he continued, \"it is also important for the Vatican because it shows the world that it is very open to the opinions of science, as long as science points to the truth, because in truth there is God.\"<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our idea of God<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

\"We have too small an idea of God,\" the scientist assured, although \"we can speak at the same time of God as a father,\" reiterating that our \"vision is small because He is the creator of all this and even more than we could imagine.\"<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is difficult for us,\" acknowledged the astronomer, \"and at the same time, in astronomy, we are faced with this reality: the universe is bigger than we know,\" although this \"incredibly big God is very close to us\".<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He also assured that \"this idea, which seems very modern, is already found in Psalm 8\". In fact, the Magisterium of the Church sees in Psalm 8 an invitation to recognize God's work in creation and to praise his name for the dignity granted to man, who is called to care for and responsibly value creation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\"O Lord our God,\" begins Psalm 8, \"how great is your name above all the earth! Thou hast exalted thy majesty above the heavens\".<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Regarding the apparent contradiction between man made in the image of God and the immensity of the universe, the scientist considers that this explanation \"more than a contradiction is a kind of poetry. For things that are too big to be explained and contained in words, we use poetry. Knowing that poetry uses images that rather than explaining reality, it shows where reality is'.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Participants in the event<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The 40 participants at the meeting include Nobel laureates Adam Riess and Roger Penrose; cosmologists and theoretical physicists Andrei Linde, Joseph Silk,Wendy Freedman, Licia Verde, Cumrun Vafa and the winner of the Fields Medal<\/a>Edward Witten.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The conference, which celebrates the scientific legacy of the bishop Georges Lema\u00eetre<\/a>the Belgian physicist who developed what is known today as the theory of the Big Bang<\/em>, is the second of its kind to take place at the Vatican Observatory; the first was in 2017.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

El astr\u00f3nomo estadounidense fray Guy Consolmagno, director desde 2015 del observatorio astron\u00f3mico de la Santa Sede, la Specola Vaticana, presidi\u00f3 la presentaci\u00f3n de un evento que tendr\u00e1 lugar del 17 al 21 de junio en Castel Gandolfo, titulado \u00abAgujeros negros, ondas gravitacionales y singularidades espacio-temporales\u00bb. Consolmagno, doctor en Planetolog\u00eda en el Lunar and Planetary Laboratory […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":40232,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[36,39],"tags":[576,1331,233,4],"class_list":["post-40230","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-actualidad","category-cultura","tag-ciencia","tag-ciencia-y-fe","tag-entrevistas","tag-roma","pmpro-has-access"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.omnesmag.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40230","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.omnesmag.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.omnesmag.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.omnesmag.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.omnesmag.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40230"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/staging.omnesmag.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40230\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.omnesmag.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40232"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.omnesmag.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40230"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.omnesmag.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40230"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.omnesmag.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40230"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}