As the argument of science versus religion comes to a head in schools across the nation that are debating intelligent design, Vatican Cardinal Paul Poupard, head of the Pontifical Council for Culture, released a statement last week saying that religion and science should strive to work closer together.
Poupard's statement, which came during a recent news conference, outlined the Vatican's desire to have religion listen to science in an effort to keep the Catholic faith from being classified as "fundamentalism."
"Fundamentalism is a literalist interpretation of the scriptures," said the Rev. Michael Fahey, professor of theology.
Fundamentalists "don't interpret things in a poetic sense, but in literal truth. It's very simplistic," he said.
The Church does not want to interpret the scriptures too literally, Fahey said, because that would distort and oversimplify their messages. Instead, he said, the Church would like to take a more metaphoric approach to the Bible.
The effort to unite religion and science is being led by the Pontifical Council for Culture, established by Pope John Paul II in 1982.
But according to Fahey, the fields of religion and science have always been relatively close, except for occasional clashes.
He cited the fact that the Vatican uses its Alice P. Lennon Telescope, one of the largest in existence, to study astronomy as proof that the Church has made an effort to become involved in science.
"The idea that Catholicism and science are hostile toward each other is not very accurate," he said.
Jame Schaefer, assistant professor of theology, agreed.
"If you look at history, there has been on-and-off contact between the two," she said. "Catholics have been encouraging dialogue between scientists and theologians for some time now."
She added that it would be extremely beneficial for religion and science to listen to each other.
"We're often speaking about the same world," Schaefer said. "Each side brings the perspective of their disciplines to the issue."
The only time in which a close working relationship could backfire, according to Schaefer, would be in cases when disciplines get off track. In other words, she said conflict could occur if scientists tried to interpret religious issues that can not be explained through strict analysis of facts.
Instead of an effort to end conflict, Fahey said he would prefer to think of the cardinal's statement as an effort to have scientists accept the theory of intelligent design, not evolution, as an explanation for the origin of human beings
Intelligent design is the theory that the evolution of humans is the result of a direct act of God, said Fahey.
But James Courtright, professor of biology, said the theory solely focuses on biology and not other aspects of science. In addition, he said intelligent design is more of a political issue than a religious or scientific issue.
"It just isn't a very unifying hypothesis," he said.
While he did acknowledge that there could be some benefits to having science and religion work together, Courtright said they would be difficult to see immediately.
"Science asks questions about the world it can experimentally explore. Religion does not," he said. "There is a divide because of the different questions religion and science ask."