BOARDMAN - The universe is God's way of expressing himself to us, explained Brother Guy Consolmagno of the Vatican Observatory.
In fact, studying the universe and the God who created it is as important to humanity as the bread we eat, he continued.
Consolmagno, known as the "Brother Astronomer" at the Vatican in Rome, spoke at the monthly luncheon of the First Friday Club of Greater Youngstown Thursday at Antone's Banquet Centre, Boardman. His topic, "Religion and Science: What's the Connection?" explored the relationship between God and science. He said science historically is studied by religious people.
"Science is one of God's ways of playing with us," he explained. "It's one of God's ways of showing us He loves us. And that's why we do science and that's why science is fundamentally a religious act."
And that is why the Vatican supports it, he concluded.
"You don't have to be an atheist to be a scientist," he said. "The world was made step by step and deliberately by a God who was there in the beginning and by a God who was interested in what he was doing."
He said every scientist must believe three things religiously: That a physical universe exists, that it makes sense and has logic to it, and that it is worth studying.
Consolmagno, a native of Detroit, earned undergraduate and master's degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Ph.D. in planetary science from the University of Arizona, after which he was a researcher at Harvard and MIT. He served in the U.S. Peace Corps in Kenya and taught university physics at Lafayette College before entering the Jesuits in 1989.
He has been at the Vatican Observatory in Tucson since 1993 . His research explores connections between meteorites, asteroids and the evolution of small solar system bodies, observing Kuiper Belt comets with the Vatican's 1.8 meter telescope in Arizona, and curating the Vatican meteorite collection. He has written and co-authored more than 100 scientific publications and a number of books, including "Turn Left at Orion," with Dan Davis, "Worlds Apart: A Textbook in Planetary Sciences," with Martha Schaefer and "Brother Astronomer."
Consolmagno has served on the governing board of the Meteoritical Society; is the past president of the International Astronomical Union, Commission 16 (Planets and Satellites) and secretary of Division III (Planetary Systems Sciences); and currently serves as chair of the Division for Planetary Sciences of the American Astronomical Society. This year he holds the Loyola Chair for visiting Jesuit scholars at Fordham University in New York.
He also spoke on "God Under the Dome" at Youngstown State University's Ward Beecher Planetarium Thursday evening.
"We are all children of God and God's creatures, God's beloved, regardless of where we exist or where in the universe we live," he said. "The God who can turn all his attention on me ... is also the God who made this universe. That's a pretty amazing God."