Dr Paddy Ryan MSC debating Professor Anderson in a symposium on Science, Philosophy and Christianity in 1936

In leafing through past editions of Annals Australasia looking for a particular article I happened in the March edition 2007 on A Response from Seventy Years Ago to Dawkins "God Delusion" by Dr James McCaughan, Honorary Senior Lecturer in Physics at the University of Sydney. Dr McCaughan gives an account of how in his research he came across the text of "a three-way debate" in 1936 on "Science, Philosophy and Christianity" between Professor Vonwiller, head of Physics at Sydney University, the notorious John Anderson, Professor of Philosophy, and Dr P.J. Ryan MSC, DD, PhD. The text of Dr Ryan's contribution was included and I reproduce it here as an outstanding example of his (then) famous ability and preparedness to go into battle in defence of Christianity. I also mention the occasion in this comment. More details about Dr Ryan are in a previous comment.

IT IS MY PURPOSE this evening (1) to explain the rational basis of natural religion and that particular supernatural religion which is Christianity. I restrict the treatment of Christianity to the Catholic religion. To deal with other forms of Christianity would be quite beyond my scope; (2) to state the attitude of the Catholic Church to the experimental sciences and to philosophy.

Natural Religion

Using the principles of reason (sufficient reason and causality), we argue from the facts of our experience to the existence of a Supreme, Personal Being, in whom alone the universe finds its ultimate explanation. By reason too, we demonstrate that the Universe proceeds from God by creation, and that in consequence, the universe and everything in it and men in particular, are absolutely and continually dependent on God.

It is not possible to prove here the foregoing propositions, but you will find abundant proof of them in any recognized textbook of scholastic philosophy. Even today it is sometimes asserted that Kant has demolished these arguments and that his objections to them have never been met. Both statements are false. Kant’s criticism of the arguments for the existence of God is based on a false theory of knowledge, an unwarranted denial of the universal value of the principles of reason, and a misunderstanding of the arguments themselves. You will find a convincing refutation of Kant’s arguments in any recognized Catholic work on Natural Theology, e.g. George Hayward Joyce: Principles of Natural Theology.

Endowed with intelligence, man is capable of knowing God, and of realizing his absolute dependence on his Creator. Man is therefore, bound in justice to recognize God as his Creator, Lord and benefactor, and to give Him that supreme reverence and honour which are due to Him.

Natural Religion is simply the recognition of these truths knowable by reason, and the practical observance of them in every day life.

Now this duty of religion is binding on man not only as an individual but as a member of society - for God is the Author and the Lord not only of the individual but of Society itself.

That a personal God exists, that He is the Creator of the world, that men are absolutely dependent on God and are consequently bound in justice to recognize and honour Him as their Creator and Lord, these truths - knowable and demonstrable by reason - constitute the rational basis of natural religion.

It is not necessary to be a Christian in order to admit this; all that is required is the right use of reason.

Supernatural Religion

Supernatural Religion presupposes the basic truths of natural religion, but its immediate basis is Divine Revelation accepted by Faith. And here it is necessary to explain what we mean by Faith.

Faith: Faith is the acceptance of something as true, not on intrinsic evidence, but on the authority of another. A stationmaster, for instance, tells me a certain train is the Melbourne Express. Now I have neither the time nor the means to board the train, go with it to its destination and thus finding out the truth of the matter for myself. But I see that the stationmaster is a reliable man who is in a position to know the truth and who would not intentionally deceive me. I see that it is reasonable to accept what he says; I take his word for it, even if I have never previously travelled by train; I believe him; I elicit an act of faith. We are making such acts all day long. They are the source of much of our knowledge.

Divine Faith: Just as it is reasonable to accept something as true on the authority of a reliable human witness, so also it is reasonable to accept something as true on the authority of God - should He choose to reveal Himself to us. In order that such assent be reasonable, it is requisite and sufficient that the witness should know the truth and be truthful. When the witness in question is God Himself, there is no reasonable alternative. To refuse to accept God’s word would do violence to reason. To accept something as true on the authority of God is to elicit an act of Divine Faith.

And the motive of our assent in divine as in human faith is not the intrinsic evidence of the truth to which we assent, but the authority of the witness who proposes that truth to our belief.

That God has the power and the right to reveal Himself to men is philosophically certain.

That man is bound to accept the word of God is obvious.

That God has really spoken and revealed Himself to man is one of the major facts of history.

Jesus Christ claimed to be God as well as man, and God in the same sense that the Supreme Being is God. He proved His claim. He proved it by His numerous miracles and above all by the supreme miracle of His bodily resurrection from the dead. (This may be - and is - denied, but it cannot be reasonably denied on historical grounds. The evidence is too strong). Now Jesus Christ made known to us momentous truths about God, the universe and men, about this world and the next. He also promulgated a code of morals. Some of these truths are knowable by unaided reason. Others, such as the mystery of the Trinity, are inaccessible to reason both as regards their existence and their full content.

But they are not to be rejected on that account. It is to be expected that in the Infinite God there will be much that our finite minds cannot fully understand. God’s word is absolute guarantee of their truth. The Blessed Trinity is a mystery, i.e., a truth which we cannot fully understand. It is not a contradiction. To say that it is, is to be ignorant either of what constitutes a contradiction, or of the import of the doctrine. The Trinity is a fact though it does not come within the ambit of our experience. To say that only those things are facts which come under experience is a begging of the whole question.

My reason tells me that whatever God reveals is the unalloyed truth, and that it is my duty to accept his revelation as such.

A careful examination of historical evidence shows that God has in fact made known certain truths, which have come down to me unaltered. The same evidence enables me to distinguish genuine from bogus and counterfeit revelation. Knowing that a divine revelation has been given, and knowing what that revelation is, I freely assent to it and thereby elicit an act of Divine Faith. This Divine Faith has for its rational basis:

(a) The existence of a personal Creator known and demonstrated by reason.

(b) The philosophical possibility of Divine revelation.

It is to be noted here that when we assent to truth on authority we must first have employed our reason to estimate and judge the evidence for the knowledge and truth of that authority. This is a dictate of common sense and is to be applied to all authority, including that of God, the Church and the Bible. Were we unable to convince ourselves on rational grounds that an All-wise All-truthful God exists; that He has spoken to man; and that His revelation has been faithfully and accurately conveyed to us, we could not reasonably accept such revelation. Objective Evidence, then, sifted and examined by the careful use of our reasoning faculties, is the ultimate test of truth in this and in all other matters.

So much for the rational basis of religion, natural and supernatural.

It is now possible to state the attitude of religion to the experimental sciences and to philosophy.

By religion I here mean:

(a) the truths which constitute the basis of natural and supernatural religion.

(b) The doctrinal and moral content of both natural and supernatural religion, as understood by Catholic philosophy and theology.

The Relationship Between
Religion And The
Experimental Sciences

(a) I begin by enunciating a general philosophical principle: God is the author of nature, of reason and of revelation. Since God is truth, and truth is one, there is not and never can be, any real conflict between an established truth of science and a truth known by Divine Revelation. The reason why no real conflict is possible is not the duality of truth but its unity. What has been shown to be true by one science holds good for every intellect and all science. There may be at times an apparent opposition, due to imperfect knowledge of the truths in question, or of their applications.

(b) While there can be no real conflict between Divine revelation and truths certainly established by philosophy or any other science, there may be real opposition between revealed truth and philosophical opinion or scientific hypothesis. But opinions and hypotheses are not demonstrated facts and no one is more keenly aware of the provisional character of his hypotheses than the genuine scientist.

There is an all-important point, too often forgotten, which is that because an explanation explains it is not, therefore, necessarily the true explanation. There may be twenty plausible explanations of a set of facts of which nineteen must be, and all twenty may be, wholly wrong. Enthusiastic writers of popular treatises on science often seem to forget this important point. Because the doctrines of protective colouring or of sexual selection, for example, seem to explain, and as a matter of fact would explain a number of facts, it is therefore assumed that they must be the explanation. Which is a non sequitur. The more facts which a theory explains and the more wide apart from one another these facts are, the more likely it is to be true; but there is a considerable gulf between extremely likely and perfectly certain. Many enthusiasts seem to take this gulf in their stride; at least they neglect to inform their readers that it has been passed.' (Sir Bertram Windle - The Church and Science - 1924, 30, p44).

And again: ‘A person cannot refuse to believe a true scientific fact, such as that human beings have osseous backbones, and still retain a reputation for sanity. But when he considers all that has happened in recent years, perhaps especially in recent years, in the history of science, he can be pardoned if he suspends his opinion on any theory of science and particularly if he suspends it when it appears to conflict with anything which he believes on higher grounds. He can and may do this, when he would be insane if he asked leave to suspend his decision on the backbone question. More especially may he venture to suspend his opinion when he finds that men of science are not all of one mind on the point in question; indeed, under these circumstances, it would seem to prudent for the ordinary person to suspend his judgment.’ (ibid p. 50-51).

‘Don't listen to his words’, writes Einstein of the scientist, ‘examine his achievements. For to the discoverer

in that field the constructions of his imagination appear so necessary and so natural that he is apt to treat them not as the creations of his thoughts but as given realities.’ (On the method of Theoretical Physics, p. 5).

Much of the supposed opposition between religion and science is due (1) to false applications or unwarranted extensions of perfectly legitimate theories. Hypotheses which are useful in a restricted sphere are applied to all reality, and thus stultify themselves, (2) to the fact that perfectly legitimate scientific methods are erected into systems of philosophy. A scientific method is concerned only with the technique of investigation; e.g. the empirical study of facts, the formation of hypotheses and their verification. If you say that the scientist should be guided by observation and experiment, you are formulating a most valuable principle of scientific investigation. If you go further and state that there is no reality apart from that which admits of observation and experiment, you have converted a principle of scientific method into a philosophy. And it is only by an abuse of the name and popularity of science that this latter procedure can be labelled scientific. And yet it is labelled scientific, as frequently and as cheerfully as Japanese merchants are said to label their goods: ‘Made in England’

(c) Just as there may be a real or apparent opposition between revealed dogma and the hypotheses of philosophers and scientists, so also there may be a real or apparent opposition between a fact of science or a demonstrated conclusion of philosophy and the opinion of an individual theologian. But there is a vast difference between a certainly revealed truth and the opinion of this or that theologian. If the latter’s opinion be opposed to fact, it is clear that he has made a mistake in his reasoning, and must cover the ground again.

Christianity And Philosophy

What has been said of the relationship between Christianity and the experimental sciences is true also of the relationship between Christianity and philosophy. The attitude of the Catholic Church to philosophy may be summed up in the following propositions:

(a) Any philosophical teaching, or any system of philosophy which is fully in accordance with reason and experience, will also be found to harmonise with the teaching of Divine revelation. For truth cannot contradict truth.

(b) With regard to the attitude of the Church to what is called "Modern Philosophy," i.e., recent and contemporary non-Christian philosophy - it is to be noted, in the first place, that there is no one system of modern philosophy. There are numerous systems of modern philosophy opposed to one another on fundamental points. If we may judge the future in the light of the past, the philosophical systems of the present day will be considerably modified or entirely rejected by the philosophers of the succeeding generation. We are under no obligation to justify Divine revelation to the modern systems of philosophy. They first have to justify their own existence and content.

There is little or no reason for regarding many of the tenets of modern philosophy as established truths. In fact there are often serious philosophical reasons for regarding them as false.

If then, any of the theories of modern philosophy are in conflict with the teaching of Divine Revelation, it does not follow that the revelation is false. In fact if it contradicts Divinely revealed truth it is most certainly false.

(c) The dominant tendency of modern philosophy is monism: all reality is of one thing or of one kind. Materialistic and idealistic monism are the dominant philosophical systems today. These cannot be reconciled with Christianity. But we are not disturbed on that account - for neither can they be reconciled with experience and common sense.

To conclude - our attitude to science and philosophy is very aptly symbolized by the magnificent gesture of Pope Leo XIII who gave to the historians of the world the freedom of the archives of the Vatican, declaring that the Catholic Church had nothing to fear from the truth.

Annals Australasia is a magazine under the editorship of Fr Paul Stenhouse MSC PhD. This is a high quality magazine of Catholic Culture with contributions by well known writers and experts in their fields. Fr Stenhouse is himself an expert on Islam and Middle Eastern history and culture. His articles and commentaries provide the reader with a view of Islam that he will not encounter elsewhere, unless Fr Stenhouse has written it. The contact details:

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