Pope Francis is widely known for his compassion and spiritual leadership, but fewer realise he had a background in science. In this article for ABC Religion & Ethics, ISCAST Fellow Neil Ormerod writes about Francis’s work to unite science and faith.
Pope Francis is known for many things: as a man of the people who reached out to the marginalised and prioritised the poor; a man who tackled some of the most contentious issues for the Church — clergy sexual abuse, LGBTIQ+ persons, those who are divorced and remarried; a man of God who served faithfully until the very end, dying in the light of the Easter celebrations.
But fewer know him as a man of science.
In fact, he graduated with a chemical technician’s diploma and worked for several years as a lab technician in a food company. It was not exactly the highest or most profound of qualifications, but enough for him to respect the value of science and to appreciate the need for precision and verification — the basics of a scientific method. In this regard he was the first pope ever to have any significant exposure to the workings of modern science. Others may have read and written about science, but they did not get their hands dirty in the laboratory.
Read the full article at ABC Religion & Ethics.
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