Nancy Wiechec / CNS St. Thomas Aquinas is depicted in a painting at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington. The Dominican philosopher and theologian's writings set the standard for Catholic theologians.By C.S. Morrissey
The B.C. Catholic

Science and theology are not opposed. In fact, for St. Thomas Aquinas, theology is a science. Scientia divina, "divine science," is the knowledge and wisdom that God possesses.

This divine science, insofar as we know it, goes by the name sacra doctrina, "sacred teaching." The word "doctrine" (doctrina), then, simply means a "teaching" that can be communicated, shared, passed down. Doctrine can be taught. It is a form of knowledge.

For example, divine science knows that God is a trinity of divine persons. We could not discover this truth with our own minds, says St. Thomas. It belongs to a realm of truth that surpasses human reason. It has to be revealed to us for us to know it.

When God, by His power and initiative, shares divine knowledge with us, it supplements our merely human knowledge, adding to the truths we know by our own powers.

Scientia humana, "human science," is the name for the sort of human knowledge we can acquire with our natural powers. In its highest form it is also called "wisdom."

For example, human wisdom knows that you should treat people as you yourself would wish to be treated. One cannot lie or cheat one's way to happiness. Don't drink motor oil, or else you will get sick, and so on.

You can think of human wisdom as a smaller circle, contained entirely within divine wisdom. Our minds can take us so far, but God's wisdom goes even farther. His circle is the bigger circle.

Where then does modern science fit in? Modern science is a specialized inquiry. It organizes its body of knowledge around experimentation and the use of special instruments. It uses mathematics to summarize and apply its results. (The philosopher Charles Peirce gave this kind of specialized science a precise name: "ideoscopic science.")

For example, Galileo built a telescope to see the heavens. Newton wrote equations to sum up how gravity and planetary motion is observed. Einstein refined their work even further, making amazing predictions that experiments later confirmed to be true.

Besides this sort of specialized knowledge ("ideoscopic science"), which is a realm known well by only a talented few (Galileo, Newton, Einstein, etc.), there is also what Peirce called "cenoscopic science": knowledge available to everyone, on the basis of common experience. Anyone can learn human wisdom. Experience is a great teacher. Go ask an older person.

But the success of modern "ideoscopic" science has led to an unnecessary divorce between science and theology. The "cenoscopic science" (common knowledge, based on experience accessible to all) of human wisdom has been downgraded in the popular mind.

This is the state of affairs that I, as a Thomist, a follower of St. Thomas, would sum up in two words: "science, interrupted." What I mean is that the connection between "cenoscopic" and "ideoscopic" science has been disrupted by modern culture. The connection has been interrupted by a false modern philosophy that tears apart the unity of all the sciences.

In our modern culture, "ideoscopic science" (the knowledge possessed by a specialized few) is what is exalted most. We are told not to trust our common sense or everyday experience. Scientists are allegedly the highest authorities.

If you think I am exaggerating, I'm not. Just look at our use of the word "science." It has been hijacked to now refer only to modern science ("ideoscopic science"). Our culture thinks of experimental science as the only real science.

But, as we have seen, the traditional conception is that theology and philosophy (divine and human wisdom) are sciences too. They are doctrines, teachable things, real wisdoms: true sciences too.

C.S. Morrissey is an assistant professor of philosophy at Redeemer Pacific College. This is Part 1 of a summary of a talk he gave June 19 at the "Catholic After Hours" Church history seminar series at the Irish Heather Pub in Gastown. Part 2 will appear in the Aug. 22 issue of "The B.C. Catholic."