3 Jan 2021. Epiphany of the Lord. Cycle B-2021. Is 60:1-6 + Eph 3:2-3a, 5-6 + Mt 2:1-12

When theologians encounter mysteries, they invoke “God.” Scientists sneer at the “God of the Gaps” assumption. But when scientists also encounter mysteries, they, too, invoke an assumption, something that sounds like theo-logy, that thing they call theo-ry. “Theos” is the Greek word for God.

Dependence solely on science can lead to error, for as the science of man progresses, the wisdom of God regresses (cf. Proverbs 3:5). While science wonders and theology ponders, God answers. While science searches and theology seeks, God speaks.

The Intelligent Design movement also suggests “God of the Gaps” manifestation, citing that the inexplicability of an irreducible complexity is a proof that there is an Intelligent Designer behind it. A moss-covered car you stumble upon in the forest is neither natural nor generated; it is designed and made by a an intelligent being. Science defends its inability to explain the complexity of the human body and the unreachable mystery of space and time with the excuse, “science will know these eventually.”

Science tried desperately to probe space to search for earthlike life, and to decipher how the infinitely vast seemingly void space makes life exist on miniscule earth, but nowhere else. The Old Testament alludes to God the Creator as an “Intelligent Designer” (cf. Is 45:18; Ps 139:17).

“In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth — and the earth was without form or shape, with darkness over the abyss… Then God said: Let there be light, and there was light…” (Gn 1:1-3) popping in a “Big Bang.”

The Big Bang Theory is what science called the big explosion they conclude the universe originated from nowhere. Something from nothing is creation, no matter how science tries to shove aside God Creation from their monitor. The incredibly one millionth of a second Big Bang, that science discovered to have originated the universe, prove no different from the instantaneous creation that theology uncovered. God is both off the gaps and of the gaps.

The beauty of creation (cf. Gn 1:18) and the awe it evokes manifests the existence of an awesome intelligence. “The heavens declare the glory of God; the sky proclaims its Builder’s craft. One day to the next conveys that message; one night to the next imparts that knowledge” (Ps 19:2-3).

Another manifestation of divinity in creation is God’s ability to contravene the laws of nature—miracles, as believers call these. Scientists may be able to explain the forces behind these miracles, but not the extraordinary confluence of force and time that brought these about. Deists, though believing in God creating the world, nevertheless, believe that He left nature to run on the laws He established for it. To them, there is no intervening miracle.

Of course, another form of Divine Manifestation is Divine Revelation. A lot of knowledge is gained by experience, and the revelations of those who experienced these. It is no different from knowledge gained from history, none of which those believers in historical accounts have personally witnessed. Unlike scientific facts, historical facts could not be, or need not be, re-enacted to prove that they are factual. VSS