Can A Catholic Journalist In The Philippines Learn From Nigeria’s Newest Cardinal Peter Ebere Okpaleke About Spreading Science As A Shared Desire For God?
Contrarian. On the
Internet, where at 82+ I am much of the time, I am now reading Victor J Stenger, Emeritus Professor of
Physics, University of Hawaii, who says (Nov 2014, “Debate: Can Religion And
Science Co-Exist?” INEOS, ineos.com):
Religion and science
are like oil and water. They might co-exist, but they can never mix to produce
a homogeneous medium.
Nyet!
Prof Stenger has probably never met a science journalist like me whose thinking
is creative enough to see that, for instance, the objective is not to produce a
homogeneous medium by mixing oil and water – but to allow the two not only to
coexist but to cooperate with each other! Which is the major point of my essay
today.
Now then, I am reading Courtney
Mares’ article, “Nigeria’s Newest Cardinal Shares Secret Behind The
Highest Mass Attendance In The World” (14 Feb 2023, CNA, catholicnewsagency.com)
– and thinking:
Which of the 3 Nigerian Roman
Catholic “secrets” can I borrow from to spread the scientific Gospel of Regenerative
Agriculture – via spreading the Good News about Organic Agriculture!?
Ms Courtney says Cardinal Okpaleke believes that these 3 “secrets”
have kept Nigerians “close to the sacraments generation after generation” – “Nigeria’s
traditional worldview, the role of the family, and a sense of community within
parishes.” And you know what? As a Filipino, I know that if we Filipino Catholics
propagate those “virtues,” we will not only be able to cultivate more and
deeper Catholics within Philippine communities but also sell more science to
the people!
But
how do you teach science to Catholic priests? You don’t! You talk to people –
you simply ask permission from the priests to spread your “Gospel of
Regeneration” – I just thought of this “gospel” now – to Catholic farmers inside
and/or outside the walls of the church, anywhere in the community.
The “Gospel of Regeneration” – only the name is new, but I find
that the “Gospel of Regenerative Agriculture” has been preached since 2019 –
read “Activists Working To Expand Regenerative Agriculture In Great Lakes,
Around The World” (03 Jan 2019, Transform,
thetransformseries.net);
Kevin Doyle Jones, co-founder of GatherLab, is being interviewed:
“What is the problem
you [are trying to] solve and how do you solve it?”
Funding the missing
gap to convert to regenerative agriculture within a community.
Pooling and sharing of
risk to enable farmers to cover the three-year cost of migrating from
conventional farming to organic and regenerative, which is beyond organic, to
significant carbon sequestration through improved and deeper topsoil.
“Three-year
cost of migrating from conventional farming to organic and regenerative” – why cannot
Catholic scientists and journalists spread science as a shared desire for God?!
Asking as a friend!@517
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