Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was a French Jesuit priest and scientist who worked mainly in the field of palaeontology (the study of prehistoric life, it’s evolution and environment). He was born in France in 1881 and ordained in 1911. While his initial scientific study was rooted in physics, chemistry and mathematics he went to work in the palaeontology laboratory of the National History Museum in Paris and hence more or less devoted his life to this field in conjunction with a mystical and religious worldview.

While his interpretation of evolution from a deeply religious viewpoint became his life’s main work, he is also remembered for his involvement in both the Piltdown Man and Peking Man discoveries.

Piltdown Man is probably the most well known of these two, because it was later exposed as a hoax. One of the great mysteries of the theory of evolution was the so called missing link, that skeleton which would show the change from our previous known ancestor to the human species, Homo sapiens, today. Anthropologists are still not sure of our exact lineage and our immediate ancestor is not the chimpanzee. He is our nearest relative. Both chimps and humans evolved from the same ancestor but not from each other. In the early days of evolution it was assumed that man evolved from the ape or similar creature and hence a missing link was necessary to bridge the gap. When Piltdown Man was discovered around 1912 in a gravel pit at Piltdown, a small village in southern England, many thought that this might be the missing link. And in fact scientists were fooled for quite a while that this was a genuine find. Although it bred a lot of controversy it wasn’t till the 1950’s before it was finally exposed as a forgery. While the identity of the forger was never discovered some of the main people accused included Teilhard de Chardin himself as well as Arthur Conan Doyle, the man responsible for the wonderful fictional detective, Sherlock Holmes. However the case against Teilhard de Chardin, as is true with all the suspects is very circumstantial and cannot be upheld.

Peking Man, on the other hand, discovered in the 1920’s in China was thought to be an ancestor to humans and was a genuine discovery. However today, he not considered to be a direct ancestor.

I was very much drawn to Teilhard de Chardin’s books because he was the first person who argued strongly that science and religion were compatible. For many years these two disciplines were considered to be at odds with each other. The famous example of which moves in the sky, the sun or the earth sent a number of men to the stake, most notably Giordano Bruno in 1600, although I would think the Church condemned him more for his other views (he was, after all, a practising magician, whose rites often bordered on black magic). Galileo, perhaps, is a better example. He followed the teaching of Copernicus who developed the heliocentric cosmology which basically said that the Sun was at the centre of the universe and the Earth revolved around it. He even went to Rome to try and convince the pope not to ban these ideas. Eventually he was summoned to stand trial on the suspicion of heresy. After all the bible says that the earth does not move, therefore Galileo had to be wrong. The result was that he was put under house arrest where he remained for the rest of his life.

It was only in 1992 that Pope John Paul II apologised for the treatment of Galileo at the hands of the Catholic Church. Far too late, as usual.

And of course the greatest wedge which appeared to be driven between science and religion came with the theory of evolution introduced by Charles Darwin in the 1850’s although he was not the first to suggest such a point of view. This controversy still rages today. Although the Catholic Church at long last accepted the theory, others still do not, including the so called Creationists in the United States. However, that said, evolution, although bolstered up by a lot of evidence, still remains a theory with some holes to plug. For example many point to the lack of transitional evidence, i.e. there are no missing links. Further, life is so complex that there has not been enough time to evolve from random groupings of molecules to the breathtaking wonder of DNA. However, as regards missing links, we just haven’t found any yet, although we have come close (i.e. archaeopteryx, which fossil clearly shows a type of dinosaur/bird). Besides, not every species may have left a fossil record. And the argument that life is too complex can be answered by pointing out that not every possible combination of molecules needed to be formed before something worthwhile was achieved. All DNA is subject to mutation. These changes can be beneficial, harmful or neutral. If harmful then it is unlikely that any offspring will reproduce and the mutation dies. If beneficial it is likely that the offspring will be improved and so reproduce more. It is through reproduction that beneficial mutations spread. This is natural selection at work. Over billions of years all this evolution has led to us, and as the Earth is 4.5 thousand million years old. I think that is enough time.

At the end of the day, religion and science are both searching for the same thing, i.e. the truth. At least that is my belief and in the final analysis, while not everything in religion or science today is necessarily true (a massive work in progress) they have to converge to the correct answer eventually. This does not mean there is a God. I don’t know the answer to that, no more than science or religion does. So it was nice to discover the writings of somebody who did believe that science and religion are compatible and I was glad to read his works. Since those halcyon days I have discovered many others scientists, religious and non religious people who are also convinced of that viewpoint, though not all would concur with Teilhard de Chardin’s view.

Of course Teilhard de Chardin also ran into problems with the Catholic Church, of which he was a member. Luckily, while they had done away with the Inquisition, they still forbade him from publishing his works and from teaching. As Teilhard de Chardin was a faithful member of the Jesuits and the Church, he acquiesced to the wishes of his masters, even though it caused him a lot of pain and anguish. He did consider briefly leaving, to work freely as a scientist, but decided against this course of action.

Why was he so obedient to a stupid decision by men who simply had no grasp nor understanding of his scientific and religious mysticism? I cannot answer that. I can only suggest, not only did he need to belong as a full member to his Church, but even though he regarded it’s ideas as somewhat outmoded, he was still convinced it was the true Church of his Lord, Jesus Christ. He never lost his faith in his own ideas and philosophy, but felt it better to remain within the fold, flawed and all as it might be. Today he may well have left, but this was during the first half of the twentieth century and so he stayed.

His works were only published after he had died, which gave the world a most interesting philosophy to read and digest.

I first came across Teilhard de Chardin from reading the novel “The Exorcist” by William Peter Blatty. For some reason I found this to be a fascinating book, so much better than most of the horror and ghost stories I had read before. Here was a book which took on board the whole idea of demonic possession yet went at it in as scientific a way as possible. For much of the first half there was a lot of doubt that such things could happen in the 20th century in which the story was set. Demonic possession belonged in the 16th century as Father Damian Karras, the priest in the story who is initially approached to perform an exorcism, said. Karras does not believe in the devil and is convinced there is a medical or psychological reason for the victim’s symptoms. The novel is very interesting in it’s discussion of the whole area of the real scientific reasons for seeming possession and although it leaves one in no doubt during it’s second half that demonic possession is real and the girl, Regan, is actually possessed by a demon, it is only a good fictional story. Certainly I do not believe in demons and doubt very much that they exist.

In fact, the film of the same name which was released in 1973 remained faithful to the book and portrayed evil very convincingly. I remember going to the first showing in the Adelphi cinema in Abbey Street. The theatre was packed and people were full of anticipation as this film was supposed to be really scary. And it was. It scared the hell out of us. I clearly remember at the conclusion of the first really frightening scene where the bed was shaking like mad under the girl, strangers turned and spoke to each other out of sheer relief. I certainly recall the guy beside me saying a few words and me replying although I can’t remember what we said. Never before in mainstream Irish films had we been subjected to such sheer evil on the screen. Gone were the Vincent Price type films where the orchestra started strumming up a storm, the violins rising to a crescendo as the hapless character moved closer to where the monster or whatever would leap out at him. But we were ready for that although many still jumped with fright. And then the second even more terrifying scene where the slip of a girl suddenly jumped up, smacked the doctor who was trying to inject her, her throat swollen, her face contorted and growled in a deep and guttural voice, “Leave the sow alone, she is mine”. Or words to that effect. That was a heavy scene, although looking at it today, it is more funny than anything else.

However, the main exorcist in the story is called Lankester Merrin. At one point he quipped that he had been named after a bridge. I discovered somewhere that his character was loosely based on the Jesuit priest, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. This piqued my interest for some reason and I tried to find out something about him. In those days not as easy as today where you can trawl the internet. However, I found that his most famous book was called “The Phenomenon of Man” and I purchased same quite easily in one of Dublin’s bookshops. As part of the blurb on the back, it mentioned something to do with a philosophy which would reconcile religion and the scientific theory of evolution.

Boy, was it a difficult read. I read it with a dictionary beside me and even then there were some words in the book which my dictionary didn’t contain. In hindsight I should have had a dictionary of palaeontology beside me. However, I managed to finish it and became deeply interested in the ideas in so far as I could understand them.

Basically, he regarded evolution as the correct theory for the emergence of mankind. He relegated the story of Adam and Eve to tales made up by men trying to come to terms with the world they found themselves in. Trying to make some semblance of sense of it. However, Teilhard de Chardin saw evolution as gradually moving from the basic cell to animals to humans. The arrival of humankind was a major stage in this development as we could bring our own consciousness to bear upon ourselves. Now a collective consciousness begins to develop as we learn from each other and move throughout the whole earth. He termed this collective consciousness the noosphere. The development of science and technology is one of the enablers of this movement. In those days (early 70’s) I thought that was a heady idea. Today I would say the noosphere smacks suspiciously of the world wide web, so I guess you could say Teilhard de Chardin was ahead of his time. However he went further and thought that evolution would culminate in what he termed the Omega Point. This was a sort of supreme consciousness and his ideas become very mystical from here. Frankly, he looses me here, but he sort of equates the Omega Point with the collective consciousness of mankind and brings it into a Christ-like being synonymous with God himself. And at this point I also think he must be nuts.

However, in his great synthesis he stated that the traditional interpretations of creation in the bible had to be abandoned. This immediately raised grave alarm with Vatican officials for it implied that Adam and Eve never existed. Without our first parents, there could be no original sin. Therefore did this imply there was no need for mankind to be redeemed, no need for Christ to die on the cross? God knows where all this would have ended up and hence the consternation among the cardinals of the Church can be imagined. Although in their usual heavy handed manner, they decided to ban him rather than open dialogue with him.

Of course, many people said his philosophy was mad and maybe it was, but what struck me most forcibly in those days was his insistence on the compatibility of science and religion. This was what I was looking for in my twenties, as I had just decided to become a fully fledged atheist and was struggling with belief. Teilhard de Chardin’s books helped me to make some sense of all of this and I always look on him as a great teacher, at least for me.

An amusing personal anecdote I’d like to relate now involved a Jesuit priest, Fergal McGrath. This kindly man used to come once a year to my parents’ house ever since I can remember. He would arrive around six o’clock in the evening and I would always be warned to be on my best behaviour as Father McGrath was coming for tea. So we sat around the table while the priest intoned the grace before meals and we would always bless ourselves with great solemnity and sanctity. Tea was a light hearted affair where we all chatted amicably. I always remember this as he never ever asked me whether I said my prayers at night or some other stupid priestly question. After tea another bout of holiness descended briefly as the grace after meals was said whereupon the good priest along with my mother and father removed themselves into the sitting room. Myself and my brother were banned from this room for that one evening in the year. God knows what they talked about, but we often heard the strains of an oboe being played, so it wasn’t all talk.

However, as I grew older I was no longer banned from the sitting room, other than by myself as I certainly didn’t want to spend evenings in theological discussion or listening to an oboe. However, shortly after my discovery of Teilhard de Chardin, I sat in the good man’s presence and asked him about the Jesuit who had upset the Church. I genuinely wanted to know what he might have thought about him, but Fergal McGrath was a very conservative, non-confrontational man who only smiled knowingly and refused to be drawn.

Damn! My first serious attempt at dialogue with the Catholic Church failed miserably.