George Lemaitre: The Catholic Priest Who Proposed the Big Bang Theory – Prof. Jonathan Lunine

The Thomistic Institute

Christianity, Religion &Amp; Spirituality, Society & Culture, Catholic Intellectual Tradition, Catholic, Philosophy, Religion & Spirituality, Thomism, Catholicism

4.8 • 729 Ratings

🗓️ 12 November 2025

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This lecture was given on October 5th, 2023, at the Thomistic Institute in Limerick, Ireland.

For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events.

About the Speakers:

Jonathan Lunine is the Chief Scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Professor of Planetary Science at Caltech in Pasadena, California. Beforehand, he was the David C. Duncan Professor in the Physical Sciences and Chair of the Department of Astronomy at Cornell University. Lunine is interested in how planets form and evolve, what processes maintain and establish habitability, and what kinds of exotic environments (methane lakes, etc.) might host a kind of chemistry sophisticated enough to be called "life". He pursues these interests through theoretical modeling and participation in spacecraft missions. He is co-investigator on the Juno mission now in orbit at Jupiter, using data from several instruments on the spacecraft, and on the MISE and gravity science teams for the Europa Clipper mission. He was on the Science Working Group for the James Webb Space Telescope, focusing on characterization of extrasolar planets and Kuiper Belt objects. Lunine has contributed to concept studies for a wide range of planetary and exoplanetary missions. Lunine is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and has participated in or chaired a number of advisory and strategic planning committees for the Academy and for NASA.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Tomistic Institute podcast.
0:06.2	Our mission is to promote the Catholic intellectual tradition in the university, the church, and the wider public square.
0:12.7	The lectures on this podcast are organized by university students at Temistic Institute chapters around the world.
0:19.3	To learn more and to attend these events, visit us at to mystic institute.org.
0:24.9	One of the things that I found after becoming Catholic
0:29.3	was that a lot of scientists that I knew at the university that I taught at the time,
0:36.3	the University of Arizona, we're also Catholic,
0:38.7	because I go to Mass and, oh, there's that person,
0:41.7	there's that person.
0:42.6	I didn't know they were Catholic.
0:45.1	And that was kind of surprising.
0:46.3	Everyone kind of kept it, you know, kind of quiet.
0:49.5	And they kept it kind of quiet because in the United States,
0:52.3	there is this perception that science and religion
0:56.0	are at odds with each other. There are some very successful writers who have tried to make
1:04.0	that case, Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris and others, and yet you see plenty of scientists
1:09.4	who are believers. and so the response to
1:12.9	that is well you know there are scientists who are believers actually half of
1:18.0	scientists believe in God in some way but those aren't the really good scientists
1:22.6	the really good scientists don't believe or you go back in in history, you know, you hear the
1:29.8	apologists for this battle between science and faith saying, well, yes, scientists did,
1:37.0	you know, we're religious back then, but that's because the rest of society was. Or, I mean,
	...

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