Pope Francis gives a thumbs up to Teilhard de Chardin

First, my apologies about the longer than expected sabbatical. It has been a crazy few months between work, health issues with my mother-in-law and trying to spend more time with family. I hope to begin posting again on a semi-regular basis very soon but I wanted to at least mention Laudato Si. I am not going to discuss its substance as I have only read it once and have not yet fully digested (hope to start doing that this weekend); plus there are plenty of other resources that can provide a better analysis than I can. (However, I will note on a personal level it is a very challenging document as it is directly asking me to step beyond my narrow, personal comfort and security, which I guess the Gospel message always does).

No, I will briefly highlight Laudato…

We are looking at what archaeological evidence was available in 1971 to support the writings of the Hebrew prophets in the Old Testament of the Bible. That’s when I was conducting an investigation, as an atheist, into the truth claims of theism and Christianity.

We’ve seen evidence for the men who prophesied during the years of the kings of Israel and Judah and the evidence for Jeremiah who prophesied during the years leading up to and following the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem and beginning of Hebrew captivity in Babylon. Now we turn to the years of captivity.

According to secular sources, deported Jews spent 70 years of captivity in Babylon – from the beginning of forced detention in 597 BC to the end of exile in 538 BC. [One of the Babylonian Chronicles (ABC 5) details the involvement of Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar in capturing Jerusalem.] While King Nebuchadnezzar had many wealthy and influential Jews…