“Give a child to the Jesuits, they say, and ten years later the man will cringe when he spots the Cross. But look, ten years or so spent studying physics is a pretty effective form of brainwashing as well. You emerge into the daylight blinking weakly and talking about an endless number of universes stacked on top of one another like an old-fashioned Maine pancake breakfast. Or you start babbling inanely about how meaningless the universe is. But if you ask me just who is the more credulous, the more suggestible, the dopier, the more perfectly prepared to convey absurdity to an almost inconceivable pitch of personal enthusiasm – a well-trained Jesuit or a Ph.D. in quantum physics, I’ll go with the physicist every time. There is nothing these people won’t believe. No wonder used-car salesmen love them.”

Yep! Goes right along with what Dr. Morris was saying: string theory, the whole universe shrunk down to the size of a grapefruit, suspension of the laws of physics, multiple universes, Bubbleland, etc. Thus I now realize I don’t have to believe these guys just because they have PhD’s in math or physics. It’s not like they can test their theories by creating a universe in the lab (yea, I know, they can make predictions based on the theories and then see if observations match the predictions, but then the theory of epicycles more-or-less predicted the motion of the planets, though it was wrong).

OTOH, contemplation of the vastness of the universe challenges my faith, too. Why would God be so interested in this teeny tiny speck of dust called earth? I know, maybe size doesn’t matter, but it does give me pause. Makes me wonder if maybe God didn’t make other worlds and other civilizations on other planets and just hasn’t told us about them. If I can get past the vastness of the universe challenging my faith to even believe that he exists, then I stand in awe of his mind-boggling immensity and infinitude. “Oh Lord my God, when I in awesome wonder, consider all the worlds thy hands have made…”