This is a subject that scientists and researchers would do well to reflect on, whatever their field of study, for they are all too inclined to specialize. … No one can deny that fantastic advances have been made thanks to specialization, and it is true that scientists need to concentrate their research within certain limits in order to penetrate their subject in depth, but they also need to recognize the links that exist between their own subject of research and the rest of creation. Instead of this, what do they do? They detach a tiny piece of bark from the Cosmic Tree of Life and, having duly weighed and examined it, they write books or summon a few hundred colleagues and students to hear them present the results of their research. That is what they call “science.” But once that piece of bark has been detached one can say it is dead! Yes, once cut off from universal life it is dead.

This is why scientists will, one day, be obliged to recognize that the way they work has contributed enormously to our poor understanding of that complex reality that is life, and they will regret it. Of course, no one can object to what they say when they enumerate the properties of a mineral, a plant or an animal. But even though what they say may be correct, it represents only a fragment of reality. To give the whole picture, they need to see the link between the object of their study and cosmic life which flows and vibrates and radiates…

… Understand what I am saying. I am not criticizing or denying the truth of scientific discoveries. That is not the problem. The problem is in the minds of researchers, in their attitude toward life, in their inability to connect the object of their studies to life as a whole. They put too much emphasis on analysis and neglect synthesis. But what is analysis? A downward movement into matter. And synthesis? An upward movement toward the spirit. The higher one rises the less one sees of the details of beings and objects and the more one perceives the relations that exist between them. And this is how one moves toward true knowledge. Knowledge is to look at things from the highest standpoint so as to have a view of the whole.

… What does science do? It works more and more with analysis. It discovers particles of matter that are smaller and smaller. It decomposes; dislocates; disintegrates… And the worst of it is that researchers end by applying to human beings the methods they use for the study of matter.

… Actually, even more serious is the fact that scientists believe that they can apply the analytical methods they use in their own disciplines to the study of all other areas, including religion.

Science and religion were not made to oppose each other but to complement each other. In any case, it is not science which opposes religion or vice versa, it is scientists and religious people who oppose each other in the name of a mistaken conception of human nature. To put it briefly, one could say that religious people want the heart to triumph and scientists want the intellect to triumph, because they see these two factors as opposed to each other. And this only shows that they do not know how God conceived the universe and human beings. Gof created man to be, at the same time, religious and scientific.

So let it be clear: science will never be capable of doing away with religion, any more than religion, in spite of all its efforts, has been capable of obstructing the development of science.

A scientist will tell you that he can only accept that something is true and worthy of interest if he has been able to observe, calculate, measure, weigh, compare and classify it. All the rest is subject to doubt and should be left aside. That is all very well, but it implies a tremendous diminishment of the range of what he can know, for two thirds (let’s say two thirds) of human existence is concerned with activities that can be neither weighed nor measured. Yes, two thirds of the time, we simply live. That’s all. And if that life is unworthy of interest or attention one wonders why scientists go on living. They breathe, eat, drink, sleep and walk about; they have thoughts and feelings, sensations and desires; they meet other people and talk to them, even embrace them, and they never ask themselves whether they are acting scientifically. How can they accept to live an unscientific life? They ought to refuse

Because the objective, material world can be observed by everyone in the same way, scientists have decided to concentrate their investigations in this area and leave aside the psychic, subjective world,. They say that it is too changeable and insubstantial to get a hold on; it cannot be measured and classified. It is true, of course, that to study the life of the psyche and observe the movement of the soul and the spirit would require instruments that no one is yet capable of constructing, but is that any reason to claim that such a study is impossible and of no interest?

We often hear prominent people deploring the fact that in our day and age human beings have still not managed to rid themselves of their so-called irrational religious beliefs. In fact, after a period of scientific materialism, we are obliged to acknowledge that more and more people are turning toward the new religion, a new spirituality, a new mysticism… and the forms that this tendency takes are sometimes very confused and absurd. Even the religious authorities are concerned about this, for they sense that they are at a loss in the face of these new trends over which they have no control. Well, it is they that are responsible for this situation, because they have been more intent on extending the dominion of their Church than on answering the real needs of souls and spirits. But the scientists share this responsibility, for their materialistic philosophy also leaves people hungry and thirsty. It is time, now, for both parties to stop bewailing a situation that they themselves have helped to create and try, rather, to collaborate in seeking the remedy.