THE ROLE OF SCIENCE IN LIBERAL EDUCATION 487 



Can Catholic Education be truly Catholic and at the same 

 time non-scientific? Or must a curriculum based on Catholic 

 philosophy make the natural sciences an integral part of the 

 curriculum, and not just an appendage attached because every- 

 one else has them? In an allocution to scientists, philosophers 

 and educators. Pope Pius XII expressed his conviction that a 

 knowledge of science is fundamental to education. Speaking to 

 the Fourth International Thomistic Congress, he said: 



You know how advantageous and necessary it is for a philosopher 

 to deepen his own understanding of scientific progress. . . . Each 

 of the branches of knowledge has its own characteristics and must 

 operate independently of the others, but that does not mean that 

 they should be ignorant of one another. It is only by means of 

 mutual understanding and cooperation that there can arise a great 

 edifice of human knowledge that will be in harmony with the higher 

 light of divine wisdom. (Sept. 14, 1955) 



Addressing the Pontifical Academy of Sciences that same year, 

 Pius XII pointed to the dangers which have arisen from the 

 separation of science and philosophy, and he insisted that sci- 

 ence itself has need of a sound philosophy. 



Science is Liberal Education 



A solution to the problem is found within the tradition of 

 Thomistic realism. An educational system orientated to the 

 thought of St. Thomas Aquinas places natural science in its 

 proper context and revitalizes its integral connections with all 

 other intellectual disciplines. The Angelic Doctor never feared 

 man's fascination for the three-dimensional world of physical 

 reality. Instead he realized that investigation of this world was 

 the beginning of all knowledge. Within such a frame of refer- 

 ence, natural science is not another branch of learning whose 

 present expansion may cause it to replace the trunk. It is 

 rather the root. It is the means of transporting experiences, 

 facts and first principles from the physically sensible world to 

 all other fields of knowledge. And a tree's growth is not im- 



