Natural Science as a Modern Locus Theologicus Alienus

Kurzfassung/Abstract

God’s word is the starting point of all theological knowledge and is conveyed through different objectivations. Since the 16th century, the authorised places of testimony of the Word of God have been referred to as “loci theologici”. The Dominican Melchior Cano distinguished ten homes of the divine word of revelation, whereby he counted human reason, philosophy, and the history of mankind among the loci alieni. The Second Vatican Council valued the non-theological sciences and granted them autonomy, which is developed in the first part of the essay. Today, it is mainly the insights of natural sciences that enrich theology but also challenge it, especially when the theological view is not narrowed anthropocentrically but is oriented towards the whole of creation. In this case, the question underlying the second part arises as to how the goal of creation can be considered together with the intrinsic lawfulness of nature. It will be shown that this question offers theology the opportunity to reflect on its statements on creation, as well as unanswerable questions.