Vaitcan Observatory

If there's any doubt as to the intentions of the Vatican Observatory, which claims its mission is "to do good science, for its own sake, and to be a bridge between Church and Science", its 2008 Annual Report taking credit for discovery of two planets outside of our solar system and a testing of the models in Big Bang theory posits the observatory as a scientific instrument akin to others.

One of the astronomers, Brother Guy Consolmagno, has a wordy blog with honest remarks such as;

My fellow astronomers are perfectly comfortable with me having a religious life. It turns out, a lot of them are active churchgoers, too — something they told me only once I had come out of the religious closet myself by joining the Jesuits. But I am, frankly, bored by journalists and members of the public who want to know how I can “reconcile” my science and my religion.

Better yet, the BBC still has an article about a 2005 program recorded at the Vatican about the search for planets like Earth capable of sustaining life as we know it.

A friend recently said to me that he believes science and religion are not compatible. Clearly, if an MIT grad can become a Jesuit and look for aliens while working for the Vatican, then we should be open to the notion that science and religion are as compatible as we grant.