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Sacred Space Astronomy
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Tag Archives: Foundation

Diary: Happy Birthday Katie!

Sacred Space Astronomy avatarPosted on December 22, 2018 by Br. Guy ConsolmagnoDecember 22, 2018
This entry is part 32 of 64 in the series Diary

Something I have come to understand, slowly but inevitably, is that astronomy is not about stars and planets; it is about people and how they (we) study those stars and planets. After all, one cannot understand the science of Galileo without knowing Galileo the person. He only was able to recognize what he saw in his telescope (he wasn’t the first to look) because he had an interest and training in art; he was only able to communicate it to the point that it led to a change in how humanity understood the situation (he wasn’t the first to try) because he had a passion for the Italian language and literature. If he had been a different person, our science would have had a different history… perhaps asking different questions, and accepting different answers as satisfactory. This blog has always been about people. And so I want to highlight someone here whose wonderful personality has been crucial to our success. … Continue reading →

Posted in Commentary, Diary | Tagged Bannan, Foundation, Philosophy of Science, staff, Steinke | 1 Reply

Three paths to enlightenment. Or something. (Only one costs you money!)

Sacred Space Astronomy avatarPosted on December 10, 2018 by Br. Guy ConsolmagnoDecember 10, 2018
This entry is part 31 of 64 in the series Diary

This has been a great year for the Vatican Observatory Foundation, in a lot of ways. We’ve made major upgrades to the Vatican Advanced Technology Telescope. We supported a fantastically successful Vatican Observatory Summer School, the 16th that we’ve run since the program began in 1986. The Jesuits and our adjunct astronomers have given hundreds of public talks and appeared in dozens of newspapers and media interviews. (I even got my picture on the front page of the New York Times!) Our Faith and Astronomy digital library is now up and running, at it has already attracted nearly 50,000 views. And the Catholic Astronomer website is now followed by more than 8,000 subscribers. In terms of supporting the scientific and educational work of the Vatican Observatory, we’ve never done more. The one downside? We are running seriously short in fundraising.  How serious? Well… every year we make up a budget, and for 2018 we assumed that we’d be able to … Continue reading →

Posted in Diary, Fundraising | Tagged Christmas, Foundation, fundraising | Leave a reply

Diary: Where does the money go? (Part 2)

Sacred Space Astronomy avatarPosted on August 2, 2017 by Br. Guy ConsolmagnoAugust 2, 2017
This entry is part 14 of 64 in the series Diary

In a previous post, I noted that the Vatican Observatory Foundation (which sponsors this blog) has to raise about $800,000 a year to cover its commitments, and at the moment we are running very much behind. On the order of $300,000 a year behind, to be exact. That’s… distressing. What do we plan to do about it? Lots of things, but one in particular concerns you, the readers of this blog. The Catholic Astronomer has been around for about three years, and every year our readership is doubled and our support has likewise increased. Let’s just give an overview of where we are as of the end of July, 2017: We have 584 people who subscribe to our free email notification whenever there is a new posting. In addition, we publicize these on the Foundations’s Facebook site (just under 3,900 followers), and on our Vatican Observatory twitter site (6,600 followers) and the Foundation twitter site (1,400 followers). We get on … Continue reading →

Posted in Diary, Outreach, Uncategorized | Tagged Foundation | Leave a reply

Diary: Where does the money go? (Part I)

Sacred Space Astronomy avatarPosted on August 1, 2017 by Br. Guy ConsolmagnoAugust 1, 2017
This entry is part 10 of 64 in the series Diary

In a recent post, I put out a short beg for folks to actually subscribe at $10 a month (more if you want!) and keep this blog, and the Foundation, going. This has brought up, quite rightly, a question about where exactly this money goes. The first item, of course, is to pay for the cost of this blog itself. At the moment, that’s covered. But the bigger goal is to have surplus from this funding go to support the Vatican Observatory Foundation and its works. What is it that the Foundation does? If you want to know what the Vatican Observatory Foundation has been up to lately, click here for a pdf of our most recent newsletter. What about the details of our funding? Where does it come from, where does it go? That’s covered in our annual report, (click here). The numbers in the annual report are the accountant’s numbers, which is different from actual cash flow. For one … Continue reading →

Posted in Diary, Outreach | Tagged Foundation, fundraising, Outreach, VATT | 1 Reply
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Recent Posts

ⓜ Believing in things…

Sacred Space Astronomy avatarPosted on February 25, 2021 by Br. Guy ConsolmagnoFebruary 24, 2021
This entry is part of 60 in the series And Then I Wrote

And then I wrote… in 2014, the national Catholic newspaper Our Sunday Visitor invited me to submit a few words about science and faith…  as anyone who reads these pages knows, it’s hard to shut me up on the topic! This covers familiar ground; but it does it in a … Continue reading…

Posted in And Then I Wrote | Tagged faith and science | Leave a reply

In the Sky This Week – February 23, 2021

Sacred Space Astronomy avatarPosted on February 23, 2021 by Bob TrembleyFebruary 24, 2021
This entry is part 184 of 184 in the series In the Sky This Week

Millions of people around the planet have seen NASA’s Perseverance Rover descent and touchdown video – I’ve watched it over and over! I tweeted that this landing made me feel like a kid during the Apollo era again! Cameras were not part of the rover’s initial design – and were … Continue reading…

Posted in Astronomy, Outreach | Tagged Dyson Sphere Program, Jupiter, Mars, Mars Perseverance Rover, Mercury, Moon, Saturn, Sun, Supernova 1987A, Uranus | 1 Reply

Arrival: Mars Takes Center Stage As Probes Arrive At The Red Planet!

Sacred Space Astronomy avatarPosted on February 22, 2021 by Fr. James KurzynskiFebruary 24, 2021

These past couple of weeks have greeted us with exciting news from Mars! First, the United Arab Emirates mission to place a weather satellite named Al-Amal into orbit around the red planet was a success! One of the main goals of the “hope probe” is to understand the red planet’s … Continue reading…

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a reply

ⓜ Full Moon-th Meetup: 28 February, 2021

Sacred Space Astronomy avatarPosted on February 21, 2021 by Br. Guy ConsolmagnoFebruary 24, 2021

Featuring Dr. Robert Janusz, and the latest news of the Vatican Advanced Technology Telescope! Just for our paying members: on the next Full Moon (actually, the day after full Moon, this month), Sunday, February 28, we’ll be holding our regular on-line meetup where we get to know and chat with … Continue reading…

Posted in Announcement | Tagged Meetup | Leave a reply

Specola Guestbook | September 16, 1934: Pope Pius XI

Sacred Space Astronomy avatarPosted on February 21, 2021 by Robert MackeFebruary 21, 2021
This entry is part 82 of 82 in the series Specola Guestbook

Since its founding in 1891, many people have passed through the doors of the Vatican Observatory.  A quick perusal of our guestbook reveals several Names, including Popes, Nobel laureates, astronauts, actors, and saints. Today’s guestbook entry is not technically from the guest book.  It is from a separate parchment reserved … Continue reading…

Posted in Astronomy, History, Uncategorized | Tagged Castel Gandolfo, Pius XI, Pontifical Academy of Sciences, Specola Guestbook, Vatican Observatory | Leave a reply

The Sun Rules!

Sacred Space Astronomy avatarPosted on February 20, 2021 by Christopher M. GraneyFebruary 2, 2021

If they [the stars] are suns having the same nature as our sun, why do not these suns collectively outdistance our sun in brilliance? Why do they all together transmit so dim a light…? When sunlight bursts into a sealed room through a hole made with a tiny pin point, … Continue reading…

Posted in Astronomy, History | 1 Reply
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Recent Comments

  • Fr. Bruce Wilkinson February 23, 2021 at 4:05 pm on In the Sky This Week – February 23, 2021I completely agree with you that putting cameras on EVERY space mission - without question and without fail. The ability to see the accomplishments of the various robotic missions have inspired future generations to want to become part of the space exploration crowd
  • Ed Yepez February 20, 2021 at 7:51 am on The Sun Rules!Excellent! Thank you very much for presenting this in such an understandable form. Also let me appreciate the math.(a lot of which I had forgotten) With Kepler, how you can make the correct observations, yet still come to an erroneous conclusion? But the observations remain correct, even useful for further...
  • Bob Trembley February 19, 2021 at 5:16 am on In the Sky This Week – February 16, 2021I joined a NASA Night Sky Network Zoom Watch Party - it was pretty cool! When I joined, an engineer was talking about his work on the helicopter - those wings are HUGE! I watched the the landing with my in-laws; it was cool to see the same image up...
  • Richard Hill February 19, 2021 at 12:54 am on Skyward by David Levy: February 2021Very nice meteor photo! Reminds me of one Geminid I saw as I was walking to night lunch on Kitt Peak. It passed right through Orion. Burned a memory in my brain.
  • Benjamin Goodison February 18, 2021 at 5:26 pm on In the Sky This Week – February 16, 2021... and three days later, Perseverance finally touched down successfully and is snapping its first images!I'm sure there were more than a few spontaneous prayers in the NASA control room in those last few minutes... there certainly were at my end :) Really looking forward to the wealth of new...
  • Bob Trembley February 16, 2021 at 8:31 am on In the Sky This Week – February 16, 2021Oh my goodness! Thank you SO MUCH for the kind replies!
  • Joseph O'Donnell February 16, 2021 at 8:00 am on In the Sky This Week – February 16, 2021Thank you for this. Always so helpful and enlightening.
  • Stan Sienkiewicz February 16, 2021 at 7:47 am on In the Sky This Week – February 16, 2021Bob, another great post. Wonderful way to start the day. Thanks for putting in the time to create these posts. Educational, beautiful, and awe inspiring. I really appreciate seeing these each week. Thank you, Stan
  • Fr. James Kurzynski February 12, 2021 at 10:40 pm on Space Exploration As An Act Of Interfaith Dialogue.Thanks Joel! I greatly appreciate your insight and encouragement!
  • Fr. James Kurzynski February 10, 2021 at 10:46 am on Polar Vortex, Snowy Owls, Puffins, and Answering the Question: Fr. James, If Global Warming Is Real, Why Am I So Cold?Thanks for you response! My apologies if it came across that Wisconsin was the southernmost Snowy Owls travel. That was not my intent. In my prep, I saw articles of sightings as south as Texas. The point being that some birds go south, others don't, and its a bit of...
  • Jim Cook February 10, 2021 at 8:05 am on Polar Vortex, Snowy Owls, Puffins, and Answering the Question: Fr. James, If Global Warming Is Real, Why Am I So Cold?Wisconsin is actually NOT very far south to find Snowy Owls in winter, as you can see from its eBird range map: https://ebird.org/science/status-and-trends/snoowl1/range-map I've subscribed to eBird's Snowy Owl reports list for almost 10 years now and while some years have seen more reports of sightings than others, they typically...
  • Fr. Timothy Sauppé February 8, 2021 at 8:38 am on A telescope made by an Angel…Br. Guy: This would make a great beginning to your opening address to the Solar Eclipse Retreat in 2024 for Bishops/Priests. I am going to save this. Fr. Timothy Sauppé
  • Richard Saam February 7, 2021 at 10:20 am on JWST update – Hexagons in SpaceI want to make an additional point on hexagons: In the realm of crystallography as described in solid state physics, there is an equivalence between real(energy) and reciprocal(momentum) hexagonal space. This was mathematically presented in Charles Kittel's (recently deceased) text "Introduction to Solid State Physics". And then something to ponder:...
  • Joel Hopko February 1, 2021 at 11:23 am on Space Exploration As An Act Of Interfaith Dialogue.Fr. Kurzynski -- I too was very moved by the Emirates and the other national efforts (Japanese, Indian etc.) Like you I found in them an expression of the human spirit and even the religious wellsprings that can inspire us toward a shared destiny beyond our fear and confusion. Thanks...
  • Richard Saam February 1, 2021 at 10:33 am on JWST update – Hexagons in SpaceAdding to Fernando's comments 'hexagons are pretty much everywhere in the universe': It can be argued that universal space time can be expressed as oscillating virtual hexagonal (~50 cm, ~8 hr) lattice units conforming to the conservation of energy and momentum and the universe vacuum energy density. There is some...
  • Christopher M. Graney January 27, 2021 at 9:05 am on Faith, Science and Astronomy TextbooksGood! Glad to hear it. As for myself I still think they need more on Kepler, at least if they are going to throw in bits of history with any religion content. It would help with those many students who are afraid that science is all about being non-theistic.
  • Joel Hopko January 24, 2021 at 12:24 pm on Faith, Science and Astronomy TextbooksProfessor Graney -- Call me easily placated, but I was actually somewhat relieved that most of the texts reviewed at least attempted to provide some nuance to the Galileo narrative. Certainly an improvement over the "martyr for science" trope so frequently dispensed over popular media. Obviously much work remains, but...
  • Fr. James Kurzynski January 20, 2021 at 6:48 am on Space Missions In 2021: What Are You Most Excited To See In This New Year?Thanks Janine! I love your reflection on the Al Amal mission! I was so impressed with the video they produced and, yes, I can't wait to see the United Arab Emirates contribution to science! It's something that isn't mentioned much, but should be mentioned more: True science, by its very...
  • Janine Samz January 19, 2021 at 9:37 am on Space Missions In 2021: What Are You Most Excited To See In This New Year?Thank you, Father. Let's see. I am drawn to three! The Emirates one is interesting because of the extent of what they are looking for and from history I know the Arab culture used to be a leader in science. It would be interesting to see them at work again...
  • Christopher M. Graney January 19, 2021 at 8:59 am on “Cosmos: Possible Worlds”, 10-13: Goodbye to a Losing SeasonMy experience with students and the general public is that a reasonable number of people will be amazed by the real universe. For example, people who saw the conjunction on the 21st were generally amazed. But certainly Cosmos seems to think that stuff has to be over the top.

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    ⓜ Full Moon-th Meetup: 28 February, 2021

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