Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

“[I]f each of us can believe that he is working so that the Universe may be raised, in him and through him, to a higher level—then a new spring of energy will well forth in the heart of Earth’s workers. The whole great human organism, overcoming a momentary hesitation, will draw its breath and press on with strength renewed.

“Indeed, the idea, the hope of the planetisation of life is very much more than a mere matter of biological speculation. It is more of a necessity for our age than the discovery, which we so ardently pursue, of new sources of energy. It is this idea which can and must bring us the spiritual fire without which all material fires, so laboriously lighted, will presently die down on the surface of the thinking earth: the fire inspiring us with the joy of action and the love of life. . . .

“We have to take into account what is required by the law of complexity if Mankind is to achieve spiritual growth through collectivisation. The first essential is that the human units involved in the process shall draw closer together, not merely under the pressure of external forces, or solely by the performance of material acts, but directly, centre to centre, through internal attraction. Not through coercion, or enslavement to a common task, but through unanimity in a common spirit. The construction of molecules ensues through atomic affinity. Similarly, on a higher level, it is through sympathy, and this alone, that the human elements in a personalised universe may hope to rise to the level of a higher synthesis.”

Read about the work of evolutionary thinker and Jesuit priest Teilhard de Chardin in the Fall 2006 issue of What Is Enlightenment?