Mother of Science, of the University, and of Beauty, the Catholic Church has always been at the forefront of the search for Truth. No wonder that, in 1904, priests and brothers of the Society of Jesus founded the Ebro Observatory (Observatori de l'Ebre, in Catalan, Observatorio del Ebro, in Spanish), a groundbreaking project for the study of the Sun, in Roquetes (Tarragona, Catalonia, Spain). As the Observatory's website itself recalls:
The Ebro Observatory is a research Institute founded by the Society of Jesus in 1904 to study the Sun-Earth relationships. It is a nonprofit Foundation associated with the Spanish Research Council (CSIC) since its inception. It has continuously maintained collaboration with the National Meteorological Institute (INM) since 1920. Recently, it has started collaboration with other institutions, like the National Technical Aerospace Institute and the Cartographic Institute of Catalonia.
The Observatory was, by itself, one of those structures that defy anti-Catholic prejudices, both in the beautiful presence of Catholic priests dedicated to scientific research and in its very foundation, in a time and place condemned by outsiders as examples of "darkness": not only a Jesuit foundation, but a Jesuit foundation in early 20th Century Spain, the humiliated post-imperial Spain of 1898.
Following fifty years of Conciliar "Springtime", however, there are not many Jesuits now left in the Observatory. The Observatory announced the following in the end of November:
Following fifty years of Conciliar "Springtime", however, there are not many Jesuits now left in the Observatory. The Observatory announced the following in the end of November:
After more than [one] hundred years of active presence at the Ebro Observatory, the staff of the Society of Jesus will leave our Center. Due to a restructuring of the Society of Jesus, the last Jesuits who are working at the Observatory - father Luis Felipe Alberca, father Ernest Sanclement and brother Isidre Moncal - will move to Barcelona later this year. The Observatory, along with the City of Roquetes, is preparing an event of recognition and farewell as thanks for their work at the Center, and in general in this region, for many years. This event will be held on December 14 in the Landerer’s Building of the Observatory. Also, an exhibition has been prepared at the Library of the Observatory for this event and it can be visited until December 30.
It is probably all the fault of the pre-Conciliar world itself: as George Weigel said in July, in pre-Conciliar Spain, "Catholic intellectual life withered"...
[Image: the Ebro Observatory was, in the 1920s, one of the foremost Jesuit research centers in Spain.]
