@jeffcliff @epictittus @Nils The Aboriginals of Australia lived on the island continent for something like 40,000 years, all in blissful isolation. No great wars of religion, no bloody battles inspired by schisms. 40,000 years with no invasions by outside barbarians or crusaders looking to impose their faith. Yet despite that the Aboriginals never advanced beyond the stone age, never grew beyond living in the dirt, eating grubs, and sometimes even eating their own children.

Meanwhile it has been part of Christian dogma from almost the beginning that God is a logical being, and therefore His creation is also logical. That meant that, to the extent our limited intellect is able, we should be able to understand His creation through the application of reason

This is a list of Catholic clergy throughout history who have made contributions to science. This list does not include lay members of religious orders, such as ordinary monks and nuns, brothers and sisters, or anyone in minor orders at such times that those were not considered clergy. It is nearly 300 entries long, including accomplishments ranging from things like inventing a bullet resistant vest in the early 1900's to creating predictive models to figure out the trajectory of hurricanes to various advances in mathematics, chemistry, geology, biology, astronomy, and even mechanics. All this stretching back to nearly the fall of the Roman empire. We are on the verge of reaching the stars precisely because of the scientific advances these deeply religious people made.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Catholic_clergy_scientists