Hato Paora College old boy, Māori astronomer and scholar Ahorangi Rangiānehu Mātāmua is this year’s New Zealander of the Year. Professor Mātāmua has dedicated much of his life to the revitalisation and resurgence of Matariki and has written widely about Matariki. He is regarded as one of the country’s foremost Māori scholars for his contribution Read more
Posts Tagged ‘Astronomy’
Church goers less likely to believe there is extraterrestrial life
Monday, August 2nd, 2021Americans who attend religious services weekly or more often are less inclined than others to see military UFO sightings as evidence of extraterrestrial life. They have a lot in common with atheists. 85% say their best guess is that intelligent life exists on other planets, far fewer (31%) say that UFOs reported by the military Read more
Vatican astronomer: God is bigger than we think
Monday, September 21st, 2020
The possible discovery of life on Venus has prompted the Vatican astronomer to caution against getting too speculative about it. If anything living exists on the planet, it doesn’t change the calculus in terms of God’s relationship with humanity, Brother Guy Consolmagno SJ says. “Life on another planet is no different than the existence of Read more
More interest in the stars as religion fades in rural Waikato
Monday, August 24th, 2020Declining membership and a lack of new blood coming through have forced the Kaimai Presbytery to review the future of its St Andrew’s Presbyterian Parish of Kihikihi. But already a replacement is waiting in the wings if the presbytery decides to “dissolve” the 130-year-old congregation and sell the church property. Read more
Māori astronomer wins top science award
Thursday, July 2nd, 2020A Tūhoe astronomer is the first Māori to win one of the country’s top science awards for his efforts to revitalise traditional Māori knowledge of the stars. Professor Rangi Matamua was awarded the top communication prize at the Prime Minister’s Science Awards on Tuesday. Read more
Southern skies and Mt John experience wow Vatican astronomer
Monday, May 13th, 2019Brother Guy Consolmagno, the Vatican Astronomer believes Tekapo is one of the best places in the world for astronomy. “There’s few places where you can actually see the stars that brightly that the Milky Way casts a shadow. And you forget that’s the way the universe used to look to everybody before we filled the sky with Read more
Students query Vatican’s astronomer about his faith
Monday, May 6th, 2019
“The Church loves science. To be close to the universe is to be close to God” says Brother Guy Consolmagno, director of the Vatican Observatory. He has been visiting New Zealand on a lecture tour been sponsored by Catholic Discovery (formerly the Catholic Enquiry Centre). Consolmagno made this remark after students at Hamilton’s St John College challenged him Read more
First solar eclipse: astronomers check Bible
Thursday, November 16th, 2017
The first record of a solar eclipse is in the Bible, say scientists from the University of Cambridge. Colin Humphreys, a physicist at England’s University of Cambridge, and his colleague astrophysicist Graeme Waddington, say a reference in the Book of Joshua refers to a solar eclipse. Leading the Israelites into battle in Canaan, Joshua said: Read more
Behold a Billion Stars in This Stunning New Map of the Milky Way
Tuesday, September 20th, 2016The European Space Agency just released a three-dimensional map of the Milky Way galaxy that charts the location of over a billion celestial objects. The new 3D map reflects the first 14 months of data collected by ESA’s Gaia satellite. Launched on December 19, 2013, Gaia orbits the Sun-Earth second Lagrange point (L2), which lies Read more
Pope’s Astronomer, Guy Consolmagno, to speak on Waiheke Island
Friday, July 29th, 2016
Brother Guy Consolmagno, director of the Vatican Observatory, will be speaking at an event on Waiheke Island in mid September. Consolmagno is a Jesuit brother and president of the Vatican Observatory Foundation. He’ll discuss the interface between science and humanity, our place in the universe and what it means to us if life is found Read more