The whole dimension of religious belief requires transcendence, it requires going beyond what you can establish rationally.

Being a scientist helps to support both my life as a Jesuit and my belief in God.

There are many people who do view scientific research as alienating from religion and from God, and when so many people do, there must be some reason for it.

I can't see for the life of me how an attempt to understand the universe, which I believe comes from God, can alienate us from God.

If I have a fundamental belief that the universe is created by God, then I also come to the belief that that universe reflects God, it gives me some knowledge of Him. Obviously, therefore, the more I know of the universe is, the more enriched my limited knowledge of God is.

The whole dimension of religious belief requires transcendence, it requires going beyond what you can establish rationally.

In a very real sense my science does inform my knowledge of God. If you would allow me to say that we never know God, because if I claim that I know God, I know something other than God, because God is not knowable, he is unknowable. So we have to approach it in that sense first, that my knowledge of God is always limited.