When a Priest Proved Einstein Wrong

Did you know that the father of the Big Bang theory was a Catholic priest? Fr. Georges Lemaître (1894–1966) was a man of the cloth AND science. He challenged models of the universe that tried to portray the cosmos as eternal.

Here’s how he proposed the Big Bang Theory and proved the great Albert Einstein wrong.

Competing Models of the Universe
During Fr. Lemaître’s time, many scientists believed that the universe always was — there was no beginning. This was a comfortable position for many atheists, as it seemed to eliminate the necessity of God.

Sir Fred Hoyle introduced the term “Big Bang” as a way to mock the idea that the universe had a beginning. Einstein subscribed to the idea of an eternal universe.

But Fr. Lemaître was about to turn Einstein’s own math against him.

Einstein Meets Fr. Lemaître
In the early 20th century, Einstein was hard at work mathematically modeling the universe and working on his theory of general relativity.

Fr. Lemaître took Einstein’s math and found that it implied that the universe was expanding. By rewinding Einstein’s model, Fr. Lemaître discovered it would come to a point where everything contracts down to a starting point.

In the 1920s, Fr. Lemaître began publishing papers to support his findings. Einstein started communicating with him soon after, purportedly telling the Belgian priest, “Your calculations are correct, but your grasp of physics is abominable.” Einstein clearly saw that the equations worked, but he was still resistant to the idea that the universe had a beginning.

In the 1930s, astronomer Edwin Hubble observed the galaxies moving away from each other, further supporting Fr. Lemaître’s findings.

Finally, Einstein had to admit that the universe did have a beginning. One of science’s great geniuses made way for the genius of a Catholic priest.