A "prestigious award" that contributes to "dialogue between science and religion" and to "encouraging all those whose work promotes a deeper understanding of the relationship between religion and science". This is how the Pope defines the Templeton Award in a letter of congratulation to the winner of this year’s award: mgr. Michael Heller, a Polish Catholic priest and cosmologist, a teacher of Theoretical Physics, Relativistic Cosmology and Philosophy of Science at the Papal Academy of Theology in Cracow. As to the important award, which will be given to the Polish priest in London today, the Pope recalls he has "highlighted on several occasions the importance of a fruitful meeting between faith and reason, the two wings with which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of the truth". Hence his wish that mgr. Heller’s work in the area of cosmology and philosophy may "contribute to spreading the massage" of the Psalms: “The heavens proclaim the glory of God, the firmament manifests the work of His hands”. "For the progress of research in the area of the relationship between science and religion": this is the reason for giving the Templeton Award to Heller’s original theory on the origin and cause of the universe, that he developed through cross-disciplinary studies in the areas of physics, cosmology, theology and philosophy.
