I came across a news item in the USA Today website, dated August 18, that got my attention. It concerns "Dark Energy", the mysterious force that seems to be speeding up the expansion of the universe, that no one can find or explain. 

Two scientists say is doesn't exist now because of a "mathematical solution they have produced, that suggests it is a natural result of the Big Bang. Part of the article is reproduced here.

"What's the answer? It doesn't exist, suggest mathematicians Blake Temple and Joel Smoller, in a study released Monday by the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science.

Dark energy is an illusion if their equations are right, and the universe, at least 27.2 billion light years across, is spreading at an increasing rate into an even bigger vacuum empty of any matter, propelled by the energy of the Big Bang.

The only problem is that for the equations to work, we must be "literally at the center of the universe, which is, to say the least, unusual," says physicist Lawrence Krauss of Arizona State University in Tempe. "I think this is plausible mathematics, but it doesn't seem physically relevant."

It is the part that says "we must be "literally at the center of the universe," for this solution to work, that caught my attention.

Three hundred years ago, two scientists named Galileo and Copernicus, were chastised and punished by the church for saying that the earth and sun were not the center of the universe. Since then the church has revised its "interpretation of the Bible" to allow for the scientifically proven "facts" that our earth and solar system are merely a small speck in an unimaginably large universe that is about 27 billions light years in width. The idea of being at the center of something so large was just too outrageous.

Now we have two distinguished mathematicians and scientists saying that the only way we can explain Dark Energy is for the earth to be the center of the universe AGAIN.

I have always had reservations about our place in God's creation but, given our insignificance in it, gave up the idea long ago that we were the center of anything. Given that there are literally trillions of stars and galaxies full of stars, it seemed unreasonable to think that we are on the only planet with life.

As I learned to appreciate the complexity of the single living cell, and all the various things that had to come together on this rock, JUST RIGHT, for life to exist, I began to re-evaluate my feelings about life elsewhere in the universe. It is true that probability says that with the large number of stars with planets, there must be some with the same conditions for life.

Then I look at the DNA structure and think "how could nature have possibly put something like this together?" If God did create man as a unique form of life, it is possible that He did it only once, and that maybe we are at the center of His creation after all.

From the scientific perspective, there are so many possible stars with planets like ours that life must be prolific, IF IT HAPPENED ACCIDENTALLY. By the same reasoning, by looking at the complexity of DNA structure and the workings of a living organism, the odds of it happening accidentally are almost zero.

Perhaps they are zero.

Contrary to what science says, there may be some events for which it is impossible for them to happen naturally. Maybe God did do it only once, and we are it. Maybe the earth really is the center of the universe. It is too much for THIS human mind to balance an infinitely large universe with the infinitely complex structure of life, and come up with a scientifically reasonable conclusion.

Occam's Razor, is a hypothesis that says, "When the solution to a problem involves increasingly complex solutions and explanations, the most likely solution is the simplest one". In this case the "simplest" explanation would be that an infinitely powerful God DID create life specifically for this very special world, and that maybe we ARE at the center of creation.

Wouldn't that be humbling?