Why Theology? - Part 3
In which Teófilo continues to explain how God and Theology captivated him.
If by now you haven't felt a sense of vertigo when imagining the size of the universe, you haven't done it right.
Going from the Very Large to the Very Small
After considering how "big" God is, it might seem paradoxical to consider how "small" He is. Yet, this is where we find ourselves in our reflection. God isn't constrained to the universe's vast, external size. God's total presence extends to the very small, event to infinitesimal space.
Let's use our imaginations again. Consider the human body.
According to a new analysis of more than 1,500 papers, the average adult male human has around 36 trillion cells — that's 36 followed by 12 zeros — while adult females have 28 trillion and 10-year-old children have about 17 trillion. (Source)
There are more cells in our bodies than galaxies in the observable universe. We ourselves are carriers of our compact universes.
Consider the average size of human cells. The average size of human body cells is between 20-30 micrometres.
A micrometer or micron is a millionth of a meter. To my fellow users of Imperial Weights and Measures, a meter is about 39 inches long. That's three inches longer than a yard. So, imagine a 39-inch long yardstick. Then break it into a million pieces of equal size. You'll get a micron-long splinter. Place between 20 and 30 such splinters side by side, and they should span the average human cell.
The DNA molecule is fundamental to all life on Earth. Every cell contains DNA, tied up in structures within, called genes. Depending on how it's measured, a DNA molecules might be as long as 0.33 nanometers. A nanometer is a billionth of a meter. To measure a DNA molecule rone must cut the micron-long splinter into 1,000 pieces. The resulting splinter would measure a nanometer long. Then take the nanometer splinter and cut it another 100 times. Take 33 of those splinters and put them in a single line. That's how long a strand of DNA would measure if one could measure it.
Atoms are the basic particles of the chemical elements. They make up molecules, such as the DNA molecule I spoke about before. Atoms are the basic building blocks of all things. Needless to say, atoms are very small, about 100 picometers across. A picometer is a trillionth of a meter. To get to it you must take our nanometer splinter and cut it down 1,000 times. Then take 100 of those splinters and line them up one after the other and you'll get an atom's width. Multiply that by 1 million and you'll get the width of one hair.
I'm going somewhere with all this, I promise!
To make a long story short, let us asks: what is the smallest length possible in the physical universe? The Planck Length is that smallest length possible. It's approximately to 1.616255×10 to the power of minus 35 meters in length. Let me give you an idea of how small that is. An atom's diameter is 6,187,140,000,000,000,000,000,000 times (6.18714×10 to the power of 24) larger than the Planck's Length. That means an atom's diameter is about 6 times a trillion-trillion times longer than the Planck Length!
Can one say "Hey, half-a-Planck's Length is smaller than a Planck's Length! Wouldn't that be an even smaller length?" Yes, but only notionally. In practice, the amount of energy needed to scan the Planck Length would create a micro black hole in-situ. The micro black hole would then evaporate in a super-fast instant. The scan would yield no information. We would be stuck with nothing.
It appears the universe has a bottom basement floor, if not a penthouse deck.
God is Small. Very Small
The point of this exercise is to enable me to say that God is there, in the smallest possible length in nature. God is there, in full not in part. Paul's saying that in Him we live, move, and exist also applies to the very small and its denizens. Atoms, molecules, every subatomic particle that moves and exists - either in reality or virtually - does so in God. There's nothing too big or small in His creation that God doesn't or can't permeate in His utmost fullness.
Our saints and doctors say God is closer to us than we’re to ourselves. After this deep dive into our inner universes, maybe we can begin to understand why.
The Really Audacious Point
Thus far we can say that the God proposed by Catholic Christians is infinite, omnipotent, and eternal. One can also say He's somewhat interested in His creation. After all, He seems to have put in a lot of thought into it. But those proposals don't end there. We Catholics say that this immense Being has spoken to us. This fantastic assertion will take us back to Abraham, as we'll see.