Science is ‘participation in Divine truth’

New Catholic outdoor program, COMPASS, gives Idaho students hands-on science education rooted in prayer, discovery and stewardship of God’s creation.

A group of 5th- and 6th-grade students from Diocese of Boise schools participated in COMPASS (Catholic Outdoor Mission Producing Adventurous Saintly Scientists), a new ministry launched in 2024 that aims to provide elementary students with a Catholic experience of science and the outdoors. The next session of COMPASS is scheduled for September 2025 at Camp John Paul II. (Courtesy photo)

By Clare Compaña

For the ICR

Picture this: kids scatter to record their observations of trees; across the clearing, other students listen raptly, their eyes fixed on the peregrine falcon perched on a biologist’s gloved hand. Last night, these 5^th and 6^th grade students prayed the rosary around the campfire; tonight, they will attend Mass in a rustic chapel before returning outside to search for constellations in the beautiful clear sky.

These students are participating in a session of COMPASS, a new ministry for students of Idaho’s Catholic schools. COMPASS stands for Catholic Outdoor Mission Producing Adventurous Saintly Scientists and aims to provide elementary students with a Catholic experience of science in the outdoors.

Hands-on outdoor science is a staple of Idaho primary education. Each year, K-12 students from across the state attend residential science camps. Many Catholic schools in the Diocese of Boise send their students to these programs for their value both to the science curriculum and to growing in a perspective of stewardship.

Catholic schools strive to provide an excellent education. Key components of this excellence are immersive, tangible experiences of the natural world and opportunities to put science skills to use in creative investigations.

Even closer to the heart of a Catholic education, memorable outdoor experiences foster the love for the natural world that is the foundation for ecology. The human responsibility for ecology holds a particular call for Catholics, as expressed by the popes of the last 60 years, from St. Paul VI to our current Pope Leo XIV. “All of us can cooperate as instruments of God for the care of creation,” wrote the late Pope Francis in his 2015 encyclical Laudato Si’ (On Care for Our Common Home).

Learning about trees during the COMPASS camp. (Courtesy photo)

Other outdoor science camps may teach stewardship, but none from a Catholic perspective. Popular discourse often presents faith and science at odds with each other, but the Catholic Church understands they have complementary value. We know the same God who created the universe also reveals himself to us by faith throughout history, and so faith and science are part of the same truth.

As St. John Paul II said in his November 2003 address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, “…scientific truth, which is itself a participation in divine Truth, can help philosophy and theology to understand ever more fully the human person and God’s Revelation about man, a Revelation that is completed and perfected in Jesus Christ.” In the Catholic perspective, science helps us discover truths about the world God has made. In the midst of these discoveries, we give glory to God and are better able to carry out the work God has entrusted us.

Faith, for its part, provides a necessary context for science, telling us the “why” behind creation: a loving God created the universe with intelligible order to reflect his own goodness. Faith also informs how we use scientific discoveries, reminding those who innovate, legislate, and invest of the dignity of the human person and of the natural world.

In recent years, Principal Rhett Mahoney of Sts. Peter and Paul School has felt a growing call to create a program that would clearly integrate science and ecology with our Catholic faith and would provide students with the same access to prayer and the sacraments that they have on campus. Mahoney, who has been principal of the Grangeville Catholic school for seven years and has worked in Idaho education for almost three decades, believes that Catholic schools should provide their students with an experience of science and nature that explicitly complements and supports Catholic teaching on creation and stewardship.

In May 2024, after months of planning, COMPASS was born. Bringing together Idaho scientists and professionals from the fields of forestry, mining, and biology, this first session of COMPASS gave the 5^th and 6^th grade students of Sts. Peter and Paul School and St. Paul’s Catholic School in Nampa a tangible experience of science illumined by faith. Hosted at Camp John Paul II in Cascade, the students learned about Catholic scientists, attended Mass, prayed the Rosary together, and used their science skills in a series of hands-on workshops.

The next session of COMPASS will be held this September, and more than 80 students from four Idaho Catholic schools will attend. As the program becomes more established, Mahoney hopes to provide multiple sessions of COMPASS each year for Catholic schools throughout Idaho.

COMPASS also invites Catholic professionals in the sciences and outdoor recreation to lead workshops at an upcoming session for the future scientists of Idaho. Presenters have the opportunity to share their profession, their gifts and talents, and how they see the hand of God in their work.

If you work in or have retired from an occupation in science or outdoor recreation and would be interested in joining COMPASS’ network of presenters, please fill out the form at https://tinyurl.com/37f44zdf or contact Rhett Mahoney (rmahoney@myspps.org) or Clare Campaña (campanaclare@gmail.com).