The Early History of the European Conferences on Science and Religion and of ESSSAT

The early history of the European Conferences on Science and Religion and ESSSAT, the European Society for the Study of Science And Theology, is documented and discussed. In Europe, there were, and still are, genuine differences in attitude towards methodology, ideas about the reach of knowledge, ways of understanding religion and theology, and priorities with respect to the agenda. Initiating European conferences on religion and science in the 1980s was quite an achievement. Once started, a controversy over the name and preamble of the Society emerged. Should it be ‘science and religion’ or ‘science and theology’? How the later terminology became dominant, is documented here, drawing on minutes and some letters. However, over the years, ESSSAT has provided a platform where different intellectual perspectives on relations between religion and science can be presented and discussed.