Professor of Chemistry Michelle Francl has written an opinion piece, titled "Exactly what does Trump imagine is within Pope Leo’s proper purview?" for The Philadelphia Inquirer, discussing the recent feud between the current administration and Pope Leo XIV, and how her faith and morals inform her thinking about everything, from politics to her research.
From the article:
"I hear this administration saying that our morals are supposed to be detached from our everyday lives. That our beliefs — or our unbeliefs — are an entirely private matter. If we aren't making our choices based on our own well-formed consciences, whatever tradition has formed them, then are they our choices at all?"
Read the full article.
Francl is the Frank B. Mallory Professor of Chemistry. She joined Bryn Mawr's faculty in 1986. She was appointed an adjunct scholar of the Vatican Observatory in 2016. She is a quantum chemist who has worked in areas ranging from the development of methods for computational chemistry to the structures of topologically intriguing molecules.
Her essays on science, culture and policy appear regularly in Nature Chemistry and other venues. She was elected a Fellow of the American Chemical Society in 2009 and was the 2019 recipient of the ACS Philadelphia Section Award.
Her latest book is Steeped: The Chemistry of Tea.
Learn more about Chemistry at Bryn Mawr
