Another evolution thread sorry

[PeteZaHut]

I am just looking for a quick answer. I don’t want this to “evolve” (no pun intended) into another huge argument. I have a science textbook for my college class that says “Today, the official position of the Catholic Church is that evolutionary processes do occur, but that the human soul is of divine creation and not subject to evolutionary processes.”

It was my understanding that the church has never said that evolutionary processes DO occur, just that Catholics are allowed to believe in it if they recognize God’s role in evolution.

Is the book flat out wrong?

 

[buffalo]

I am just looking for a quick answer. I don’t want this to “evolve” (no pun intended) into another huge argument. I have a science textbook for my college class that says “Today, the official position of the Catholic Church is that evolutionary processes do occur, but that the human soul is of divine creation and not subject to evolutionary processes.”

It was my understanding that the church has never said that evolutionary processes DO occur, just that Catholics are allowed to believe in it if they recognize God’s role in evolution.

Is the book flat out wrong?

Is it impramatur? I have not seen a document that says it is the official position of the Catholic Church. Does this textbook reference such a document in the footnotes?

 

[PeteZaHut]

Is it impramatur? I have not seen a document that says it is the official position of the Catholic Church. Does this textbook reference such a document in the footnotes?

No. There was a whole section of the book that was somewhat critical of people who didn’t believe in evolution. I didn’t really see how that fit into a science textbook. They aren’t supposed to be opinionated. I would love to have a church document that disproves what the book says.

 

[Spirithound]

I am just looking for a quick answer. I don’t want this to “evolve” (no pun intended) into another huge argument. I have a science textbook for my college class that says “Today, the official position of the Catholic Church is that evolutionary processes do occur, but that the human soul is of divine creation and not subject to evolutionary processes.”

It was my understanding that the church has never said that evolutionary processes DO occur, just that Catholics are allowed to believe in it if they recognize God’s role in evolution.

Is the book flat out wrong?

The Church does not concern herself with matters of biology. I think “microevolution” has actually been observed by scientists though. “Macroevolution”, since that would take many many many years, has not been directly observed.

What the book says about the soul, however, is correct Church teaching.

 

[Verbum]

Hi Pete,

The Church does not get involved in scientific matters.

 

[buffalo]

Hi Pete,

The Church does not get involved in scientific matters.

Not quite.

The Church is involved when they involve truth.

 

[Cairone]

I have no documentation to back me up on this, but I hope this helps. The Church fully acknowledges that as long as one believes that all of mankind is descended from two parents, Adam and Eve or however you wish to name them, and that the soul is specially created at conception, you can (barring any other contradictions) believe in anything consistent that evolutionary biologists have to say about the process.

The Church is in full agreement that science has shown repeatedly that evolutionary forces are at work. The field of genetics, experiments in petri dishes, and the like have pretty much shown that beyond a shadow of a doubt. Where she remains skeptical is at those places that many doubters of evolution will speak out about: the development of multi-cell organisms from single-cell organisms; speciation; “irreducibly complex” components and the like. So essentially, the Church is in full swing with “microevolution”, but has reservations about “macroevolution”. However, she will not commit herself to saying that these process, micro or macro, are indeed exactly what occurs, because except for the rare times when science attempts to change dogma, that is beyond the Church’s scope.

Cairone