Any young earth creationists out there?

[ASC]

Yeah, right … according to “scientists” who also claim life arose naturally from inanimate matter. I’d be a fool to trust such deluded, unscientific clowns to inform me about the history of life on earth

Why shouldn’t you trust them? The very foundations of science are in proof. Scientific theories are not declared true until the scientists have evidence to support them. You accept (I hope) the scientific evidence that proves that a fetus is a human person. This “cafeteria” approach that you seem to be using puts forth very unconvincing arguments. You say, “I’ll accept this evidence because it backs my point, but this evidence goes against the beliefs that I personally hold, so I’ll deny that.” I am sorry, but that just does not prove your point in the least. Besides, if you don’t trust the “deluded, unscientific clowns” (aka scientists) to tell you about science, who will you trust? I am not an atheist. I believe in God. But when evidence that does not contradict Him is staring me in the face, I’ll belive it too, because why shouldn’t I?

 

[Hugh_Farey]

So as far as I can ascertain, the genealogical information provided in Scripture rules out the theistic-evolutionist tale about Adam being created about 100,000 years ago. It is for this reason, I imagine, that certain Catholic, pro-evolution “theologians” make the bizarre claim that the first eleven chapters of Genesis were written in figurative language. But let’s face it - evolution and the Bible are incompatible.

I really have no answer to this than to quote the wisest man on this thread…

“A Catholic ought to be able to use the CCC as a faithful and comprehensive guide to what a Catholic can believe, yet it states that Genesis is written in figurative language. Where is the part that informs an uninformed reader (a youth, for example, or a newcomer to the faith) that a literal interpretation is also permitted?”

Perhaps you could discuss your disagreement with him?

 

[Glark]

Firstly, what we actually observe in the present world is that every species of plant and animal generates its own kind, lions come from lions, humans from humans, ants from ants, oak trees from oak trees. So, to say that every conceivable observation of reality somehow works differently than what we actually observe is simply not true.

The problem with the “little changes add up to big changes” belief is that there is not a scrap of empirical evidence that supports it. Thousands of years of intense animal and plant breeding by humans demonstrates that there are limits to how much life-forms can change. Commercial chicken breeders, for example, would love to breed chickens the size of turkeys (for their meat) - but they can’t - genetics imposes boundaries that can’t be crossed.

With respect to Scripture, Genesis 1 describes organisms created “according to their kind”. This statement makes no sense at all if the original respective kinds evolved into a completely different kinds.

 

[Gorgias]

So as far as I can ascertain, the genealogical information provided in Scripture rules out the theistic-evolutionist tale about Adam being created about 100,000 years ago.

Glark:

But let’s face it - evolution and the Bible are incompatible

There is hard scientific evidence for evolution, you know.

We don’t have to get into a debate about ‘evolution’ to address @Glark’s point here, though. His claim is that one interpretation of the Bible (a literalistic one) informs us that the earth is about 6000 years old, based on the genealogies in the OT.

Without even addressing ‘evolution’, we can point out that the universe is around 13 billion years old, and the earth itself is around 4 or 5 billion years old.

Unless he wants to go off-script and claim a 4.4 billion year ‘pause’ in the Genesis creation epic (which the text doesn’t support), then we already know that his assertions founder in the face of hard data.

 

[Aloysium]

Scientific theories are not declared true until the scientists have evidence to support them.

Scientific theories are not declared truth by scientists.

We do have a concept that is referred to as a scientific fact, which is an observation or measurement that has been repeated and verified many times over. The speed of light among the various constants in physics is one example. It should be pointed out that facts are connected to theories, forming a whole. We can consider the movement of plants in the sky a theory; a fact would be their predicted path. Those facts helped us develop a more comprehensive theory that understands planets as revolving around the sun. We are able to translate one motion into another frame of reference. Scientific facts are tweaked as we are able to get better measurements and gain deeper insights into how things work.

I would say that evolution does not qualify as being a truth. It is not a fact; nor is it even a theory. Theories have to be falsifiable and we cannot determine whether for example we were created as human beings or developed from existing hominids. Reason based on faith tells us we were created as persons, solely from one original person. The various theories of evolution are ultimately stories which weave together scientific facts based on assumptions that are materialistic and fit the norms of modern societies, both secular and communist.

The natural sciences should be neutral on the matter, but as a social institution being more attractive to those who hold a materialistic view of reality, that particular vision will be expressed. And, we are all very passionate about what we consider the ground of everything, the truth.

 

[Hugh_Farey]

With respect to Scripture, Genesis 1 describes organisms created “according to their kind”. This statement makes no sense at all if the original respective kinds evolved into a completely different kinds.

That’s because it’s wrong.

 

[Nelka]

Without even addressing ‘evolution’, we can point out that the universe is around 13 billion years old, and the earth itself is around 4 or 5 billion years old.

Where did you pull those random numbers from?

 

[Gorgias]

Gorgias:

Without even addressing ‘evolution’, we can point out that the universe is around 13 billion years old, and the earth itself is around 4 or 5 billion years old.

Where did you pull those random numbers from?

Random scientists?

Those are the generally-accepted numbers for the age of the universe (~13.7 billion years) and Earth (~4.5 billion years).

 

[Nelka]

Random scientists?

I don’t move in their circles.

 

[Nelka]

Those are the generally-accepted numbers for the age of the universe (~13.7 billion years) and Earth (~4.5 billion years).

But God didn’t take that long to blow some dust around.

 

[Gorgias]

But God didn’t take that long to blow some dust around.

Not sure how to respond:

• No, if you believe in a literalistic interpretation of Genesis 1, it took six “days”.
• Who knows how God did it? We just look at the universe around us, and learn from the empirical data it provides.

 

[Nelka]

No, if you believe in a literalistic interpretation of Genesis 1, it took six “days”.

Absolutely.

God could have made the Earth in six seconds if he wanted so why constrain him to human time? I think the scientists believe it would take man 13 billion years to create the Earth.

 

[Hugh_Farey]

Absolutely.

God could have made the Earth in six seconds if he wanted so why constrain him to human time? I think the scientists believe it would take man 13 billion years to create the Earth.

God is not constrained by time. God rejoices in time. Every second of the last 13 billion years has been a creative joy to him. To God the unfolding of his plan is at least as important as its destiny, or he needn’t have bothered to have invented time at all.

 

[Nelka]

God is not constrained by time. God rejoices in time. Every second of the last 13 billion years has been a creative joy to him. To God the unfolding of his plan is at least as important as its destiny, or he needn’t have bothered to have invented time at all.

But why watch trees growing for 13 billion years and then create man so late in the day?

Imagine 13 billion years of trees and grass cuttings piled up or under the soil, the Earth would be bigger than Neptune.

 

[Hugh_Farey]

But why watch trees growing for 13 billion years and then create man so late in the day?

Imagine 13 billion years of trees and grass cuttings piled up or under the soil, the Earth would be bigger than Neptune.

Why watch trees growing? Isn’t it obvious? They are glorious, wonderful, intricate mechanisms it is a joy to observe. So are galaxies. (After all trees have only been around for a few million years, not 13 billion). Try not to think of creation as a kind of painting, which was only really interesting when it was finished, or a kind of building, which was only really useful when it had been built. Or a story which is hardly worth reading till the last page. Think of the universe as a wonderful ballet, say like Swan Lake. You don’t come out of Swan Lake staying, “why watch people dancing for two hours and then have Siegfried and Odette ascending into heaven so late in the day?”

And what do you mean, “so late in the day”? The universe has only been going for 13 billion years, and it may well have 85 billion years to go. That’s puts us in quite early as it happens.

 

[Nelka]

85 billion?

 

[Hugh_Farey]

Imagine 13 billion years of trees and grass cuttings piled up or under the soil, the Earth would be bigger than Neptune.

Oh, dearie me. Environment 101 for you, I think. All the matter required to produce life is not appearing from somewhere, growing, dying and then ending up piled under the soil. It’s all being continually recycled. You are made of the trees and grass-cuttings. The front garden of my house in the UK was a cemetery until 1870. Now it is a lawn with a huge beech tree in the middle. The grass and tree are made (partially) of the people buried there, and so are the worms and rabbits that eat the grass and the birds and beetles that eat the tree. And the carnivores that eat them.

“A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king, and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm.” (Hamlet)

 

[Hugh_Farey]

85 billion?

Yup. Maybe more.

 

[Richca]

Richca:

Again, from what I understand you saying, namely, identifying the whole reality of the bread and wine, both substance and accidents, with the body and blood of Christ is a form of what is called impanation or possibly you might be thinking in terms of consubstantiation too. The Church does not believe or teach either of these but rather transubstantiation.

I’m not sure one can translate what I am saying into an A/T understanding. Thanks for trying. From my perspective at this time, it is a different way to formulate the reality of, in this case, the Eucharist.

I am not trying to translate what your saying into an A-T understanding or even into the Church’s understanding and teaching of transubstantiation because neither will work or fit with what your saying.

If I understand you correctly and I believe I do, among other things, the main difference between the Church’s teaching concerning how the body and blood of Christ become substantially present under the appearances of bread and wine and your view is this: in the Church’s teaching, a real change or conversion takes place in the reality, being, substance, or nature of the bread and wine; in your view I believe, the full reality, being, substance and appearances or accidents, of the bread and wine do not change but it is what God says it is though the bread and wine remain in reality, in their full being, bread and wine.

For example, recall the miracle Jesus performed at the wedding in Cana when he changed the water into wine. Would you agree that Jesus changed not only the subtance but also the appearances or accidents of the water into wine? Did Jesus change the chemical/molecular structure of the water into that of wine? I would say yes to both questions.
If we apply your understanding of the eucharistic change to the miracle at Cana, we would get the following: the water remains in its full reality and being substantially water, it looks like water, taste like water, has the chemical/molecular structure of water. But, because Jesus says it’s wine, well that is what it is. Does this make any sense? Did the wedding guests drink water or wine after Jesus’ miracle?

Similarly, if God called an ant a horse but nothing changed in the reality, nature, being of the ant and still looks like an ant, is it really a horse? Is this how God works? Is this how he created the various natures of things? I don’t believe so. In Genesis 1, God calls the light day and the darkness night, the dry land earth and the waters that were gathered together seas. God calls things by what they are according to their various natures as we do. And Jesus does the same in the gospels, the flowers, lilies, fig trees, the heavens, donkey, rain, clouds, men and women, children, etc. Is an apple the same thing as bread? or water the same thing as wine?

 

[Richca]

(continued)

Accordingly, the Church dogmatically teaches through whom Christ and the Holy Spirit speak, that a real change and conversion takes place in the very being, reality, nature, substance of the bread and wine, at the substance level of the reality of the bread and wine. And what remains after this miraculous change at the substance (from latin substare or substand meaning to stand under) level, the foundational structure of the reality of things, are the species (latin for appearances) or accidents of the bread and wine that do not change. It is obvious that at Mass, the appearances of the bread and wine including their chemical/molecular structures do not change after the consecration. But, something does physically/materially or metaphysically change in the nature and being of the bread and wine and its not the appearances.

The whole substance of the bread changes into the substance of the body of Christ and the whole substance of the wine changes into the substance of the blood of Christ. The entire Christ is substantially present, his entire body, soul, and divinity under the appearances of the whole host (and wine), and entire under every part of the host invisibly. Christ’s body and blood as neither do ours either look like bread or wine nor have the chemical/molecular structure of bread and wine, these are appearances or accidents proper to bread and wine.

In terms of transubstantiation, there is a level of reality (the substance) in the nature of things beyond physics, chemistry, biology, or any of the natural sciences, beyond that which is observable, measurable, quantifiable. In the A/T philosophical tradition, this level is also called the substance, the foundational structure of individual substances such as horses, oak trees, the elements. It is only known by the intellect. Is there some reason why there shouldn’t be? Substance thus understood is beyond the reach of the natural sciences as is the substantial and invisible presence of Christ’s body and blood in the eucharist. A few obvious examples that you probably wouldn’t disagree with are: (1) according to the natural sciences, a human being is nothing more than a body, but we believe that a human being is a composite of soul or spirit and body. Indeed, a soul that is the principle or form of the body that animates it. (2) according to the natural sciences, Jesus Christ was nothing but a human being, but we believe Jesus is God, the second person of the Blessed Trinity in the form of a man.

Some recommended reading: Pope Paul VI encyclical ‘Mysterium Fidei’ which touches upon modern errors concerning Christ’s substantial Real Presence in the eucharist such as transfinalization and transignification. Also, Pope Paul VI ‘Credo of the People of God.’