Creation

[rben20]

What does the Church say about Adam and Eve other than all humans are traced back to them? Can we accept that they evolved or do we have to accept that they were already created in the right state? How also do we explain other human like species under the Genus of Homo like the Neanderthal?

 

[annb]

You can believe either that they evolved from other creatures that God created, or you can believe they were created literally as the Bible says, but either way they were the first humans, and we just don’t know exactly how they came about because Genesis is not in a literal style of writing and it’s not a history book. If there were other human-like creatures before Adam and Eve, then they were animals without souls. We also know that Adam and Eve committed the first sin, called Original Sin, which may or may not have had anything to do with eating apples!

 

[Catholic_Dude]

What does the Church say about Adam and Eve other than all humans are traced back to them? Can we accept that they evolved or do we have to accept that they were already created in the right state? How also do we explain other human like species under the Genus of Homo like the Neanderthal?

The Church lays down parameters, and as long as you remain in those parameters you can hold various degrees of personal opinion.

For example, the Church condemned the following erroneous thought process that had been creeping in from secular pressure:
Scientific progress demands that the concepts of Christian doctrine concerning God, creation, revelation, the Person of the Incarnate Word, and Redemption be re-adjusted. (Syllabus of Modernist Errors, prop. 64)
The error being condemned here is the idea that Christian Theology must “bow down” to science, especially the “latest scientific findings,” such that “science” is used to twist the Scriptures in this or that direction. In the case of creation, some would (falsely) push an issue like evolution to the point of “dogma” and thus mak the Creation accounts in the Bible so figurative as to mock the text. This is what is meant by “re-adjusted”.

Another good quote:
Let them loyally hold that God, the Creator and Ruler of all things, is also the Author of the Scriptures - and that therefore nothing can be proved either by physical science or archaeology which can really contradict the Scriptures. (Providentissimus Deus, 23)

 

[buffalo]

We believe as the Church has taught and understood

[What Does The Catholic Church ** (http://www.kolbecenter.org/images/kolbe/pdfs/what_church_teaches.pdf)Teach about Origins?

**

• God created everything “in its whole substance” from nothing (ex nihilo) in the beginning.
  (Lateran IV; Vatican Council I)
• Genesis does not contain purified myths. (Pontifical Biblical Commission 1909[1])
• Genesis contains real history—it gives an account of things that really happened. (Pius XII)
• Adam and Eve were real human beings—the first parents of all mankind. (Pius XII)
• Polygenism (many “first parents”) contradicts Scripture and Tradition and is condemned. (Pius XII; 1994 Catechism, 360, footnote 226: Tobit 8:6—the “one ancestor” referred to in this Catechism could only be Adam.)
• The “beginning” of the world included the creation of all things, the creation of Adam and Eve and the Fall (Jesus Christ Mark 10:6]; Pope Innocent III; Blessed Pope Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus).
• The body of Eve was specially created from a portion of Adam’s body (Leo XIII). She could not have originated via evolution.
• Various senses are employed in the Bible, but the literal obvious sense must be believed unless reason dictates or necessity requires (Leo XIII, Providentissimus Deus).
• Adam and Eve were created upon an earthly paradise and would not have known death if they had remained obedient (Pius XII).
• After their disobedience of God, Adam and Eve were banished from the Garden of Eden. But the Second Person of the Trinity would subsequently pay the ransom for fallen man (Nicene Creed).
• Original Sin is a flawed condition inherited from Adam and Eve (Council of Trent).
• The Universe suffers in travail ever since the sin of disobedience by Adam and Eve. (Romans 8, Vatican Council I).
• We must believe any interpretation of Scripture that the Fathers taught unanimously on a matter of faith or morals (Council of Trent and Vatican Council I).
• All the Fathers who wrote on the subject believed that the Creation days were no longer than 24-hour-days. (Consensus of the Fathers of the Church)
• The work of Creation was finished by the close of Day Six, and nothing completely new has since been created—except for each human rational soul at conception (Vatican Council I)
• St. Peter and Christ Himself in the New Testament confirmed the global Flood of Noah. It covered all the then high mountains and destroyed all land dwelling creatures except eight human beings and all kinds of non-human creatures aboard the Ark (Unam Sanctam, 1302)
• The historical existence of Noah’s Ark is regarded as most important in typology, as central to Redemption. (1566 Catechism of the Council of Trent)
• Evolution must not be taught as fact, but instead the pros and cons of evolution must be taught.
  (Pius XII, Humani Generis)
• Investigation into human “evolution” was allowed in 1950, but Pope Pius XII feared that an acceptance of evolutionism might adversely affect doctrinal beliefs.

.

 

[Catholic_Dude]

We believe as the Church has taught and understood

[What Does The Catholic Church ** (http://www.kolbecenter.org/images/kolbe/pdfs/what_church_teaches.pdf)Teach about Origins?**

• God created everything “in its whole substance” from nothing (ex nihilo) in the beginning.
  (Lateran IV; Vatican Council I)
• Genesis does not contain purified myths. (Pontifical Biblical Commission 1909[1])
• Genesis contains real history—it gives an account of things that really happened. (Pius XII)
• Adam and Eve were real human beings—the first parents of all mankind. (Pius XII)
• Polygenism (many “first parents”) contradicts Scripture and Tradition and is condemned. (Pius XII; 1994 Catechism, 360, footnote 226: Tobit 8:6—the “one ancestor” referred to in this Catechism could only be Adam.)
• The “beginning” of the world included the creation of all things, the creation of Adam and Eve and the Fall (Jesus Christ Mark 10:6]; Pope Innocent III; Blessed Pope Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus).
• The body of Eve was specially created from a portion of Adam’s body (Leo XIII). She could not have originated via evolution.
• Various senses are employed in the Bible, but the literal obvious sense must be believed unless reason dictates or necessity requires (Leo XIII, Providentissimus Deus).
• Adam and Eve were created upon an earthly paradise and would not have known death if they had remained obedient (Pius XII).
• After their disobedience of God, Adam and Eve were banished from the Garden of Eden. But the Second Person of the Trinity would subsequently pay the ransom for fallen man (Nicene Creed).
• Original Sin is a flawed condition inherited from Adam and Eve (Council of Trent).
• The Universe suffers in travail ever since the sin of disobedience by Adam and Eve. (Romans 8, Vatican Council I).
• We must believe any interpretation of Scripture that the Fathers taught unanimously on a matter of faith or morals (Council of Trent and Vatican Council I).
• All the Fathers who wrote on the subject believed that the Creation days were no longer than 24-hour-days. (Consensus of the Fathers of the Church)
• The work of Creation was finished by the close of Day Six, and nothing completely new has since been created—except for each human rational soul at conception (Vatican Council I)
• St. Peter and Christ Himself in the New Testament confirmed the global Flood of Noah. It covered all the then high mountains and destroyed all land dwelling creatures except eight human beings and all kinds of non-human creatures aboard the Ark (Unam Sanctam, 1302)
• The historical existence of Noah’s Ark is regarded as most important in typology, as central to Redemption. (1566 Catechism of the Council of Trent)
• Evolution must not be taught as fact, but instead the pros and cons of evolution must be taught.
  (Pius XII, Humani Generis)
• Investigation into human “evolution” was allowed in 1950, but Pope Pius XII feared that an acceptance of evolutionism might adversely affect doctrinal beliefs.

.