Creationism - Catholics SYMBOLIC & Protestants LITERAL

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agzag

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What do you think about this quote:

“The Bible and the Koran say God directly created the world and everything in it. In Christianity, fundamentalists believe this literally but the largest denomination, Catholicism, and most mainline Protestant churches read it more symbolically.”

(See msnbc.msn.com/id/17799902/ for entire article.)

I for one don’t believe that this reporter got his facts straight. Don’t Catholics believe that the God created the world literally?
 
It probably means that we don’t believe that the record of the seven days is a literal, factual one, and not a metaphor. What we do believe is that Adam and Eve were real people. Science actually also shows it’s likely we’re all descended from one couple. I regret but I can’t give you any links for any of this.

The fact that some species evolved from another species doesn’t mean that God didn’t create it. Some fundamentalists will claim that all species were created by God as they are.
 
Sounds wrong to me. 😛

I think what he is confused about is the way we believe God directly created the world. The Catholic Church does allow for belief in the literal 7-days creation or the belief that God used evolution as a means of creation.

I’m not sure how God would have “symbolically” created us. 🙂
agzag said:
What do you think about this quote:

“The Bible and the Koran say God directly created the world and everything in it. In Christianity, fundamentalists believe this literally but the largest denomination, Catholicism, and most mainline Protestant churches read it more symbolically.”

(See msnbc.msn.com/id/17799902/ for entire article.)

I for one don’t believe that this reporter got his facts straight. Don’t Catholics believe that the God created the world literally?
Click to expand...
 
If the Bible were meant to be a Science textbook, then God seriously failed us, i.e. maybe giving us a hint or 2 about the mechanism of diseases, Grand Unification Theory, ect.

God wrote the laws of Physics with a specific INTENT AND OUTCOME in mind. there is a REASON why the speed of light is the maximum speed, ect.

Consider my favorite computer game, FarCry. The authors of the game wrote a physics engine, a particle system, and even an artificial intelligence system where the “enemies” quite literally “evolve”. Makes it REALLY hard to beat. As the game unfolds, things change, enemies adapt, and the game can reconfigure itself.

All these components of the game blend together, and render a quite amazingly real world. God did EXACTLY the same thing, that is, the Universe is governed by a set of physical Laws that allow, and almost seem to direct, the advancement of Life itself.
 
But, did the programmers create FarCry “literally” or “symbolically?”
BioCatholic said:
If the Bible were meant to be a Science textbook, then God seriously failed us, i.e. maybe giving us a hint or 2 about the mechanism of diseases, Grand Unification Theory, ect.

God wrote the laws of Physics with a specific INTENT AND OUTCOME in mind. there is a REASON why the speed of light is the maximum speed, ect.

Consider my favorite computer game, FarCry. The authors of the game wrote a physics engine, a particle system, and even an artificial intelligence system where the “enemies” quite literally “evolve”. Makes it REALLY hard to beat. As the game unfolds, things change, enemies adapt, and the game can reconfigure itself.

All these components of the game blend together, and render a quite amazingly real world. God did EXACTLY the same thing, that is, the Universe is governed by a set of physical Laws that allow, and almost seem to direct, the advancement of Life itself.
Click to expand...
 
chevalier said:
What we do believe is that Adam and Eve were real people. Science actually also shows it’s likely we’re all descended from one couple. I regret but I can’t give you any links for any of this.
Click to expand...
Science does not say that. Most scientists would say it’s almost impossible that we were descended from one and only one couple. Now, some think there was a population bottleneck of a few thousand individuals, but that’s still a lot more than two.
 
agzag said:
What do you think about this quote:

“The Bible and the Koran say God directly created the world and everything in it. In Christianity, fundamentalists believe this literally but the largest denomination, Catholicism, and most mainline Protestant churches read it more symbolically.”

(See msnbc.msn.com/id/17799902/ for entire article.)

I for one don’t believe that this reporter got his facts straight. Don’t Catholics believe that the God created the world literally?
Click to expand...
The Church allows Catholics to believe the Creation accounts in a literalist manner (exactly as written in Genesis 1) or adhere to a more symbolic interpretation of the “days”. Because of that, it is okay to give leeway to either interpretation.

There are things however, that are non-negotiable:
  1. God did it; and
  2. We descended from only one pair of parents.
 
Pope Benedict XVI, wrote a book when he was Cardinal Ratzinger: ‘In the Beginning…’ “A Catholic Understanding of the Story of Creation and the Fall”, which was a series of lectures he gave during one of the Lenton seasons. I haven’t finished it yet, but so far, it is excellent. He argues that the Bible isn’t a science text book and that the Genesis authors were interpreting what was around them, to convey the greater unseen realities. This book is an excellent resource for good solid scholarship, and far outweighs phony “creation scientists”, who constantly misinterpret Scripture and often have absolutely no formal education from any accredited University/College.
 
There are things however, that are non-negotiable:
  1. God did it; and
  2. We descended from only one pair of parents.
Click to expand...
Where is #2 stated as a non-negotiable?
 
Formosus said:
Humani Generis by Pius XII says that we must beleive God created us and that Adam and Eve were the parents of all humanity.
Click to expand...
I’d like to point out that Humani Generis was a papal encyclical, not an ex cathedra teaching. Not that it’s wrong, of course…
 
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