Evolution and Vatican I - Question

[wildleafblower]

Chemically analysing a consecrated host will only show wheat, not flesh and blood. rossum

Hi Rossum,

I’ll address only this segment of your message though further discussion on other topics you touch upon should be discussed in the future. Your statement above is false. After Mass any remainder of “consecrated” host is consumed by the priest(s) though a priest may decide to give a small handful of consecrated hosts to a few, selected members of the Church who will then immediately deliver communion to individuals that weren’t able to attend Mass due to illness.

The “consecrated” host is immediately dissolved within one’s mouth. A host that hasn’t been consecrated could be analysed but never a “consecrated” host which is the body of Christ. Anyway, that is what I’ve been taught and believe as a Roman Catholic. (Tim, I hope that answers your question.)

 

[Orogeny]

Hi Rossum,

I’ll address only this segment of your message though further discussion on other topics you touch upon should be discussed in the future. Your statement above is false. After Mass any remainder of “consecrated” host is consumed by the priest(s) though a priest may decide to give some of the consecrated host to a few, selected members of the Church who will deliver communion to individuals that weren’t are unable to attend Mass due to illness.

How is what you posted make his statement false?

Peace

Tim

 

[JimG]

Quote:
Originally Posted by rossum
Chemically analysing a consecrated host will only show wheat, not flesh and blood. rossum

Hi Rossum,

I’ll address only this segment of your message though further discussion on other topics you touch upon should be discussed in the future. Your statement above is false.

I can’t help but comment on this. The statement by rossum is true. Chemical analysis of a consecrated host would show only wheat, because the accidents–appearances–of wheat remain. And the appearances of a thing are all that can be analyzed chemically or physically. The substance of the body and blood of Christ is present under the appearances of wheat, not within them.

 

[wildleafblower]

I stand by what I have stated in msg. 41 in response to Rossum’s statement, “Chemically analysing a consecrated host will only show wheat, not flesh and blood.”

A “consecrated” host isn’t avialable (obtainable or accessible) to a laboratory for a chemist to chemically analysis.

 

[JimG]

I stand by what I have stated in msg. 41 in response to Rossum’s statement, “Chemically analysing a consecrated host will only show wheat, not flesh and blood.”

A “consecrated” host isn’t avialable (obtainable or accessible) to a laboratory for a chemist to chemically analysis.

Well, I haven’t seen anyone actually stealing consecrecated communion hosts for the purpose of chemical analysis, but you never know.

The point is, though, that the doctrine of transubstantiation itself states that the accidents of bread and wine remain after the consecration. And the accidents are all that is perceptible to our senses, or to any scientific instrument or to chemical analysis.

 

[wildleafblower]

I stand by what I have stated in msg. 41 in response to Rossum’s statement, “Chemically analysing a consecrated host will only show wheat, not flesh and blood.”

A “consecrated” host isn’t avialable (obtainable or accessible) to a laboratory for a chemist to chemically analysis.

Adding a tad more…

**HOLY MASS AND EUCHARISTIC PROCESSION ON
THE SOLEMNITY OF THE SACRED BODY AND BLOOD OF CHRIST **
HOMILY OF HIS HOLINESS BENEDICT XVI
Saint John Lateran
Thursday, 15 June 2006

“The Host is our manna whereby the Lord nourishes us - it is truly the bread of heaven, through which he gives himself.”

vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/homilies/2006/documents/hf_ben-xvi_hom_20060615_corpus-christi_en.html
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/b...f_ben-xvi_hom_20060615_corpus-christi_en.html

Christ’s presence in Christians
Prepared by the Spiritual Theology Department
of the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross

“In a special way Christ stays with us in the daily offering of the holy Eucharist. That is why the Mass is the center and source of Christian life. In each and every Mass the complete Christ, head and body, is present. Per Ipsum et cum Ipso et in Ipso. For Christ is the way; he is the mediator; in him we find everything. Outside of him our life is empty. In Jesus Christ, and taught by him, “we dare to say: Our Father.” We dare to call the Lord of heaven and earth our Father. The presence of the living Christ in the host is the guarantee, the source and the culmination of his presence in the world.”
vatican.va/spirit/documents/spirit_20010515_escriva_en.html
http://www.vatican.va/spirit/documents/spirit_20010515_escriva_en.html

I’ll end on the above note since I don’t wish to derail the topic, hoping to stay focused on the science (EVOLUTION).

 

[Joab_Anias]

Doesn’t it all really come down to our understanding?

Our Human understanding is finite.

Over the progression of time the Holy Spirit reveals truth to us.

Evolution is not contrary to the work of God if one understands how God works.

Our time is not Gods time.

Mitachondria DNA proves without doubt that we have two original parents and are beyond probable animal mutation (creation).

The world isn’t flat and the Sun doesn’t revolve around the us.

All things evolve including our understanding of how that growth takes place.

In Gods time and according to His plan. Glory to God.

Heart, Mind and Soul in one Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

All things aren’t so cut and dry as we once believed.

 

[Catholic_Dude]

Thanks for what everyone has posted so far. I have been busy the last few days struggling to find time to sneak on the forums so I havnt had a chance to read it all. I will try to get up to speed here tomorrow.

 

[Koru]

This is how I meant to write this statement…

If one does not agree that ALL of God’s creations were originally] made [or *created

] completely whole and in it’s intended form from absolutely nothing, let him be anathema. This is how the doctrine is interpreted.

There is a clear difference in “creating” something and “making” something.

To create something is to, for lack of a better word, “invent” something. The doctrine stated at the beginning of this thread discusses the creation of God’s things, not the making of God’s things.

Does the Church teach that God “makes” spirits to house the bodies upon conception, or does the Church teach that each soul is “invented” upon conception?​

The world was NEVER taught as flat by official Catholic teaching. It was only 400’ish years ago that geocentrism was questions by Copernicus and his follower Galileo… then without explicit scientific proof, eventually sliding into the majority of the idiological mainstream with no scientific and factual breakthroughs to support it. The Church officially taught geocentrism and refuses to annul the history of it.

Evolutionary origin IS contrary to the work of God because it is not how God explains how all was created in the beginning. If one should say that any chapter in the book of Genesis is allegorical or metaphorical, then why stop there? Claim that the entirety of Genesis is just a story and none of it was true… not pick and choose what you want to be factual and leave the rest as allegorical.

Why stop there? What other books would you like to choose to be metaphorical or simply not acknowledge, Luther? Watch out though, Calvin is right on your heels to follow up what you started.

There is no such thing as God’s time unless speaking about his ownership over His creation OF time itself. God doesn’t experience past or future events, everything for Him is in the present.

From Answers In Genesis: Some prominent creationist promoters of these tracks have long since withdrawn their support. Some of the allegedly human tracks may be artifacts of erosion of dinosaur tracks obscuring the claw marks. There is a need for properly documented research on the tracks before we would use them to argue the coexistence of humans and dinosaurs…

I thought you didn’t acknowledge anything from Answers in Genesis in the first place Phil… oh well. You believe in a theory that has an immensely larger field of holes and supported by half-truth evidences yet these wet human footprints located underneath (not within) dinosaur tracks that some claim to need more evidence to support is completely beyond your range? Is that because you have a predetermined assumption on evidence that doesn’t fit within the range you already believe?

This argument is not new to the age… anything I can and ever would say has been said and will continue to be said by more informed and experienced individuals in the field that are believers in the special creation, such as Sungenis. I’m sure that Sungenis has more credibility than anybody speaking here on this thread and any of the other threads that we discuss this topic on. How does your claim that people shouldn’t listen to what he has to say if you, yourself have less credibility than he has?

You should really study this subject before debating someone like Alec because he DOES know the subject. And I don’t mean listening to people like Sungenis, I mean listening to scientists (which, by the way, Sungenis is not).

Why do you claim that I do not know the subject and that Alec knows it much more than I do; please elaborate… don’t just state claims as if they are true just because you’re the one who said them.

Why shouldn’t I be listening to people like Sungenis? He is one of the LEADING apologists for the Church, and you (whoever you are), a person who presents no credibility regarding the issues assumes that that I should listen to him (you) instead of the leading apologist? Don’t fool yourself too much, because none of us here most likely have credentials to back up our claims, and even if we did… do you think that would change anything? People would still disagree no matter what credentials one has.

 

[PhilVaz]

Koru << I thought you didn’t acknowledge anything from Answers in Genesis in the first place Phil… oh well. >>

The point is even the big young-earth creationist groups like Answers In Genesis say to creationists:

"DEFINITELY DO NOT USE THIS ARGUMENT."

If that’s the case, you can be sure the “human footprints from Paluxy” are totally bogus. Glen Kuban (a Christian btw) exposed these tracks as frauds and has studied them since the early 1980s. His work has been peer-reviewed by dinosaur experts.

ICR abandoned these tracks in the 1980s. Yet Sungenis and The Kolbe Center still promotes them. That tells us a lot about the status of Catholic creationism. Time for the Cardinal Schonborn quote again:

"Now there is another misunderstanding that is constantly found in the ongoing discussion, and I have to deal with it right here at the beginning. I refer to what is called ‘creationism.’ Nowadays the belief in a creator is automatically run together with ‘creationism.’ But in fact to believe in a creator is not the same as trying to understand the six days of creation literally, as six chronological days, and as trying to prove scientifically, with whatever means available, that the earth is 6000 years old. These attempts of certain Christians at taking the Bible absolutely literally, as if it made chronological and scientific statements – I have met defenders of this position who honestly strive to find scientific arguments for it – is called ‘fundamentalism.’ Or more exactly, within American Protestantism this view of the Christian faith originally called itself fundamentalism. Starting from the belief that the Bible is inspired by God, so that every word in it is immediately inspired by Him, the six days of creation are taken in a strict literal way. It is understandable that in the United States many people, using not only kinds of polemics but lawsuits as well, vehemently resist the teaching of creationism in the schools…

“The Catholic position on this is clear. St. Thomas says that ‘one should not try to defend the Christian faith with arguments that are so patently opposed to reason that the faith is made to look ridiculous.’ It is simply nonsense to say that the world is only 6000 years old. To try to prove this scientifically is what St. Thomas calls provoking the irrisio infidelium, the scorn of the unbelievers. It is not right to use such false arguments and to expose the faith to the scorn of unbelievers. This should suffice on the subject of ‘creationism’ and ‘fundamentalism’ for the entire remainder of this catechesis; what we want to say about it should be so clear that we do not have to return to the subject.” (Christoph Cardinal Schonborn, Catechetical Lecture for 11/13/2005)

Phil P

 

[Koru]

Peer reviewed = filtered through the majority rule

One does not need to be a fundamentalist to believe the history of Genesis as how God explained it happened (this includes the flood).

St. Thomas says that ‘one should not try to defend the Christian faith with arguments that are so patently opposed to reason that the faith is made to look ridiculous.’

So what are you stating about the teachings of the Church for the first 16 centuries? Was she arguing the authority of the bible falsely for so long? It is very reasonable to have the Word of God as on a higher authority than the word of man (science). What do we know, we are INSIDE the equation and trying to work ourselves outward… While God is both inside and outside and created the equation, but STILL explains nothing of any sort of death before the fall of man or of evolutionary origins.

 

[Nepenthe]

Koru:

Peer reviewed = filtered through the majority rule

Nope. It means being picked apart harshly by people who know their elbows from holes in the ground. And they generally have an interest in debunking any thesis that doesn’t fly.

 

[DJim]

There is a clear difference in “creating” something and “making” something.

To create something is to, for lack of a better word, “invent” something. The doctrine stated at the beginning of this thread discusses the creation of God’s things, not the making of God’s things.

And indeed that is the point regarding the material world–God is no longer creating the material world–He is rather “holding it in existence.”

Vatican One is focused upon the concept of creation from nothing–that God created all matter from nothing.

But this has really little or nothing to do with the creation of man.

In fact, for you to accept Genesis literally would require you to accept the principle that man “evolved” from some other material.

The God depicted in Genesis is reliant upon an artistic medium–the mixture of earth and water we call clay–to “build” Adam materially.

Adam therefore “evolves” not from nothing but from something in Genesis, materially speaking.

But it is only when God breathes “ruah” into Adam that Adam becomes a “living being.”

Likewise, God has to make several attempts to create a suitable partner for Adam–first God goes back to the original “stuff”–clay–to “shape” the animals (again–animals made directly from clay, NOT from “nothing”–the earth and water are made from nothing, presumably…well the matter making them up is made from nothing…)

But God apparently chose the “wrong” material from which to “build” a suitable partner. God then realizes it’s best to use some other material–Adam’s flesh–and then “builds” the woman accordingly.

So, do you see that even Genesisdescribes God using existing material to create man and woman??? Absolutely obvious, isn’t it???

Does the Church teach that God “makes” spirits to house the bodies upon conception, or does the Church teach that each soul is “invented” upon conception?

The soul is created immediately from nothing at the moment of conception–that’s what is inferred by the teaching Church. However, the material body of each human being is conceived via the union of two existing human cells. That is NOT creation from nothing–at least not directly. The “matter” involved in conception was created from nothing at the “beginning”. But there is no way to claim that Vatican One excludes evolution on the basis of the original creation of the material universe…

Evolutionary origin IS contrary to the work of God because it is not how God explains how all was created in the beginning. If one should say that any chapter in the book of Genesis is allegorical or metaphorical, then why stop there? Claim that the entirety of Genesis is just a story and none of it was true… not pick and choose what you want to be factual and leave the rest as allegorical.

God DOES use analogy and metphor to communicate–do you deny that this is exactly how Jesus communicated? Jesus always spoke truth, but sometimes spoke it in metaphor and in parable. So the real question is why anyone would think Genesis does NOT contain metaphor and is only some woodenly literalistic history lesson?

As Pius XII made clear, evolution of the human form is NOT contrary to the work of God, nor contrary to Genesis. Especially given that Genesis itself is exactly a story of how God “built” first Adam and then Eve from EXISTING matter.

DJim

 

[hecd2]

Now… you, hecd2. Explain then, WHICH radiometric dating method is used? Potassium Argon dating? Which one? How do YOU (since you apparently claim to be so knowledgible on the subject and claim that I lack comprehension) determine the age of dirt?

Well Koru posts a bit of a bizarre question - which radiometric dating method is used, he asks, but he does say what for. Sure, potassium-argon dating is used for dating lavas, tuffs, evaporites and clays. But it is by no means the only dating technique.

For dating older rocks such as ancient terrestrial gneiss or meteorites, uranium-lead dating is used as well as lead-lead isochrons. A minimum age for the solar system was first determined, incredibly accurately, by radiometric dating by Patterson et al way back in 1955 and has since been refined:

Patterson et al, ‘Age of the Earth’, Science 121, 69-75, (1955)
Ulrych, ‘Oceanic Basalt Leads - a new Interpretation and an Independent Age for the Earth’, Science 158, 252- 256, (1967)
Amelin et al, ‘Lead Isotopic Ages of Chondrules and Calcium-Aluminum-Rich Inclusions’, Science 297, 1678 -1683 (2002)
Tilton, ‘Isotopic Ages of Chondritic Meteorites’, Earth Planet Sci Lett 6, 15 (1969)
Allegre et al, ‘The Age of the Earth’, Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 59, 1445-1456 (1995)

Other radiogenic species can be used, for example, samarium-neodynium (Boyet and Carlson, ‘142Nd Evidence for Early (>4.53 Ga) Global Differentiation of the Silicate Earth’ , Science 309, 576-581, (2005)
… and rubidium-strontium and others.

You sure like to go around making claims that, since you are all intelligible and seemingly know immensely more truth than half of the world, that you can automatically claim that I lack knowledge and common sense on these key issues, of course

Well, I am reasonably intelligible. Whether I am intelligent is a different question. It’s becasue Koru knows nothing whatsoever about these subjects, other than what he has read in three and a half minutes on a creationist website.

Why don’t you discredit the information about the earth’s radioactive equilibrium since you seem to just LOVE bringing up the subject on threads even though I happened to only mention this ONCE on a completely different thread.

Actually, Koru, wrong as always, mentioned it on this thread (in post #29). He said:
“Would you please explain how non-living rocks absorb carbon-14 to even represent a plausible half-life for dating?”
That shows an utter misunderstanding of how most radiometric dating works. Because he read on a pathetic creationist website somewhere that carbon-14 dating requires the continuous generation of carbon-14 in the atmosphere by cosmic rays, and that that atmosphere needs to be taken up living things, he thinks, ill-informed man that he is, that all radiometric dating requires continuous generation and living things. He would be better to keep silent until he had learned something about the subject. All he is teaching us is that fundamentalist catholics make fools of themselves by pontificating on subjects that they know nothing about.

Provide credible evidence that the earth has reach radioactive equilibrium and that will be enough said. If you don’t support your claims, then you are simply a complainer.

Equilibrium is a question only for carbon dating and not for the other techniques, since the radioactive species are not continuously generated - to think otherwise, is to show how little one knows. With regard to carbon dating see:
Radiocarbon 46, (2004), which is the 2004 calibration issue of Radiocarbon containing many papers contributing to the calibration, based on dendochronology, corals and foraminifera…

(to be continued)
%between%

 

[hecd2]

(continuation)

Also, i’d love to see you prove that I know nothing about isochrons, concordance and discordance… especially since I never even mentioned ANYTHING about them!

Fine. Show us what you know. Tell us what an isochron is, and to make it specific, tell us how a lead-lead isochron is used to date chondrites. Tell us precisely how discordia on a concordia curve determines the date of a zircon near the KT iridium anomaly.

If I knew nothing about radiometric dating, then why, pray-tell, did I even bring it up and seem to understand that non-living material doesn’t absorb carbon-14?

Only you know why you think that three minutes of study on a creationist website is sufficient to refute the work of knowledgeable scientists who have devoted their lives this subject. The fact is that you know nothing about radiometric dating, and yet you pontificate about it. If that’s not hubris, I don’t know what is.

How can DIRT, a non-living thing, absorb carbon-14?

I assume by “dirt”, you mean igneous rocks, gneiss, tuffs, evaporites etc. They do not absorb C14, but as C14 is not used to date them, your point is utterly irrelevant.

What about rubidium-strontium dating? The half-life is SO immense that it’s IMPOSSIBLE to accurately determine the age of dirt or anything really without ASSUMING that the dirt or targetted object is already millions of years old!

What balderdash. Work based on the Rb-Sr, U-Pb, K-Ar and other decay schemes concludes that the earth is 4.55 billion years old - it does not *assume *it.

All of the other radiometric dating methods have extreme lengths of time for their half-life expendature except for c-14 dating. If c-14 dating can only measure very recent dates some-what accurately (not past recorded history) and these other dating methods have such a long length of half-life… how do you determine the ages between the HUGE gap? You can’t unless you make assumptions on how old the earth already IS, and that isn’t correct scientific study.

When in a hole, don’t keep digging:
uranium 238 - thorium 230 - half life 80,000 years
uranium 235 - protactinium 231 - half-life 35,000 years
Then there is fission track dating and optically stimulated luminescence - Koru has obviously never heard of these techniques.

You claim that I have pride on the issues?

Yes, because you think that a few superficial minutes on a creationist website is enough to refute scientists. You will always fail when confronted by the real thing, until you do the hard work to actually learn the subject.

Alec
evolutionpages.com

 

[hecd2]

Why shouldn’t I be listening to people like Sungenis?.

Well, when it comes to science, Sungenis is not only completely unqualified, he confidently makes countless public errors, a bit like you really (although with slightly more sophistication).

Alec
evolutionpages.com

 

[Koru]

The Evolution Handbook

Go through the links that explain all the problems with modern dating methods on this site and please explain to me why you believe that these problems aren’t relevant to the accuracy of these dating methods.

Yes, it is a creation website… it’s not like there’s a third option now is there, so don’t dismiss the information categorized all throughout this compliation simply because it’s on an anti-evolution website. You aren’t going to find anti-evolution information on an evolutionist website.

If you can systematically go through and address each of the facts against evolution, then I’ll start debating you with all the in-depth technicalities.

Feel free to start off at the 6th chapter, “Inaccurate Dating Methods.”

By the way, I’ve spent more than your accused “three minutes” finding the flaws with evolution. Also, why don’t you show me some absolute proofs for evolution, or at least give me evolution’s best evidence (don’t give me dating results because they aren’t trustworthy enough, I want physical proof) that supports macroevolution and I bet you that there have already been flaws found in it.

 

[Catholic_Dude]

I finally found time to read through all the replies. Im not sure if this thread is considered ‘dead’ yet, but most of the discussion has shifted off of what a “substance” is and how it applies to VI. Someone posted a newadvent article describing “substane” but it was pretty hard to follow.

 

[Koru]

I finally found time to read through all the replies. Im not sure if this thread is considered ‘dead’ yet, but most of the discussion has shifted off of what a “substance” is and how it applies to VI. Someone posted a newadvent article describing “substane” but it was pretty hard to follow.

As referred to in the original quote, the “whole substance” is ALL that makes up something… well, that’s what I take from it at least.

Substance itself can be complete or either incomplete.

“The tendency of modern philosophy has been to regard substance simply as an idea which the mind indeed is constrained to form, but which either does not exist objectively or, if it does so exist, cannot be known.” - New Advent Link

There are many interpretations for what “substance” is, so what we need to do is find out the terminology for the age that the wording was used. How was the word “substance” used during the time of Vatican I?

 

[zian]

The Evolution Handbook

Go through …

Yes, it is a creation website… it’s not like there’s a third option now is there, so don’t dismiss the information categorized all throughout this compliation simply because it’s on an anti-evolution website. You aren’t going to find anti-evolution information on an evolutionist website.

Actually, I have found this last (bolded by me) claim to be quite inaccurate. In fact, much more often than not, I can go to pretty much any subject at Talk Origins, find the links and or reference(s) to the YEC literature, and then find the scientific rebuttal, with links and or reference(s) to the scientific literature. I find it is extremely rare for a YEC site to be similarly forthcoming with links to material contrary to their contentions.

Kinda makes you wonder why, doesn’t it?

If you can systematically go through and address each of the facts against evolution, then I’ll start debating you with all the in-depth technicalities.

Feel free to start off at the 6th chapter, “Inaccurate Dating Methods.”

Would you settle for a few random counter-examples? For easy reference, I am going to use the Index to Creationist Claims

Let’s see, if I go to your source, Chapter 4, Age of the Earth, and I scroll down to No. 6, Solar Collapse. The other 5 previous claims contain no reference to literature of any kind for support, whether scientific or otherwise. No. 6, however contains this

Research studies indicate that our sun is gradually shrinking at a steady rate of seconds of arc per century. At its rate of shrinkage, as little as 50,000 years ago the sun would have been so large that our oceans would boil. But in far less a time than 50,000 years, life here would have ceased to exist. Recent studies have disclosed that neither the size of the sun, nor our distance from it, could be much greater or smaller—in order for life to be sustained on our planet.

“By analyzing data from Greenwich Observatory in the period 1836-1953, John A. Eddy [Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and High Altitude Observatory in Boulder] and Aram A. Boornazian [mathematician with S. Ross and Co. in Boston] have found evidence that the sun has been contracting about 0.1% per century during that time, corresponding to a shrinkage rate of about 5 feet per hour. And digging deep into historical records, Eddy has found 400-year-old eclipse observations that are consistent with such a shrinkage.”— *“Sun is Shrinking,” Physics Today, September 1979.

Extrapolating back, 100,000 years ago, the sun would have been about twice its present size, making life untenable.

The answer to this particular claim can be found here, and at this link within that article.

(cont’d)