Evolution & the catholic church

[Gottle_of_Geer]

hurst:

I don’t recall that insects were preserved on the Ark (at least, not deliberately). I don’t believe they were collected. You perhaps believe they must have been lest they die in the flood, but the preservation of such insects doesn’t seem important to me. Perhaps many died out, and were replaced with new types. Perhaps a subset survived in the mud under the water, or on the water and floating debris, etc.

But that contradicts the text - “all flesh died”:​

• Gen 7:1 Then the LORD said to Noah, "Go into the ark, you and all your household, for I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation.
• Gen 7:2 Take with you seven pairs of all clean animals, the male and his mate; and a pair of the animals that are not clean, the male and his mate;
• Gen 7:3 and seven pairs of the birds of the air also, male and female, to keep their kind alive upon the face of all the earth.
• Gen 7:4 For in seven days I will send rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights; and every living thing that I have made I will blot out from the face of the ground."
• Gen 7:11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the windows of the heavens were opened.
• Gen 7:12 And rain fell upon the earth forty days and forty nights.
• Gen 7:13 On the very same day Noah and his sons, Shem and Ham and Japheth, and Noah’s wife and the three wives of his sons with them entered the ark,
• Gen 7:14 they and every beast according to its kind, and all the cattle according to their kinds, and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth according to its kind, and every bird according to its kind, every bird of every sort.
• Gen 7:15 They went into the ark with Noah, two and two of all flesh in which there was the breath of life.
• Gen 7:16 And they that entered, male and female of all flesh, went in as God had commanded him; and the LORD shut him in.
• Gen 7:17 The flood continued forty days upon the earth; and the waters increased, and bore up the ark, and it rose high above the earth.
• Gen 7:18 The waters prevailed and increased greatly upon the earth; and the ark floated on the face of the waters.
• Gen 7:19 And the waters prevailed so mightily upon the earth that all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered;
• Gen 7:20 the waters prevailed above the mountains, covering them fifteen cubits deep.
• Gen 7:21 And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, birds, cattle, beasts, all swarming creatures that swarm upon the earth, and every man;
• Gen 7:22 everything on the dry land in whose nostrils was the breath of life died.
• Gen 7:23 He blotted out every living thing that was upon the face of the ground, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the air; they were blotted out from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those that were with him in the ark.
• Gen 7:24 And the waters prevailed upon the earth a hundred and fifty days.

That’s pretty emphatic.

And yet - it is those who use the historical-critical method who are continually accused of not believing in “the supernatural”, or in miracles - so why do those who disagree with them find it necessary to rationalise what the text says, even to the extent of ignoring it ? It makes no exceptions except for those in the ark - everything else died, bar nothing.

I would very much like to ask those who criticise them, whether they themselves allow God to be miraculous, by not rationalising the text, and by taking it as it stands, difficulties and all. ##

[continue…]

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

…continued & ended]

hurst:

As for the dinasaurs, they are not as big as you might think.

Besides, there is no reason to believe Noah collected animals from the entire globe.

OTOH, Henry Morris holds out for a worldwide Flood in “The Genesis Flood” - and those who agree with him in that, are the ones who have to take responsibility for questions about waste matter, methane, torpid spiders, animal husbandry and collection, and the migration of turtles and sloths. Not to mention the effects of a world-wide flood on the rotation of the globe, and the physics of shifting gigantic amounts of water.​

I don’t want to hurt people, or bully them, or sneer at what they hold dear, or make them stumble; but if people profess to hold a belief, then it’s not unChristian, I think, to point out what that belief implies and entails, and to expect them to take responsibility for that belief. If they insist that they believe in the Flood as described in Genesis 6-8, it’s not unfair to mention the details and difficulties. If people say they believe in the Genesis Flood, they have no right to fob off the rest of us with a less Floodish, less miraculous, less Biblical, less Genesiac Flood. Especially when people’s failure to believe in a world-wide flood becomes a reason to question the genuineness of their faith, or their honesty in claiming to believe the Bible. ##

Given that he had over a hundred years to make the ark, and that back then people lived in such a manner as to understand those things better than we do,

Are you thinking of anything in particular ?##​

I don’t see a problem.

Consider how they had to travel with donkeys back then. They were better and faster at packing delicate items for long journeys, including keeping live fowl in narrow cages and loaves of bread in leather pouches and wine or water in leather bottles that it would put us to shame.

hurst

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

The queen of dinosaur poop!​

The volume of the coprolite was a whopping 2.5 quarts, so Chin went onto reason that only a very large beast could have produced it. Dromaeosaurids, Elimisaurids, Leidyosuchus, and Troodon all weighed less than 250 pounds, so it couldn’t be them, Chin explained. So, by process of elimination, Chin and Erickson finally put the tag on the large Tyrannosaurus rex; “The best candidate for the producer is T. rex”, Chin explained; “I am 99% sure. It is either T. rex or an even larger, currently undiscovered creature.”. But, beyond the T. rex hype, the most amazing aspect of this coprolite was the chunks of bone found within. “T. rex must have been able to break bone a bit,” she said;" the bone was not completely digested, but (the T. rex) must have ingested bone when they bit."

---

Someone would have had to deal with those future coprolites - for several months. At least there were (presumably) only two of T. Rex - but that doesn’t account for similar deposits from (say) Diplodocus or Brontosaurus ##

 

[hurst]

Gottle of Geer:

But that contradicts the text - “all flesh died”:​

…

That’s just it - I don’t think it does. Are insects “flesh”? Do bugs have the “breath of life”? I never took it to mean that, nor have I heard of anyone else who thought that except in the past few years as I have come across atheists and other materialists bringing it up. I don’t recall any teaching of the Church saying that insects, bugs, microbes, or other such things were necessarily taken on the ark.

He took animals (beasts, cattle, creepers) and birds.
Gottle of Geer:

And yet - it is those who use the historical-critical method who are continually accused of not believing in “the supernatural”, or in miracles - so why do those who disagree with them find it necessary to rationalise what the text says, even to the extent of ignoring it ? It makes no exceptions except for those in the ark - everything else died, bar nothing.

I am not sure who you are talking about here, “those”.

Whatever is written in Scriptures is true and honest. What I am saying is that I never took it to have said insects and bugs were taken into the ark. Likewise, no fish were taken in there. Just whatever birds and animals God wanted. All other people, animals, and birds died. That is why they were taken into the ark - to preserve their seed (Gen 7:3).

We must conclude that it was not necessary to save the bugs or microbes. I personally find that easy to accept because I can easily imagine them either not being needed or else being preserved without the ark. Again, are they “flesh”?
Gottle of Geer:

I would very much like to ask those who criticise them, whether they themselves allow God to be miraculous, by not rationalising the text, and by taking it as it stands, difficulties and all. ##

Again, I am not sure if you categorize me along with “those”.

However, it is a misnomer to say you should “take the text as it stands” as though it interpreted itself. Ten people doing that will likely interpret the same passage differently. Certainly it was not written in English, and your translation differs from mine.

It certainly must first be understood in the literal sense, since it meant to convey something based on reality. It also has a spiritual sense, since God speaks to us through the realities He governs. But the Church is the ultimate authority on the proper interpretation…

from the CCC
The senses of Scripture

115 According to an ancient tradition, one can distinguish between two senses of Scripture: the literal and the spiritual, the latter being subdivided into the allegorical, moral and anagogical senses. The profound concordance of the four senses guarantees all its richness to the living reading of Scripture in the Church.

116 The literal sense is the meaning conveyed by the words of Scripture and discovered by exegesis, following the rules of sound interpretation: **“All other senses of Sacred Scripture are based on the literal.”**83

117 The spiritual sense. Thanks to the unity of God’s plan, not only the text of Scripture but also the realities and events about which it speaks can be signs.

1. The allegorical sense. We can acquire a more profound understanding of events by recognizing their significance in Christ; thus the crossing of the Red Sea is a sign or type of Christ’s victory and also of Christian Baptism.84
2. The moral sense. The events reported in Scripture ought to lead us to act justly. As St. Paul says, they were written “for our instruction”.85
3. The anagogical sense (Greek: anagoge, “leading”). We can view realities and events in terms of their eternal significance, leading us toward our true homeland: thus the Church on earth is a sign of the heavenly Jerusalem.86

118 A medieval couplet summarizes the significance of the four senses:

The Letter speaks of deeds; Allegory to faith;
The Moral how to act; Anagogy our destiny.87

119 "It is the task of exegetes to work, according to these rules, towards a better understanding and explanation of the meaning of Sacred Scripture in order that their research may help the Church to form a firmer judgement. For, of course, all that has been said about the manner of interpreting Scripture is ultimately subject to the judgement of the Church which exercises the divinely conferred commission and ministry of watching over and interpreting the Word of God."88
vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p1s1c2a3.htm

I have also read that we must try to reverently reconcile any apparent discrepancies, and if we can’t than we should rather believe we don’t understand it than to disbelieve it.

hurst

 

[hurst]

Gottle of Geer:

…

OTOH, Henry Morris holds out for a worldwide Flood in “The Genesis Flood” - and those who agree with him in that, are the ones who have to take responsibility for questions about waste matter, methane, torpid spiders, animal husbandry and collection, and the migration of turtles and sloths. Not to mention the effects of a world-wide flood on the rotation of the globe, and the physics of shifting gigantic amounts of water.​

No problem, God can handle it. In fact, I’m sure there are a thousand or more other points necessary for the precise preservation of life during and after this cataclysm, that are not mentioned.

There is an explanation for everything, but there does not have to be a purely natural explanation for everything. That is a philosophical belief that is opposing itself to supernatural belief.

For example, materialists have already challenged the notion of the mircle of the sun and moon stopping by saying it would physically cause irreversible aftereffects (e.g. Scopes Trial). To assume we had to answer them on that level is to accept their presumption that God does not exist, or if He does He is not allowed to work a miracle. They have simply decided to not believe in God or His power, and then confidently assert that He must not exist because an event could not have naturally happened.

Well is it said by Our Lord of these:

Luke 10:21 In that same hour, he rejoiced in the Holy Ghost, and said: I confess to thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hidden these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them to little ones. Yea, Father, for so it hath seemed good in thy sight.

Jeremias 4:22 For my foolish people have not known me: they are foolish and senseless children: they are wise to do evil, but to do good they have no knowledge.

Psalm 77:16 He brought forth water out of the rock: and made streams run down as rivers. … 19 And they spoke ill of God: … Can he also give bread, or provide a table for his people? 21 Therefore the Lord heard, and was angry: and a fire was kindled against Jacob, and wrath came up against Israel. 22 Because they believed not in God: and trusted not in his salvation. … 32 In all these things they sinned still: and they believed not for his wondrous works. 33 And their days were consumed in vanity, and their years in haste.
Gottle of Geer:

… if people profess to hold a belief, then it’s not unChristian, I think, to point out what that belief implies and entails, and to expect them to take responsibility for that belief. If they insist that they believe in the Flood as described in Genesis 6-8, it’s not unfair to mention the details and difficulties.

True, it is not unfair to mention your difficulties. But it is unfair to expect them to be answered according to your unbelief, as I explained above.
Gottle of Geer:

If people say they believe in the Genesis Flood, they have no right to fob off the rest of us with a less Floodish, less miraculous, less Biblical, less Genesiac Flood. Especially when people’s failure to believe in a world-wide flood becomes a reason to question the genuineness of their faith, or their honesty in claiming to believe the Bible. ##

I did not understand this part of your statement. Are you saying people who believe in the flood have no right to tell nonbelievers it was a small one, just so they accept it? Or are you saying people who believe in the flood have no right to force people it had to be a big one?
Gottle of Geer:

Given that he had over a hundred years to make the ark, and that back then people lived in such a manner as to understand those things better than we do,

Are you thinking of anything in particular ?##​

I was thinking of the care and management of the animals and birds, among other things. People understood more about nature because they lived in it more intensely than we do, and they helped each other and passed it on to their children. Nowadays, we pass on knowledge through the public schools, and rely on technology to do things for us. Most people are clueless about nature, or even about charity for that matter. (Just look at New Orleans after Katrina).

In any case, just because we might think it hard for us doesn’t necessarily mean it was hard for Noah, especially given that He was instructed by God.

hurst

 

[hurst]

Gottle of Geer:

…
Someone would have had to deal with those future coprolites - for several months. At least there were (presumably) only two of T. Rex - but that doesn’t account for similar deposits from (say) Diplodocus or Brontosaurus ##

If Noah took these, then it would make more sense that He took very young ones. But it is also possible that he did not take them. Just because we know they existed does not mean they had to be on the ark. Then again, that doesn’t mean he didn’t take any.

hurst

 

[steveandersen]

you know, I’ve heard skeptics and literalist believers go back and forth over the Ark story ad nauseum and they both seem to miss the point that it is not a tale of a boat trip in a rain storm

 

[Orogeny]

steveandersen:

you know, I’ve heard skeptics and literalist believers go back and forth over the Ark story ad nauseum and they both seem to miss the point that it is not a tale of a boat trip in a rain storm

Sure it is. And the physics of light were different before the storm than they are now!

Peace

Tim

 

[buffalo]

Orogeny:

Sure it is. And the physics of light were different before the storm than they are now!

Peace

Tim

Oregeny, were you there?

 

[Orogeny]

buffalo:

Oregeny, were you there?

Maybe.

Peace

Tim

 

[buffalo]

Orogeny:

Maybe.

Peace

Tim

Will you share your memoirs with us?

 

[Orogeny]

buffalo:

Will you share your memoirs with us?

Sure. As I recall, it didn’t happen quite like it was recorded. In fact, it didn’t actually happen, it was just a story that was made up to teach us a moral lesson. Believe it or not, there really were rainbows prior to that time.

Peace

Tim

 

[Roche42]

foxnews.com/story/0,2933,176050,00.html

Interesting article with confusing implications about Church positions.

 

[Ahimsa]

foxnews.com/story/0,2933,176050,00.html

Interesting article with confusing implications about Church positions.

The Vatican astronomer quoted said that ID isn’t science.

That’s consistent with what the Pope has said: "He quoted [St. Basil the Great](javascript:siteSearch(‘St. Basil the Great’), a fourth century saint, as saying some people, “fooled by the atheism that they carry inside of them, imagine a universe free of direction and order, as if at the mercy of chance.”

One could believe that the cosmos has direction and order, without subscribing to ID. For instance, one could believe in theistic evolution, where God guides the evolutionary process.

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

steveandersen:

you know, I’ve heard skeptics and literalist believers go back and forth over the Ark story ad nauseum and they both seem to miss the point that it is not a tale of a boat trip in a rain storm

It’s not.​

But, since there are readers of the Bible who see it as being that (and, depending on who they are, as other things too), one has to be aware of, and take account of, what they think - even what they think the Bible text is about, is not what it is about.

So one can’t just point out to a Fundamentalist - Protestant, Catholic, or atheist (such as the folk at the Skeptic’s Annotated Bible site) - that Genesis is not Noah’s log: one has to begin with how they think. They aren’t interested in the Gilgamesh Epic, Tablet 11; nor in the literary use of a Flood motif; nor in the theology of ancient Israel. So talking about these things would be a waste of time - until one had the very least explained why the Fundamentalist POV is insufficient.

One can’t hurry people - if they have a Fundamentalist view of the narrative, that is how one must take them - just as we all have to take each other as we find each other, and not as we might like each other to be. People have to be approached within their world-view: whether Catholic Fundamentalist, Conservative Presbyterian, Pre-tribulation Baptist, or whatever. Ways of thinking which a Catholic lover of the HCM finds helpful and illuminating, won’t mean a thing to a Catholic Fundamentalist: so an approach which treats the HCM as though bioth agreed it was useful & valid, would be doomed to failure. So the proper meaning of the text is not the only thing to consider - we also have to look at it from viewpoints with which we may not agree: otherwise, communication with those who hold views we don’t, will be impossible. And if there is a lack of communication, there may be a weakening of communion - which would be appalling. That is why the “Deepest Thing” is not the Bible, not its interpretation, but our communion in Christ. That should be the bond of union which gives strength & stability to all others. ISTM

That doesn’t relieve any of us for responsibility for our views - that’s one reason why those who hold a Fundamentalist view have to take responsibility for it - just as those who disagree with them must, too. That’s why Fundamentalists have to take responsibility for dinosaur muck or the age of Methuselah or the star of Bethlehem - it’s their view of the Bible, so they can’t ignore inconvenient details; just as those who think that Biblical criticism including the HCM is a Godsend to the Church, can’t ignore details which arise from the POV they adopt. Only if we take responsibility for our views, can we escape infantilism in theology, ISTM; otherwise, exegesis becomes partisan & self-serving, instead of building us all up. ##

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

Orogeny:

Sure. As I recall, it didn’t happen quite like it was recorded. In fact, it didn’t actually happen, it was just a story that was made up to teach us a moral lesson. Believe it or not, there really were rainbows prior to that time.

Peace

Tim

Since there were, presumably the point of that detail is that the rainbow is a sign of the covenant - not that it was never observed previously, but that it was given a meaning which made it significant for Noah (in the story) and for Israelites (when hearing the story about Noah).​

The rainbow was also the war-bow of the god Ninurta in Assyria - it would make sense for the rainbow to be given a meaning for Israel. So, it is related to the covenantal faithfulness of God, as a sign of it. Much as the Church has taken “pagan” deays, and made them feasts of Christ. The perpetuity of the seasonal cycle is very important - one of the purposes of the New Year feast in Babylon was to ensure it. But here, man does not have to - this stability, is a Divine gift, based on the unfailing faithfulness of the God Who so creatively chose Israel.

But there isn’t much likelihood of our seeing these details, if one looks only at the text as it stands in a translation, and not at its cultural context as well. We won’t be able to see what’s in the Hebrew text, unless we see it AFA possible as an Israelite or Judahite might have. One can’t appreciate the meaning of stories which refer to gods and their weapons, if one looks only at the concerns of 19th or 20th-century Christians. Nobody would try to understood Homer, by looking at 19th or 20th century Europe or America, and never at early Greece. Only in the reading of the Bible is such a perverse method deemed not only desirable, but praiseworthy; and contextual reading such as is characteristim of the HCM, as an ungodly & hellish abomination vomited forth by satan. Yet Fundamentalism does that all the time. The result: endless nonsense about how the latest tyrant is the Antichrist. Maybe there is a case for banning widespread Bible-reading… ##

 

[buffalo]

Orogeny:

Sure. As I recall, it didn’t happen quite like it was recorded. In fact, it didn’t actually happen, it was just a story that was made up to teach us a moral lesson. Believe it or not, there really were rainbows prior to that time.

Peace

Tim

I wish you took some pictures.

 

[The_Barbarian]

It’s pretty sure thing. If light did not refract in precipitation, then there would have been no atoms, no proteins, no water, no humans.

The structure of matter is connected to the speed of light, which is what causes refraction, and thus rainbows.

 

[buffalo]

The Barbarian:

It’s pretty sure thing. If light did not refract in precipitation, then there would have been no atoms, no proteins, no water, no humans.

The structure of matter is connected to the speed of light, which is what causes refraction, and thus rainbows.

Unless the speed of light were different.

 

[The_Barbarian]

Barbarian observes:
It’s pretty sure thing. If light did not refract in precipitation, then there would have been no atoms, no proteins, no water, no humans.

The structure of matter is connected to the speed of light in a vacuum, which is what causes refraction, and thus rainbows.

Unless the speed of light were different

If the speed of light were different, the strong force would be different, and there would be no atoms of the sort that make up humans and everything else we know.

So many important constants are tied to the speed of light that a significant change would have all sorts of disasterous affects.