I am having a little trouble with Genesis

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Jovian90 said:
Okay, why do Fundamentalist Protestants and Evangelicals oppose evolution if the Catholic Church is fine with it. Is the young earth idea a Protestant dogma? I am just curious I do not intend to offend anyone.
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Because they take a fundamental approach to the bible. If you check with Buffalo he also believes in a global flood and a youngish earth (I think his last estimate was a few score thousand). Maybe he believes in Jonah and the whale as well. I haven’t asked.

He seems to think that accepting scientific facts is some lind of atheist agenda which denies God.
 
I take the first sentence in the Bible to be an absolute truth, ‘In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth’. The rest of the bible is a lifetime journey trying to understand and to be inspired by.
 
Jovian90 said:
I want to be a good Catholic and obey everything God teaches, but one thing i am struggling with is the first chapters of Genesis. I hear some people say how we need to take these first chapters literally and that evolution is a lie, right now I am feeling confused, you see I am kinda of drawn to believe in evolution because of the evidence but I feel like it is incompatible with Christianity. As for the young earth idea I found the idea preposterous, I cant believe it even though I tried to because of how strong the evidence is for an ancient Earth, so my questions are should I reject evolution and accept a literal 6 day creation? Does believing in evolution make you a bad Catholic? Is it alright if I like dinosaurs?
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I don’t think salvation depends on knowing the exact age of the universe.
…even scientists don’t know this.

Neither do I think we can inspect or interrogate a person’s fidelity to Jesus Christ based on their opinions and interpretations of the language used in Genesis 1.

As for me, I like to think of evolution as creation in slow motion.

Also, when people ask me if I believe in a literal or a symbolic Genesis, I say both.

It’s the same for Jesus’ parables.

When He starts a story about a father who had two sons, Jesus can be simultaneously telling us about three real people who actually lived, and He can use that (absolutely truthful) historical event to reveal to us an even deeper Truth about reality.
 
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So are you saying the Flood along with Jonah and the whale are myths?
 
Nothing wrong with myths. Myths are a good thing. Especially when rooted in truth.
 
Catholics can believe in evolution as designed by God who breathed life into our soul.

I find the idea of atheistic random evolution scientifically and mathematically absurd anyway so this isn’t a stretch for me.
 
Is the flood a myth that is meant to teach us a good morale lesson like Christ’s parables?
 
Yes and no. I think it’s still rooted in an ancient flood and that there was a real Noah… but it wasn’t literally a global flood.
 
angel12 said:
No, it’s not. The Bible was never intended to be a science textbook. You should look at what the Church actually teaches, not at what “some people say.”
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It becomes an issue of polygenism and Eve coming from Adam.

Micro-evolution, aka adaptation, is not an issue.
 
Jovian90 said:
why are there people opposing the theory?
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Because macro-evolution does not happen and in the last 10 years we know the limits of natural selection and random mutation. There are many here who are still in denial as to the weakness of evo theory and the strength of intelligent design.
 
Riman643 said:
As Catholics we are not required to take the chapters of Genesis literally. I believe the Pope has even gone as far as to say evolution and the big bang are true or at least legitimate theories. Like other posters have noted the Bible is not a science/history text book. It is a book to help us understand God the father and Jesus.
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The very first line of Genesis:

In the beginning, (time)
God created the heavens (space)
and the earth (matter)

This was revealed to us and science has just confirmed this recently.
 
I am a cradle Catholic and I majored in biology in college. I believe that God created the heavens and the earth, but it is up to science to find out how. I look at the chapters of Genesis as a literary tale. Yes, God exists and yes He created the heavens and the earth, but not in 6 days of 24 hours each.
 
twf said:
The Catholic Church has officially been open to modern theories of biological evolution since the 1950s under Pius XII…
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Open to study, which it has been and the conclusion is micro happens, macro does not. Polygenism is ruled out.
 
Not the conclusion of any mainstream scientists nor mainstream Catholic theologians…

Macro evolution is, of course, just micro evolution over a long period of time.

And it depends on what you mean by polygenism… yes there was a real Adam and a real Eve, but it is not heretical to suppose that they belonged to a larger pre-existing hominid population.
 
twf said:
Macro evolution is, of course, just micro evolution over a long period of time.
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No it is not. That is what they tell you, but reason it out. Micro is very limited in how it can change the organism. Macro evo is adding novel features etc. There is a big difference.
 
The scientific world awaits the evidence of the ID theory. If correct, then science will form a consensus. Until then, this is some unproven hypothesis.

Personally, I will wait and read and try to keep an open mind. I won’t open my mind so much that my brains fall out, however.
 
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