Is Darwin's Theory of Evolution True? Part 4.1

[buffalo]

Catholic Dogmas:

1. God, our Creator and Lord, can be known with certainty, by the natural light of reason from created things.
2. God’s existence is not merely an object of natural rational knowledge, but also an object of supernatural faith.
3. God’s Nature is incomprehensible to men.
4. The blessed in Heaven posses an immediate intuitive knowledge of the Divine Essence.
5. The Immediate Vision of God transcends the natural power of cognition of the human soul, and is therefore supernatural.
6. The soul, for the Immediate Vision of God, requires the light of glory.
7. God’s Essence is also incomprehensible to the blessed in Heaven.
8. The Divine Attributes are really identical among themselves and with the Divine Essence.

 

[vz71]

What a very strange God you have. Shall we remove all the words from the Bible because they are “wholly inadequate”?

Hardly.
You appear to be selectively reading.
Inadequate does not mean not. It means inadequate.

God is loving, but more. Loving does not adequately descrive.
Creator is another inadequate description.
Intelligent likewise another.

Every word we have is created in the context of a finite universe.
Our language fails in describing God.

Your efforts to pigeonhole God likewise fail.

Further, I am certain I am not the only one to find insult, malice, and offense in your efforts.

 

[buffalo]

IV. HOW CAN WE SPEAK ABOUT GOD?

39 In defending the ability of human reason to know God, the Church is expressing her confidence in the possibility of speaking about him to all men and with all men, and therefore of dialogue with other religions, with philosophy and science, as well as with unbelievers and atheists.

40 Since our knowledge of God is limited, our language about him is equally so. We can name God only by taking creatures as our starting point, and in accordance with our limited human ways of knowing and thinking.

41 All creatures bear a certain resemblance to God, most especially man, created in the image and likeness of God. The manifold perfections of creatures - their truth, their goodness, their beauty all reflect the infinite perfection of God. Consequently we can name God by taking his creatures" perfections as our starting point, “for from the greatness and beauty of created things comes a corresponding perception of their Creator”.15

42 God transcends all creatures. We must therefore continually purify our language of everything in it that is limited, image-bound or imperfect, if we are not to confuse our image of God–“the inexpressible, the incomprehensible, the invisible, the ungraspable”–with our human representations.16 Our human words always fall short of the mystery of God.

43 Admittedly, in speaking about God like this, our language is using human modes of expression; nevertheless it really does attain to God himself, though unable to express him in his infinite simplicity. Likewise, we must recall that “between Creator and creature no similitude can be expressed without implying an even greater dissimilitude”;17 and that "concerning God, we cannot grasp what he is, but only what he is not, and how other beings stand in relation to him."18

 

[Aloysium]

The standard evolutionary theory actually would see it as simply different, but that again speaks to the vagueness and lack of coherence in what pople call evolution.

The theory of evolution may be incorrect, but to describe it as vague and lacking coherence is ignorant.

You taught High School Science, right? Evidently not English.

That said, I could have been clearer, But, wordiness in this platform is a no-no, and my posts tend to already be too long. What the heck is a “pople” anyway.

The thing is that you ask any two people how they understand evolution and you’ll get three answers, I’m sure. Especially evo Catholics who think if they just throw in the idea of God they have provided a mechanism by which randomness becomes purposeful and natural selection selects for beauty - which actually doesn’t sound wrong, but is close to ID, which they seem to criticize.

 

[Richca]

(continued)

In interpreting the seven days creation narrative of Gen. 1-2:3, there is no doubt that the very number ‘7’ is significant here and in many texts of the Bible. The number ‘7’ has some significant or symbolic meaning for the sacred writers of the Bible. ‘7’ has been interpreted to mean fullness, perfection, or completeness. The significance of the number 7 not only pertains to the seven day narrative but it is built into the very literary structure of Gen. 1-2:3.

I would just like to add here that the number ‘7’ is significant because for at least one obvious and primary reason is that scripture says that God completed his work of creation on ‘the seventh day’ and rested; and he blessed and hallowed it ‘because on it God rested from all the work which he had done in creation.’ Naturally then, the number ‘7’ or ‘the seventh day’ is associated with God’s work of creation and completion, rest, wholeness, perfection. Perfection because God is perfect and his work is perfect ‘The Rock, his work is perfect’ (Deuteronomy 32:4).

One of the commandments God gave to Moses on Mount Sinai is, of course, ‘Keep holy the Sabbath day.’
Moses explains the reason and meaning of this commandment:
"Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Six days you shall labor, and do all your work;
but the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God; in it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your manservant, or your maidservant, or your cattle, or the sojourner who is within your gates;
for six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and hallowed it." (Exodus 20: 8-11).

Essentially, God himself sets the example for our work and rest days.

The CCC says: Creation was fashioned with a view to the sabbath and therefore for the worship and adoration of God. Worship is inscribed in the order of creation (#347)…The sabbath is at the heart of Israel’s law. To keep the commandments is to correspond to the wisdom and the will of God as expressed in his work of creation (#348).
For the Israelites, their seven day week revolved around the Sabbath (the seventh day, what we call Saturday) and was ordered to it. It is the same for us christians except that our Sabbath day is the ‘eighth day’, the day of the Lord’s resurrection what we call Sunday, the first day of the week for the Israelites.

 

[Richca]

(continued)

The ‘eighth day’, the day of the Lord’s resurrection, commences the new creation in Christ as the CCC#349 says:
‘The eighth day. But for us a new day has dawned: the day of Christ’s Resurrection. the seventh day completes the first creation. the eighth day begins the new creation. Thus, the work of creation culminates in the greater work of redemption. the first creation finds its meaning and its summit in the new creation in Christ, the splendour of which surpasses that of the first creation.’

There are many deep mysteries in all this. Consider that on the seventh day in Gen. 2: 1-3 wherein God completed his work of creation and rested on that day, there is no mention of ‘and there was evening and there was morning’ as in the other previous days. It is as if ‘the seventh day’, the day of God’s rest from finishing his work of creation is unending. And later sacred writers of the Bible notice this and allude to it. Besides the literal, there is a spiritual sense (an anagogical sense) as the CCC says “In Christ’s Passover, Sunday fulfills the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath and announces man’s eternal rest in God”. Hebrews 3-4 speaks of our hoped for entering after this life on earth into our eternal home and our eternal rest in God.

Hebrews 3 quotes Psalm 95: 7-11 which speaks of the Israelites exodus in the wilderness for forty years and their hardened hearts and testing the Lord. The Psalm ends with ‘Therefore, I swore in my anger that they should not enter into my rest.’ The rest here has both a literal and allegorical or anagogical sense. The literal sense refers to the promised land God was to give and did give to the Israelites. The promised land in turn is a type of our hoped for eternal home and rest in heaven with God.

 

[Richca]

(continued)

Concerning the number 7 by itself, I believe other ancient cultures such as the Babylonians considered it sacred in some sense. It would be an interesting study as to how this came about. It is most likely derived from the nature of creation itself, how they observed and experienced it. For example, maybe 7 represented the entire cosmos or universe. From the vantage point of the earth looking vertically, there are the heavens, the earth, and under the earth; horizontally, there is north, south, east, west, ‘the four winds;’ you add the vertical three and the horizontal four you get seven, the entire universe. I believe it is said that the Babylonians came up with their seven day week from the sun, moon, and the five wandering stars or planets visible to the naked eye all of which they believed to be gods. So again we have 7 from creation itself, indeed, God’s seven day creative activity.

St Augustine writes about the number 7 and its significance and examines it from a variety of angles. He says it signifies perfection, wholeness, completeness and this is gathered from Holy Scripture itself primarily from the creation narrative of Genesis 1-2:1-3 and chiefly the seventh day verses of 2:1-3. God himself reveals to us the significance of the ‘seventh day’ and this is the foundation for whatever significance other occurances of 7 may have in the Bible. It may be that some occurrances of 7 may have no significance or relation to Genesis at all. The Holy Spirit may be said to be signified by 7 with his seven-fold gifts (Isa. 11:1-2). Possibly the ‘seven spirits of God’ in Rev. 4:5 refer to the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit “and before the throne burn seven torches of fire, which are the seven spirits of God.” Seven is prominent in the Book of Revelation, mentioned like over 50 times, most likely for some significant reason. Possibly that the Book of Revelation is the final book of the Bible, the ‘completion’ of God’s word and revelation to mankind.

 

[Richca]

(continued)

St Augustine also looks into the science of numbers. In the City of God he mentions that the first whole odd number is 3 and the first whole even number is 4. If you put 3 and 4 together you get 7 representing all numbers, wholeness or completeness. Now, I don’t know if the translation I have is wrong or Augustine is talking whole numbers in a way that is different from the meaning of whole numbers we have today. However, I believe I did come up with something similar to what he is saying unless I’m wrong about this. Consider that the first odd prime number is 3 and all odd numbers following 3 are either prime or composite. The first even composite number is 4 ( 0-1 are not considered prime and 2 is considered the only even prime number) and all even numbers following 4 are composite and divisible by 2. Add 3 and 4 you get 7 representing all prime (except 2) and composite numbers, essentially all numbers following 0,1,2.

Wisdom 11:21 says “Thou hast ordered all things in measure, and number, and weight.”
It is not my intention that we should get to bogged down considering ‘number’ in the Bible less we forget ‘measure and weight.’ At the same time, It is quite interesting as it is a part of God’s word and St Augustine says it can be useful for the exegete and interpreting the Bible. Concerning Genesis 1-2:1-3 and however long it took God in creating and forming the world until He finished his creative activity with the creation of man, the main theological truth is that God himself did it.

 

[Richca]

(continued)

As regards the evolution theory which to this day is presumably an ongoing creative process which God works through secondary causes presumably to the end of the world, I don’t see how that can be reconciled with the creation narrative of Genesis 1-2:1-3 especially with the ‘seventh day’ wherein God’s word says:

‘Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God finished his work which he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all his work which he had done in creation’ (2: 1-3).

If ‘the sabbath is at the heart of Israel’s law’ (CCC#348) and the Sabbath day is modeled from the ‘seventh day’ of God’s resting from his creative activity from Gen. 1-2:1-3 as Moses explains, how does one go about reconciling this with evolutionary theory? There appears to me to be a manifest contradiction?

 

[Aloysium]

The sixth day ended with the creation of mankind, which I believed happened a few hundred thousand years ago. Where do you see evolution happening after that?

Creation has stopped. There is no new matter coming into the universe and no new types of animals, just a rearranging, and in fact a degeneration of what’s there.

As to numbers, I wouldn’t give too much weight to numerology. Seven is a special number, used in different instances, like virtues and vices, which were numbered on the basis of the days of creation I would think. However, Hinduism speaks of 7 chakras, so it may be universal.

 

[edwest211]

Mark 2:27

New International Version
"Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.”

New Living Translation
"Then Jesus said to them, “The Sabbath was made to meet the needs of people, and not people to meet the requirements of the Sabbath.”

English Standard Version
“And he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.”

 

[Richca]

The sixth day ended with the creation of mankind, which I believed happened a few hundred thousand years ago. Where do you see evolution happening after that?

Creation has stopped. There is no new matter coming into the universe and no new types of animals, just a rearranging, and in fact a degeneration of what’s there.

That was my point. If God finished his creative activity a long time ago following the creation of man, in what sense can theistic evolutionary theory be reconciled with that if at all?

 

[Richca]

Mark 2:27

New International Version
"Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.”

New Living Translation
"Then Jesus said to them, “The Sabbath was made to meet the needs of people, and not people to meet the requirements of the Sabbath.”

English Standard Version
“And he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.”

Yes, the worship and praise of God is why God created us, it is our happiness. We also need rest from work naturally speaking to rejuvenate our bodies and minds. The Baltimore Catechism:
Question: Why did God create you?
Answer: God created me to know, love, and serve him in this life and be with him forever in heaven.

 

[benjamin1973]

No, that’s not the reason. They are limited by physics. You can breed a dog that grows large with a small-dog heart, insufficient bone density to support the weight, etc., and it will likely die young.

Really motivated breeders will need a lot more stock, so they can choose those animals which are large, but also which have stronger bone structures, stronger cardio, etc. This also implies additional science instead of just eyeballs-- the ability to test for certain genetic disorders, ultrasound and X-Ray to check the animals’ organs, etc.

 

[benjamin1973]

I’d like a source for the first point. I don’t know that much about Catholicism, so. . .

In particular, (1) and (3) seem mutually exclusive, because I read “incomprehensible” as “unable to be known or understood.”

 

[buffalo]

I’d like a source for the first point. I don’t know that much about Catholicism, so. . .

In particular, (1) and (3) seem mutually exclusive, because I read “incomprehensible” as “unable to be known or understood.”

If you want to know Catholicism, and every other form of Christianity up to the Protestant Reformation this is the source.

CHAPTER ONE
MAN’S CAPACITY FOR GOD

I. THE DESIRE FOR GOD

http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc/p1s1c1.htm

 

[Richca]

The poetry of Genesis, and its understanding of God’s creative imagination, is astonishing in a book so old. It’s not a history book, or a science book. It is a fundamental theology book, and should be honoured and respected as such.

It is a theology about creation and its creator. The two are intrinsically bound together. Genesis 1 is not a treatise on God’s nature and attributes, but it is about God in relation to his creation. If the world exists and God created it, than Genesis 1-2:1-3 is certainly historical. At the same time, reasonable explanations can be put forward that the intention of the sacred writer was not to give a precise historical account of the appearance of all the natural phenomena he recounts. This does not translate that the natural phenomena he lists has no history for we can readily observe all the natural phenomena he recounts. Obviously, the chronological sequence of not a few of the elements or phenomena in the account are a matter of common sense and reason. Where did the world come from and all its phenomena? The inspired sacred writer tells us God created it and that out of nothing.

 

[edwest211]

Science, by its own rules, cannot deal with that. Instead we get a biology textbook that indicates no one made us, just “natural” forces and elements (physics and chemistry). Thomas Aquinas tells us that things don’t just happen “somehow” but that God works infallibly in bringing Creation to existence. The conflict occurs when “scientific” explanations are assigned to God’s work and He had nothing to do with it, both at the same time.

There are no two right answers. The ancient writers were not just any primitive men. They worked under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. The Bible is not called the Word of God for nothing.

 

[Glark]

1. God is alive: “living God”.
2. God is not created.
3. God did not create the first life (Himself); He can only have created the second and subsequent living things.

I agree with all of this (I think), but what I meant was point 3

 

[Glark]

Jesus was a carpenter.

I wonder what Jesus said when he accidently hit his finger with a hammer.