The Church makes pronouncements about science all the time. In the encyclical, Humani Generis, it was stated that there was an Adam and an Eve, not a tribe of hominids.
In stating that there was a historical Adam and Eve,
Humani Generis was making a
theological declaration, not a scientific one. It was telling Catholics what they must
believe on the basis of the biblical text, not what they must affirm as scientific fact.
Cardinal Ratzinger writing in "Human Persons Created in the Image of God, had this to say: “In the Catholic perspective, neo-Darwinians who adduce random genetic variation and natural selection as evidence that the process of evolution is absolutely unguided are straying beyond what can be demonstrated by science. Divine causality can be active in a process that is both contingent and unguided. Any evolutionary mechanism that is contingent can only be contingent because God made it so. An unguided evolutionary process - one that falls outside the bounds of divine providence - simply cannot exist because “the causality of God, Who is the first agent, extends to all being, not only as to constituent principles of species, but also as to the individualizing principles…It necessarily follows that all things, inasmuch as they participate in existence, must likewise be subject to divine providence” (Summa theologiae I, 22, 2).” From part 69. (Also available online.)
Again, Cardinal Ratzinger (a theologian) is here doing
theology, not science. He is outlining the theological parameters of Catholic belief. Consider this from the Holy Father:
"Now more reflective spirits have long been aware that there is no either-or here. We cannot say: creation or evolution, inasmuch as these two things respond to
two different realities. The story of the dust of the earth and the breath of God…does not in fact explain
how human persons come to be but rather
what they are. It explains their inmost origin and casts light on the project that they are. And, vice versa, the theory of evolution seeks to understand and describe biological developments. But in so doing it cannot explain where the ‘project’ of human persons comes from, nor their inner origin, nor their particular nature. To that extent we are faced here with
two complimentary----rather than mutually exclusive----realities" (
In the Beginning, p. 50).
As taught in school, the theory of evolution does “deny to divine providence any truly causal role in the development of life in the universe.” From part 64.
Actually, no, rather it simply acknowledges that any such “divine causal role” would be indetectable to science, and thus beyond the scope of the scientific enterprise.
What Catholics, and Christians in general, need to watch out for is accepting any theory of evolution that excludes the guiding work of God.
How could one possibly adopt a theory of evolution that
included the guiding work of God? Since supernatural causes and agents are necessarily beyond the limits of scientific investigation, this would be a categorical impossibility. Science can say absolutely nothing about the existence or activity of any god or gods. Therefore, your demand for a scientific theory that “includes the guiding work of God” simply fails to comprehend the limitations of science as an empirical discipline. Now, I certainly believe that God works providentially behind all creational events, but this is a
theological conviction on my part, rather than a scientific conclusion.
Blessings,
Don
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