M
mlchance
Guest
It’s in my Bible right under the words “Table of Contents.”
– Mark L. Chance.
- Status
– Mark L. Chance.
C
Charity
Guest
Dear Alec,
I am truly sorry that you experienced queasiness at my mention of the Fall of man in the context of genuine scientific DNA conversation.
Did you feel disappointed or possibly betrayed that I have lowered my mainstream scientific integrity by acknowledging the supernatural realm?
It doesn’t have to be that way, Alec.
This is an apologetics forum- we are anonymously “allowed” to get “religious” in our science here in a way we NEVER could at the University. That’s why I decided to come here where we have a flexible arena for our imagination and faith-based curiosity.
Do you think it is meaningless that I choose to 'walk by faith and not by sight?" I feel awe and **love **for the meaningfulness of God when I gaze at the current human genome because of the beauty of God’s creative power. However, I too, am a lover of rigorous science, just like you, Alec; yet, I’m willing to allow my mind to be transformed by the Holy Spirit of truth.
I think your nausea, though, may be a result of a misunderstanding of my question. Yes, I agree with you that all aspects of the genome can be, in principle, scientifically elucidated. But, man is more than just a genome! Man has a human nature comprised of the *union *of body and soul.
Pre-lapsarian original man had a mortal human nature in an immortal (but capable of death/destined to die) state due to God’s grace of original justice… Now we receive our mortal human nature in a fallen state. Adam did not have to die, get sick, argue with Eve, or lust after her (maybe that’s why she didn’t get headaches.) But when he “ate the poison fruit” and mutated his body with the original sin, he lost,among other things, the special characteristics of his physical body, leaving us with the still awesome but perhaps fallen human genome of historical man.
So I repeat, what are the limitations of science probing the interface between OM and HM? Much less than you or I might imagine… I believe we can push exploration closer to the edge of the “insuperable barrier” between corporeal and soulful man, if we keep an open mind.
Let’s go there. I know it is distasteful to you, being limited by nausea and all… But knock down some Mylanta and try givin’ it a shot.
I’ll go first…(continued in next post)
.
C
Charity
Guest
(continued from previous post)
Dear Alec,
Suppose there was a genomic mechanism or structure which would allow the creation of Eve from Adam and the conception of Jesus in Mary’s virginal womb?
Is there a possible pre-fall-effective genetic means by which the sex chromosomes could be arranged that could result in the Immaculate Conception (no original sin here) of Mary from St; Anne’s egg and St. Joachim’s sperm in the womb of Mary’s mother, St. Anne,?
Could Mary, as you speculated earlier have been a chimaeric, hermaphrodite or an XX/XY etc. mosaic or some unknown but, analagous arrangement? Mosaicism is the coexistence of multiple, genetically different populations of cells in one person, all derived originally, from a single zygote. Mosaics with the coexistence of of abnormal and normal groups of cells can cause an abnormal phenotype to approach the normal.
Indeed, could the elusive Y-chromosome of Jesus have been that of his own grandfather Joachim via a mosaic/chimaeric germ line in Joachim’s daughter Mary?
Joachim (Heli) was a devout Jew in the direct blood line of David, (see the geneology of Jesus in Luke 3: 23-38), and tradition has it that both he and Anne died when Mary was age 11, leaving her orphaned in the Temple. The memorial of the parents of the Virgin Mary, Ss. Ann and Joachim, are celebrated annually on July 26 in the liturgy of the Roman Catholic Church.
Could the maleness of the Palestinian Jew Jesus at the Incarnation in Mary’s womb have been drawn soley from Mary’s humanity though Joachim’s retained germ cell Y- chomosome when the Holy Spirit overshadowed her?
Dear Alec,
Suppose there was a genomic mechanism or structure which would allow the creation of Eve from Adam and the conception of Jesus in Mary’s virginal womb?
Is there a possible pre-fall-effective genetic means by which the sex chromosomes could be arranged that could result in the Immaculate Conception (no original sin here) of Mary from St; Anne’s egg and St. Joachim’s sperm in the womb of Mary’s mother, St. Anne,?
Could Mary, as you speculated earlier have been a chimaeric, hermaphrodite or an XX/XY etc. mosaic or some unknown but, analagous arrangement? Mosaicism is the coexistence of multiple, genetically different populations of cells in one person, all derived originally, from a single zygote. Mosaics with the coexistence of of abnormal and normal groups of cells can cause an abnormal phenotype to approach the normal.
Indeed, could the elusive Y-chromosome of Jesus have been that of his own grandfather Joachim via a mosaic/chimaeric germ line in Joachim’s daughter Mary?
Joachim (Heli) was a devout Jew in the direct blood line of David, (see the geneology of Jesus in Luke 3: 23-38), and tradition has it that both he and Anne died when Mary was age 11, leaving her orphaned in the Temple. The memorial of the parents of the Virgin Mary, Ss. Ann and Joachim, are celebrated annually on July 26 in the liturgy of the Roman Catholic Church.
Could the maleness of the Palestinian Jew Jesus at the Incarnation in Mary’s womb have been drawn soley from Mary’s humanity though Joachim’s retained germ cell Y- chomosome when the Holy Spirit overshadowed her?
G
Ghosty
Guest
So does Eden not lay in the area described in Genesis (modern Iraq)? The Bible seems pretty clear that Eden was indeed a place on Earth, and even gives a very specific location for it. It’s not that I can’t imagine it being in a different dimension, simply that it says that it wasn’t.
As for your claims that it goes against Catholic doctrine to suggest that death in any form existed prior to the Fall, I suggest you take it up with the Pope, who has said that studies of evolution were a legitimate study (and, according to the most reputable translations, even says that it’s more than mere hypothesis). Evolution necessitates death prior to the Fall, unless the Fall happened billions of years ago. The Church itself seems to hold, and teach, a very different version of this doctrine then you seem to be pushing.
In every quote you used, the death being addressed is human death. That was always the heresy; death of animals was never considered an issue (or even death, for that matter). The doctrines related to things like the Pelegian heresy, and must be understood in that context. The issue of the death of plants and animals (and it says that animals ate plants in Eden) was never raised, and therefore was never addressed.
As for your claims that it goes against Catholic doctrine to suggest that death in any form existed prior to the Fall, I suggest you take it up with the Pope, who has said that studies of evolution were a legitimate study (and, according to the most reputable translations, even says that it’s more than mere hypothesis). Evolution necessitates death prior to the Fall, unless the Fall happened billions of years ago. The Church itself seems to hold, and teach, a very different version of this doctrine then you seem to be pushing.
In every quote you used, the death being addressed is human death. That was always the heresy; death of animals was never considered an issue (or even death, for that matter). The doctrines related to things like the Pelegian heresy, and must be understood in that context. The issue of the death of plants and animals (and it says that animals ate plants in Eden) was never raised, and therefore was never addressed.
I
ISABUS
Guest
For the record I would like to say:
Peace ~
Isabus
p.s. I haven’t forgotten you Marcia. It’s just that I’m having a day of fun! :yup:
- I believe in God and Jesus.
- I believe that religion and science should be kept separate therefore don’t believe in Intelligent Design because I believe in EVOLUTION.
- I don’t believe we will ever know the truth about Jesus’ DNA!
Sorry folks. - I believe I was a creation of my mother and father (God bless their souls.) who were co-creators in God’s master plan for me. My soul belongs to God.
- I believe you can call it whatever you like, Heaven or Paradise. It doesn’t really matter much to me because they are words and words have many meanings. All I want at the end of my days is to be with the people whom I’ve loved that have left this planet called Earth.
- I believe in love and forgiveness.
Peace ~
Isabus
p.s. I haven’t forgotten you Marcia. It’s just that I’m having a day of fun! :yup:
H
hecd2
Guest
universe that exists. Heaven, Hell and Purgatory are not located in this universe, nor is the paradise where Adam and Eve once dwelled. Read Genesis carefully; Adam and Eve’s sin did not destroy paradise - Adam and Eve were cast out of paradise *after *they sinned…
God is fecund. Perhaps God has created many other physical realms solely for his own delight.
Dear Matt,
Well I never imagined that you were meaning the terrestrial Paradise to exist in a parallel universe with different physical laws, and I expect that hardly anyone else reading this thread thought that you meant that until you explicitly said so. In fact, this idea doesn’t come out strongly in earlier posts of yours in this thread, where you seem to talk about a single universe that was corrupted at the Fall. Well, I am no theologian or expert exegist, but I think that this interpretation is idiosyncratically yours. According to Genesis, God didn’t create several ‘heavens and earths’; he created one. Your idea of a parallel universe as the physical location for the pre-Fall paradise depends on a cosmology that has hardly existed in the mind of man for more than 100 years. I would suggest that throughout most of the history of Christianity, theologians and biblical scholars had in mind an Eden that physically existed in this universe, and on this earth.
You are free to believe whatever you like about the nature of the pre-Fall universe. If you believe it lies physically and dimensionally outside this one and is subject to physical laws different from the ones in our universe, and if you believe Adam and Eve were transported miraculously between it and ours at the Fall, then science and reason have no power to disprove you.
However, I will register two issues. You say that there was no death and decay before the Fall. Which universe, in your cosmology, are you talking about? This one? If so, that would put the Fall at least 13 billion years ago - or is it your belief that this decaying universe has existed for 13.7 billion years with the same physical laws, and Adam and Eve were simply plonked down in it a few tens of thousands of years ago as a punishment for their sin – as a kind of celestial penal transportation?
to be continued
H
hecd2
Guest
continuation…
But there is another issue - we can trace the ancestry of modern humans back millions of years. There is no discontinuity in the record where humans suddenly appear unrelated to precursor species. Furthermore, humans form a monophyletic genetic group with other primates. Take for example the case of L-Gulono-gamma-lactone oxidase (GULO) - this is the final enzyme used by all mammals in a chain of four enzymes that synthesise vitamin C. All mammals express GULO and biosynthesise vitamin C, except primates (which includes humans), where the GULO gene is irreparably broken by an ancestral mutation - humans and other primates are unable to synthesise vitamin C, must get it from their diet, and so are subject to scurvy (vitamin C synthesis is also broken in guinea pigs, but in a different way). In all primates, the remains of the GULO gene and the other three genes that are used in other mammals to synthesise Vitamin C are still present in the genome. It is absolutely clear that GULO was broken by a mutation in the gene in a common ancestor of all primates including man, about 25 million years ago. It doesn’t make sense to think that humans are genetically unrelated to other animals. Ancestral classical pseudogenes, such as GULO, ancestral processed pseudogenes and ancestral retrotransposons, the shared detritus of the primate genome, demonstrate the common ancestry of humans and other primates.
Nishikimi, Fukuyama, et al. (1994) “Cloning and chromosomal mapping of the human nonfunctional gene for L-gulono-gamma-lactone oxidase, the enzyme for L-ascorbic acid biosynthesis missing in man.” Journal of Biological Chemistry 269: 13685-13688
Inai, Ohto and Nishikimi, “The whole structure of the human nonfunctional L-gulono-gamma-lactone oxidase gene”, J Nutr Sci Vitaminol (Tokyo). 49(5): 315-319
Alec
http://tinyurl.com/49qod
But there is another issue - we can trace the ancestry of modern humans back millions of years. There is no discontinuity in the record where humans suddenly appear unrelated to precursor species. Furthermore, humans form a monophyletic genetic group with other primates. Take for example the case of L-Gulono-gamma-lactone oxidase (GULO) - this is the final enzyme used by all mammals in a chain of four enzymes that synthesise vitamin C. All mammals express GULO and biosynthesise vitamin C, except primates (which includes humans), where the GULO gene is irreparably broken by an ancestral mutation - humans and other primates are unable to synthesise vitamin C, must get it from their diet, and so are subject to scurvy (vitamin C synthesis is also broken in guinea pigs, but in a different way). In all primates, the remains of the GULO gene and the other three genes that are used in other mammals to synthesise Vitamin C are still present in the genome. It is absolutely clear that GULO was broken by a mutation in the gene in a common ancestor of all primates including man, about 25 million years ago. It doesn’t make sense to think that humans are genetically unrelated to other animals. Ancestral classical pseudogenes, such as GULO, ancestral processed pseudogenes and ancestral retrotransposons, the shared detritus of the primate genome, demonstrate the common ancestry of humans and other primates.
Nishikimi, Fukuyama, et al. (1994) “Cloning and chromosomal mapping of the human nonfunctional gene for L-gulono-gamma-lactone oxidase, the enzyme for L-ascorbic acid biosynthesis missing in man.” Journal of Biological Chemistry 269: 13685-13688
Inai, Ohto and Nishikimi, “The whole structure of the human nonfunctional L-gulono-gamma-lactone oxidase gene”, J Nutr Sci Vitaminol (Tokyo). 49(5): 315-319
Alec
http://tinyurl.com/49qod
H
hecd2
Guest
Don’t worry about it - it arises from the vertiginous changes of perspective. I’ve belayed now, so I contemplate the mile of air beneath my feet with equanimity
My experience of University common rooms is a huge acceptance of bizarre speculations and hypotheses over endless coffee, many of which led to serious work and serious results.
No I don’t think so. Each person must forge their own path that carries meaning for them.
Steady on there - I said I was slightly queasy, not nauseous.
Poor Adam. No lust. Perhaps that’s why wandered off and got into mischief!
Well, there’s the rub - the human genome shows no sign of a sudden degrading event and every sign of unremarkable evolution within the phylogeny of primates.It’s quite hard to speculate about a prelapasarian state if one has no reason to believe in a literal Adam and Eve and a literal Fall and good reason to dibelieve them.
Alec
tinyurl.com/49qod
M
Matt16_18
Guest
The pope has NEVER said that death was in the world before the Fall. No pope has ever said such a thing. You are simply being obstinate in choosing to deny what the church teaches. The pope does NOT contradict what the church teaches.
This is really quite simple. At the final judgement, the CCC says that the original creation will be restored. Death will be cast into the lake of fire at the final judgement; therefore, it will be impossible for death to be in the restored creation. And if the restored creation is free of death, then the original creation must be also free of death.
Death is the enemy of God, and God did not allow his enemy to run rampant in paradise. To assert that death was in the world before the Fall, shows a complete misunderstanding of Romans 8: 19-21.
H
hecd2
Guest
Charity said:
Dear Charity, I’ll play with some of these ideas. First, why ask for a pre-Fall genetic means to account for Mary’s conception. OK - according to dogma it is Immmaculate (…checking very carefully that incipient senility hasn’t betrayed me into confusing Immaculate Conception and Virgin Birth again…) but why seek a unique genetic event for it. No-one suggest that Anne was a virgin, so what’s wrong with the idea that Mary is the offspring of a normal act of reproduction? The Immaculate bit is to do with being a state of grace and not to do with genetics as I read it.
You said it - mosaicism derives from a single zygote. Some time into cell multiplication, one line of cells suffers a mutation and so the organism is made of two different populations of cells, one with the mutation and one without. Mosaicism is commonly caused by non-disjunction in mitosis resulting in a population of cells with trisomy and a population with monosomy in the same body. Mosaicism cannot convert the X-chromosome to Y -the Y-must be present in the zygote in the first place. For example XO/XY mosiacs start out as an XY zygote. XX/XXY mosaics start as an XXY zygote (a Klinefelter syndrome zygote). So if Mary was a germline mosaic containing Y, she must have started out as a normal male or a Klinefelter male zygote.
- This is just what I pointed out before - if Mary was a chimaera who derived from the fusion of a femal and a male zygote, then she could appear to be entirely female but still have Y containing cells. This is getting to the point where it might cause offence, but you did ask. For Y-containing cells to appear in her germ-line she would have to be a hermaphrodite and to have, in addition to a womb and ovaries, sperm-producing testes. And I suppose she could be a somatic rather than germ line chimaera and the miracle would be that her somatic cells yielded a haploid set of chromosomes, including a Y -chromosome to fertilise her egg. That would indeeed require a miracle!
http://tinyurl.com/49qod
M
Matt16_18
Guest
I can hardly take credit for being the first person to understand that the terrestrial paradise still exists in its uncorrupted state. After all, Genesis makes that clear enough. Father Schmöger writes in his biography of Catherine Emmerich that the Fathers of the Church taught this “eccentric” view, and he gives a quote from St. Hildegarde that brings forth even more detail than can be found from a careful reading of Genesis.
I just gave just a small quote from Father Schmöger’s book - this quote comes from a section where Father Schmöger is commenting on the Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich’s detailed descriptions of the terrestrial paradise, which she too insists still exists. Father Schmöger also mentions other saints that understand that the terrestrial paradise still exists, and gives examples of their visions and mystical connections with the terrestrial paradise. If my beliefs are eccentric, it is only because I learned them from eccentrics such as St. Hildegarde, St. Lydwine, St. Colette, the Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, the Fathers of the Church …
G
Ghosty
Guest
Matt16_18: The Pope has endorsed studies in evolution, and evolution presupposes death before the Fall. The Big Bang Theory is also supported by the Church in scientific studies, and was raised by a Catholic priest.
If the stance of the Church was a clear as you say, why hasn’t such study been declared heresy? On the contrary, the Pope has explicitly affirmed the exploration of Evolutionary Theory, and never once implied that such studies were off-base due to the presupposition of death before the Fall. Why the silence, and even support, on the part of the Pope and the Magesterium in regards to evolutionary studies that presuppose, without any room for negotiation, what you say are heretical notions?
I’m still interested in why Genesis says that Eden lay in modern Iraq explicitly. I’m also honestly curious to hear what Fathers support your notion of an alternate dimension for Eden.
If the stance of the Church was a clear as you say, why hasn’t such study been declared heresy? On the contrary, the Pope has explicitly affirmed the exploration of Evolutionary Theory, and never once implied that such studies were off-base due to the presupposition of death before the Fall. Why the silence, and even support, on the part of the Pope and the Magesterium in regards to evolutionary studies that presuppose, without any room for negotiation, what you say are heretical notions?
I’m still interested in why Genesis says that Eden lay in modern Iraq explicitly. I’m also honestly curious to hear what Fathers support your notion of an alternate dimension for Eden.
I
ISABUS
Guest
:clapping:
M
Matt16_18
Guest
That is exactly my point. Science has no power to prove or disprove what I am saying.
I said there was no death in the terrestrial paradise before the Fall. Angels fell before Adam and Eve fell. Death came into being at the fall of the angels, for the rebellious angels suffered a type spiritual death when they fell. The rebellious angels were cast out of their heavenly dwelling place and forced to inhabit a dark universe. Death was already in existence when paradise was created, but death was not dwelling in paradise before Adam and Eve committed their sin of disobedience. Paradise was exactly that, a physical paradise free of all sin, disease, decay, and death.
The latest issue of Discover Magazine has these words on its cover “Was Your Ancestor a Sea Sponge?” I have no problem at all that fallen human bodies might have come into being through a process of evolution in the corrupted world. IMO, it would be quite appropriate that Adam and Eve would have to inhabit mortal bodies that derived its DNA from sea sponges. After all, Adam and Eve sinned by choosing creation over the Creator - they listened to a serpent instead of listening to God. The serpent was a created being that was lower than Adam and Eve. It seems appropriate to me that Adam and Eve should dwell in mortal bodies that are subject to the physical laws of a fallen world, and that after the Fall, that Adam and Eve should dwell in bodies connected to the lower life forms.
.
Scriptures doesn’t speak about the details of how Adam and Eve made the transition between dwelling in immortal bodies in the terrestrial paradise and dwelling mortal bodies in the world of death. Personally, I consider these nit picking details to be rather trivial in the grand scheme of things, and whatever those fine details actually are, not knowing the details does not cause me to question what has been divinely revealed to man.
Is our fallen world something like a penal colony? The scriptures certainly speak of the children of the wrath as dwelling in something like a penal colony. The children of the wrath are born in bondage in the Kingdom of the World, and begin life under the dominion of the Prince of Darkness. The children of the wrath were (and are) in need of a Redeemer that can purchase their freedom from the ruler of the Fallen world.
M
Matt16_18
Guest
Evolution presupposes a world where death has dominion over the world. That is why evolution is only a theory about the fallen universe, and not a theory that is germane to the pre-Fall universe. The pope has no problem with scientists studying the physical laws of this fallen universe, but that hardly means that the pope denies the scriptures that explicitly teach that death came into the physical world because of Adam’s sin. Nor has the Pope John Paul II ever contradicted Pope Pius XII:For the faithful cannot embrace that opinion which maintains that either after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin through natural generation from him as from the first parent of all, or that Adam represents a certain number of first parents. Now it is no no way apparent how such an opinion can be reconciled with that which the sources of revealed truth and the documents of the Teaching Authority of the Church propose with regard to original sin, which proceeds from a sin actually committed by an individual Adam and which, through generation, is passed on to all and is in everyone as his own.
HUMANI GENERIS (37)
POPE PIUS XII, 12 August 1950
I
ISABUS
Guest
Matt, would you comment on the following for me: THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION, Ineffabilis Deus, Apostolic Constitution issued by Pope Pius IX on December 8, 1854. papalencyclicals.net/Pius09/p9ineff.htm
"So at the instance and request of the bishops mentioned above, with the chapters of the churches, and of King Philip and his kingdoms, we renew the Constitutions and Decrees issued by the Roman Pontiffs, our predecessors, especially Sixtus IV,[8] Paul V,[9] and Gregory XV,[10] in favor of the doctrine asserting that the soul of the Blessed Virgin, in its creation and infusion into the body, was endowed with the grace of the Holy Spirit and preserved from original sin; and also in favor of the feast and veneration of the conception of the Virgin Mother of God, which, as is manifest, was instituted in keeping with that pious belief. So we command this feast to be observed under the censures and penalties contained in the same Constitutions.
“And therefore, against all and everyone of those who shall continue to construe the said Constitutions and Decrees in a manner apt to frustrate the favor which is thereby given to the said doctrine, and to the feast and relative veneration, or who shall dare to call into question the said sentence, feast and worship, or in any way whatever, directly or indirectly, shall declare themselves opposed to it under any pretext whatsoever, were it but only to the extent of examining the possibilities of effecting the definition, or who shall comment upon and interpret the Sacred Scripture, or the Fathers or Doctors in connection therewith, or finally, for any reason, or on any occasion, shall dare, either in writing or verbally, to speak, preach, treat, dispute or determine upon, or assert whatsoever against the foregoing matters, or who shall adduce any arguments against them, while leaving them unresolved, or who shall disagree therewith in any other conceivable manner, we hereby declare that in addition to the penalties and censures contained in the Constitutions issued by Sixtus IV to which we want them to be subjected and to which we subject them by the present Constitution, we hereby decree that they be deprived of the authority of preaching, reading in public, that is to say teaching and interpreting; and that they be also deprived ipso facto of the power of voting, either actively or passively, in all elections, without the need for any further declaration; and that also, ipso facto, without any further declaration, they shall incur the penalty of perpetual disability from preaching, reading in public, teaching and interpreting, and that it shall not be possible to absolve them from such penalty, or remove it, save through ourselves, or the Roman Pontiffs who shall succeed us.”
THX, Isabus
M
Matt16_18
Guest
I believe in the Dogma of the Immaculate Conception.
Hail Holy Queen, Mother of Mercy, our Life, our Sweetness, and our hope. To thee we cry, poor banished children of Eve. To thee do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears. Turn then, most gracious advocate, thine eyes of mercy toward us; and after this our exile, show unto us the blessed fruit of thy womb, Jesus. O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary!
I
ISABUS
Guest
On behalf of our Mother of God, thank you Matt.
with Love, Peace, and JOY ~
Isabus
with Love, Peace, and JOY ~
Isabus
G
Ghosty
Guest
Matt16_18: You’re still very far from supporting an alternate universe. All things are possible with God, but why grasp for a theory that has no doctrinal basis, and has absolutely no physical evidence, when alternate theories that incorporate both are available?
The Pope has never endorsed the view you are suggesting, nor has he denied it. He has endorsed the studies that directly oppose the view you are suggesting, however, including the views that myself and numerous other Catholics have supported for decades. To suggest that we are heretics in absence of any such teachings by the Pope and the Church is extremely uncharitable. If the Pope viewed the notion of evolution before the Fall heretical, he would have said so in his address on the subject.
As for the quote by Pius XII, no one here, even hecd2, has in this thread supported polygenism as it was being put down in that encyclical, so the quote is irrelevant at best, and misleading at worst.
Again I’ll ask why the transformed body of Jesus has the traits of DNA if immortal human bodies are not to have DNA, or how animals ate plants in Eden if death did not exist (indeed, why was eating necessary/possible if decay was not present at all in the sense you are describing), or why the exact location of Eden is given in Genesis if it was in some alternate universe. These are important issues that directly address your suggestions, and you’ve yet to tackle them.
The Pope has never endorsed the view you are suggesting, nor has he denied it. He has endorsed the studies that directly oppose the view you are suggesting, however, including the views that myself and numerous other Catholics have supported for decades. To suggest that we are heretics in absence of any such teachings by the Pope and the Church is extremely uncharitable. If the Pope viewed the notion of evolution before the Fall heretical, he would have said so in his address on the subject.
As for the quote by Pius XII, no one here, even hecd2, has in this thread supported polygenism as it was being put down in that encyclical, so the quote is irrelevant at best, and misleading at worst.
Again I’ll ask why the transformed body of Jesus has the traits of DNA if immortal human bodies are not to have DNA, or how animals ate plants in Eden if death did not exist (indeed, why was eating necessary/possible if decay was not present at all in the sense you are describing), or why the exact location of Eden is given in Genesis if it was in some alternate universe. These are important issues that directly address your suggestions, and you’ve yet to tackle them.
M
Matt16_18
Guest
Genesis does seems to say something like that, but Genesis is using “figurative language” to describe history (CCC #390). Keeping in mind that Genesis is using figurative language, Catholics do not have to believe that the universe was literally created in six of our earth days (though one can believe in a literal six-day creation and still be a faithful Catholic). In the same way, Catholics don’t have to believe that paradise was once literally in Iraq, and that there really is a visible Cherubim with a revolving flaming sword somewhere between the Tigris and the Euphrates guarding the entrance to the Garden of Eden. But saying that Genesis uses figurative language does not mean that any old interpretation of Genesis is possible. The Church does have doctrine that is related to how she interprets Genesis (e.g. Original Sin), and Catholic theological speculation must not conflict with established Catholic doctrine.
That said, there definitely is a challenge to be met by Catholics to incorporate the scientific evidence for evolution into an integrated way of thinking that does not conflict with established Catholic doctrine. And Evolution would seem to conflict with these doctrines of the Catholic Church:1.Paradise is a real physical place where Adam and Eve once dwelt with immortal bodies.
2. Death, disease, and decay did not exist in the physical world before the Fall.
3. All human beings are descendants of Adam and Eve Personally, I don’t see any reason to not accept the scientific evidence for evolution. And I don’t find that I have any major problems with evolution as a Catholic because I have what hecd2 has called a “parallel universe” conception of reality. Hecd2 said that “[my] idea of a parallel universe as the physical location for the pre-Fall paradise depends on a cosmology that has hardly existed in the mind of man for more than 100 years. I would suggest that throughout most of the history of Christianity, theologians and biblical scholars had in mind an Eden that physically existed in this universe, and on this earth.” I think the hecd2 has overstated his objections, and the mystical writings of Saints such as St. Hildegarde disprove him.
More …
- Status