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Hope1960
Guest
Your definition of previous biological forms sounds like the tract is agreeing or implying agreement with Ed Feser’s theory. Yes? No?
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twf
Guest
Yes, they don’t contradict each other. The tract doesn’t get into the details of how Adam and Eve can be reconciled with evolution, only that Catholics are free to accept modern scientific theories…Feser offers a potential hypothesis for how this may have worked.
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Hope1960
Guest
So then believing in Ed Fesers theory is OK with the Catholic Church?
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twf
Guest
Yes, to the best of my knowledge it is fine…and it is what I personally believe to be the most likely scenario.allowed
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Hope1960
Guest
Does anyone else know for sure that Catholics are allowed to believe Ed Fesers theory?
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rossum
Guest
Bestiality is always infertile since it involves different biological species. What is being proposed, between humans and almost-humans would not be infertile since there would be compatible DNA on both sides. The mating would be open to life. Once that life appeared God could add a soul provided at least one of the parents had a soul.It seems too much like bestiality to me.
$0.02
rossum
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guanophore
Guest
Interesting. Do you know of any other “beasts” that create art?Yes, I consider them to be beasts and man-like physically.
DNA analysis has proved that all modern humans have 2-4 % Neanderthal DNA. Was it contrary to God’s will that human beings couple with “beasts”? If they are not part of the human family, how is it possible that offspring can be produced?
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1Lord1Faith
Guest
Yes…Is the part of the link in the Catholic Answers tract I posted above, where it says “It [the Church] has a more definite teaching. It allows for the possibility that mans BODY developed from previous biological forms, under Gods guidance but insists on the special creation of his soul,” basically saying the same thing, or allowing for the same thing?
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Spyridon
Guest
It’s not that they didn’t have souls (a quantatative distinction), but rather that they didn’t have fully human, intelligent souls (a qualitative distinction).He says that in the beginning humans interbred with human-like beings who didn’t have souls and God gave their offspring souls,
Adam and Eve could have had fully modern bodies biologically, and had the human soul - an intelligent soul which also has the animal and nutritive principles. They and their offspring could have intermingled with other humanoids who were fully anatomically modern, but their souls did not possess the full intelligent principle, but rather just the nutritive and an advanced animal principle.
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twf
Guest
Right. Some modern apes can be taught up to several hundred words in sign language. That’s pretty darn intelligent…for an animal. Adam and Eve’s genetic relatives would have been even keener than that.
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anon65111186
Guest
Some people have up to 3% Neanderthal DNA, so we know we did not keep within the species.
Neanderthal DNA makes up 70% of DNA related to our skin and hair. Europeans and Asians have the most Neanderthal DNA.
They are technically a sub-species of human but whether they had souls or not is not certain. If humans mated with them, then the children most definitely had souls.
Neanderthal DNA makes up 70% of DNA related to our skin and hair. Europeans and Asians have the most Neanderthal DNA.
They are technically a sub-species of human but whether they had souls or not is not certain. If humans mated with them, then the children most definitely had souls.
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FrDavid96
Guest
Yes.Does anyone else know for sure that Catholics are allowed to believe Ed Fesers theory?
Yes. It’s perfectly fine to accept that theory. I would not use the word “believe” though, because that implies it is a matter of faith. We “accept” scientific theories rather than “believe” them. For example “I believe in God” but not “I believe in gravity” instead “I accept that the theory of gravity is true.”
Science, not Scripture, is the method we use to understand (as much as we can) how the human species evolved. The book of Genesis is not a scientific text.
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edwest211
Guest
We’re not allowed to believe that.
First, Adam and Eve are identified as our first parents.
The Church tells us that God gave them certain gifts like immortality.
And from the Encyclical Humani Generis:
“37. When, however, there is question of another conjectural opinion, namely polygenism, the children of the Church by no means enjoy such liberty. 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 in 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.[12]”
Adam and Eve had only one commandment from God to follow and they disobeyed. This created two real problems: The Fall meant they lost their gifts from God and Original Sin had to be dealt with. That is why Jesus Christ had to be born. Science will not tell you this, only the Church. We would not need a Redeemer if sin and death had not entered the world.
First, Adam and Eve are identified as our first parents.
The Church tells us that God gave them certain gifts like immortality.
And from the Encyclical Humani Generis:
“37. When, however, there is question of another conjectural opinion, namely polygenism, the children of the Church by no means enjoy such liberty. 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 in 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.[12]”
Adam and Eve had only one commandment from God to follow and they disobeyed. This created two real problems: The Fall meant they lost their gifts from God and Original Sin had to be dealt with. That is why Jesus Christ had to be born. Science will not tell you this, only the Church. We would not need a Redeemer if sin and death had not entered the world.
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FrDavid96
Guest
Not true. The issue is more subtle than that.We’re not allowed to believe that.
Neither the book of Genesis nor the Encyclical you cited is a scientific text.
Science tells us how we evolved as a human species.
As Catholics, we cannot deny the truths of science.
It is possible to believe in the science of polygenism without contradicting the theological values which the Pope expressed, namely thisFirst, Adam and Eve are identified as our first parents.
The Church tells us that God gave them certain gifts like immortality.
And from the Encyclical Humani Generis:
“37. When, however, there is question of another conjectural opinion, namely polygenism, the children of the Church by no means enjoy such liberty. 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 in 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.[12]”
Adam and Eve had only one commandment from God to follow and they disobeyed. This created two real problems: The Fall meant they lost their gifts from God and Original Sin had to be dealt with. That is why Jesus Christ had to be born. Science will not tell you this, only the Church. We would not need a Redeemer if sin and death had not entered the world.
The real world is not so binary.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.
We can accept the truths of both disciplines.
As Catholics we must, yes we must, be able to distinguish between science and faith. Otherwise we present ourselves to the world as a bunch of superstitious fundamentalists. Unfortunately, I see a lot of that on CAF.
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edwest211
Guest
Your reply does not make sense. God did real, actual things in Genesis. Evolution has no practical scientific application and people are still arguing about other things that happened less than 100 years ago. Evolution is not testable in the case of man. And it certainly provides no guidance where bacteria and viruses are concerned.
Some on CAF refuse to acknowledge what God literally did in human history. And Science? What is that? A method of study that cannot, under any circumstances, acknowledge any supernatural event. It is very wrong to suggest that God does not do anything today, as if He is a bystander to what boils down to a materialist only explanation for all life. The Biology textbook is a type of secular Bible and is complete as it stands. It may not have all the answers but it does have one that is promoted here constantly: Evolution. God/gods had nothing to do with life. Life is just something that happens on its own.
Is God a superstition, or is the risen Christ alive at this very moment? Of course, science has nothing to say about that.
"Real History
"The argument is that all of this is real history, it is simply ordered topically rather than chronologically, and the ancient audience of Genesis, it is argued, would have understood it as such.
"Even if Genesis 1 records God’s work in a topical fashion, it still records God’s work—things God really did.
"The Catechism explains that “Scripture presents the work of the Creator symbolically as a succession of six days of divine ‘work,’ concluded by the ‘rest’ of the seventh day” (CCC 337), but “nothing exists that does not owe its existence to God the Creator. The world began when God’s word drew it out of nothingness; all existent beings, all of nature, and all human history is rooted in this primordial event, the very genesis by which the world was constituted and time begun” (CCC 338).
"It is impossible to dismiss the events of Genesis 1 as a mere legend. They are accounts of real history, even if they are told in a style of historical writing that Westerners do not typically use.
"Adam and Eve: Real People
“It is equally impermissible to dismiss the story of Adam and Eve and the fall (Gen. 2–3) as a fiction. A question often raised in this context is whether the human race descended from an original pair of two human beings (a teaching known as monogenism) or a pool of early human couples (a teaching known as polygenism).”
Some on CAF refuse to acknowledge what God literally did in human history. And Science? What is that? A method of study that cannot, under any circumstances, acknowledge any supernatural event. It is very wrong to suggest that God does not do anything today, as if He is a bystander to what boils down to a materialist only explanation for all life. The Biology textbook is a type of secular Bible and is complete as it stands. It may not have all the answers but it does have one that is promoted here constantly: Evolution. God/gods had nothing to do with life. Life is just something that happens on its own.
Is God a superstition, or is the risen Christ alive at this very moment? Of course, science has nothing to say about that.
"Real History
"The argument is that all of this is real history, it is simply ordered topically rather than chronologically, and the ancient audience of Genesis, it is argued, would have understood it as such.
"Even if Genesis 1 records God’s work in a topical fashion, it still records God’s work—things God really did.
"The Catechism explains that “Scripture presents the work of the Creator symbolically as a succession of six days of divine ‘work,’ concluded by the ‘rest’ of the seventh day” (CCC 337), but “nothing exists that does not owe its existence to God the Creator. The world began when God’s word drew it out of nothingness; all existent beings, all of nature, and all human history is rooted in this primordial event, the very genesis by which the world was constituted and time begun” (CCC 338).
"It is impossible to dismiss the events of Genesis 1 as a mere legend. They are accounts of real history, even if they are told in a style of historical writing that Westerners do not typically use.
"Adam and Eve: Real People
“It is equally impermissible to dismiss the story of Adam and Eve and the fall (Gen. 2–3) as a fiction. A question often raised in this context is whether the human race descended from an original pair of two human beings (a teaching known as monogenism) or a pool of early human couples (a teaching known as polygenism).”
- Catholic Answers
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edwest211
Guest
Why does the Church have a Congregation for Saints’ Causes? To show, even if it takes decades, through research involving witnesses, actual records and other information regarding miracles related to intercessory prayer to the saint candidate. Actual Literal Miracles. The secular world ignores all that but two miracles - real, lasting miracles - are required before sainthood. In fact, the Congregation has someone assigned to vigorously challenge all of the evidence. Sainthood is not bestowed lightly.
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Benadam
Guest
May I ask?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.
True men means having immortal souls.
Polygenism means having many parents with immortal souls
The opinion that Adam was born of a woman who did not have an immortal soul ,I don’t think is either one of those.
Could it be that a special creation is God, by the power of the Holy Spirit, breathing an immmortal soul into Adam at conception?
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guanophore
Guest
Science tells us a theory that seems to explain the available evidence, but it cannot be proved scientifically that we evolved this way. I agree, Catholics don’t need to deny the truths of science, but we also do not need to accept theory as proof, or accept an explanation of science that rules out the revelation of God.Neither the book of Genesis nor the Encyclical you cited is a scientific text.
Science tells us how we evolved as a human species.
As Catholics, we cannot deny the truths of science.
You are right, there is room for both!
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edwest211
Guest
If everyone stopped believing evolution was true, nothing would happen anywhere.
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Hope1960
Guest
Are you saying that Ed Fesers theory is an example of polygenism? Do you believe in polygenism?
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