Pope Benedict admits evidence for evolution

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I have never understand all this debate about evolution and creationism.

As Catholics we don’t take a great deal of the bible literally…but we recognize that God made everything…and made everything good.

Isn’t that enough? Why do we have to know exactly how God did it?
 
frommi said:
I have never understand all this debate about evolution and creationism.

As Catholics we don’t take a great deal of the bible literally…but we recognize that God made everything…and made everything good.

Isn’t that enough? Why do we have to know exactly how God did it?
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Excellent. And to answer yout questions, yes, it is, and no, we don’t.

Blessings,

Gerry
 
From the article:

“A full transcript of the two-hour event was issued yesterday.”

If anyone runs across the transcript, please post a link. I’d like to read it, but am having no luck finding it. Thanks!
 
I was shocked upon hearing this news. I have done plenty of research on Creation/Evolution and found that the arguments for evolution are not sound, scientifically speaking. Surely, I thought, the Holy Father would’ve had sources close to him to point this out. The mere fact that the heart of evolution suggests that there wasn’t an intelligent creator should sound an alarm in the ears of all Christians.

Am I misinterpreting what our Holy Father is saying or am I the only one who am a little “nervous” about this. :confused:
 
No need to be concerned. At no point does the Church exclude God from His creation. Pope Benedict has made other statements about evolution, and although he many see no conflict between evolution as a scientific theory and creation, he may not be aware of the fact that evolution is being heavily marketed by atheists right now.

The method is quite simple. Evolutionists go to Christian sites and say: “You still don’t believe in evolution? Well, why the heck not?’” If anyone dares say anything against evolution, they are attacked, called ignorant or willfully ignorant, fundamentalist (which means willing to kill unbelievers), and the Bible is called a book of myths, and God is a myth.

The Church is willing to listen and weigh the evidence for and against evolution carefully and thoughtfully. I believe the current evolution vs. creation debate is a manufactured one. It is based mostly on emotion and a desire by atheists to spread their worldview.

God bless,
Ed
 
The way it is being presented is that the Church and the Pope now believe that evolution is a fact.
 
frommi said:
I have never understand all this debate about evolution and creationism.

As Catholics we don’t take a great deal of the bible literally…but we recognize that God made everything…and made everything good.

Isn’t that enough? Why do we have to know exactly how God did it?
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Yes. A kind of a beautiful simplicity is possible in faith. Thanks for reminding me! 👍

I learned in Catholic school that we do not read the bible in a fundametalist way, and that the Catholic church does not oppose the theory of evolution. It dropped it’s opposition to it decades ago. So the pope has said nothing new.

I think some confusion has come in the last couple of decades when Catholics and the Christian Right, Evangelicals, fundamentalists etc seem to have converged into a political “voting block” and then, add to that the “not-so-good” Chatechisis (sp?) Many received in the 60’s and 70’s, and soon many start to think that all our faiths all believe the same thing. We don’t.

As I was reminded by an email from this very website yesterday, many of those other faiths mentioned still see Catholicism as something you must be saved from!:eek:
 
edwest2 said:
I know of no statement made by Pope John Paul II which called evolution true, however, he did state that it was “more than a hypothosis.”
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You might want to check the original language JPII said that statement. From what I’ve read, “more than an hypothesis” was said originally in French, which could plausibly also be interpreted as saying “more than one hypothesis” – the indefinite article “un/e” meaning either “a/n” or “one”.
 
Nope. Not true. Later, it was even referred to as offhand remark of little consequence. The Church is not opposed to learning about science, but in the case of evolution, it is just a theory.

I do not subscribe to the “religious right” and I have no poilitical party affiliation.

God bless,
Ed
 
edwest2 said:
No need to be concerned. At no point does the Church exclude God from His creation. Pope Benedict has made other statements about evolution, and although he many see no conflict between evolution as a scientific theory and creation, he may not be aware of the fact that evolution is being heavily marketed by atheists right now.

The method is quite simple. Evolutionists go to Christian sites and say: “You still don’t believe in evolution? Well, why the heck not?’” If anyone dares say anything against evolution, they are attacked, called ignorant or willfully ignorant, fundamentalist (which means willing to kill unbelievers), and the Bible is called a book of myths, and God is a myth.

The Church is willing to listen and weigh the evidence for and against evolution carefully and thoughtfully. I believe the current evolution vs. creation debate is a manufactured one. It is based mostly on emotion and a desire by atheists to spread their worldview.

God bless,
Ed
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I guess we need to define “Evolution”. Is it the theory that all life, human life included, evolved from a singular event better known as the “Big Bang Theory”? Or can Evolution be defined as certain species on earth that came to be how we see them today by slowly mutating from their original form AFTER creation? This excluding humans.

To flat out claim that evolution in the former sense is plausible would create a doctrinal contradiction. You cannot have both God’s creation AND humans evolving from monkey’s.

To see evolution as the ladder definition would make sense. If this is the case, it would then need to be explained by the Vatican to clear up any mis-understanding. I have plenty of Protestant friends of mine who tore me apart after hearing the Holy Fathers statement that evolution is fact.

I have done plenty of study on the subject from both perspectives.
They methods evolutionists use for dating, testing etc. are flawed and cannot be 100% fully trusted.
 
StPolycarp77 said:
I guess we need to define “Evolution”. Is it the theory that all life, human life included, evolved from a singular event better known as the “Big Bang Theory”? Or can Evolution be defined as certain species on earth that came to be how we see them today by slowly mutating from their original form AFTER creation? This excluding humans.

To flat out claim that evolution in the former sense is plausible would create a doctrinal contradiction. You cannot have both God’s creation AND humans evolving from monkey’s.
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Catholicism makes this distinction: God might have let the human body evolve from lower primates, but the human soul is definitely a supernatural creation directly by God.
I have plenty of Protestant friends of mine who tore me apart after hearing the Holy Fathers statement that evolution is fact.
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Did they crucify you?😉
 
rien said:
Sounds very New Age and or strongly environmental. But I agree, it is hard to deny evolution anymore.
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I believe some of the Traditionalists have an issue with Evolution (especially as talked about in the most recent Catechism), correct?
 
Ahimsa said:
Catholicism makes this distinction: God might have let the human body evolve from lower primates, but the human soul is definitely a supernatural creation directly by God.

Did they crucify you?😉
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No, they didn’t crucify me.

Had God created humans from primates He would’ve said so in Sacred Scripture. Creation in Genesis leaves no room for doubt that Adam was created from the dust of the earth. He could not have simply “evolved” from another created creature. That would be downplaying the significance of man being in the image and likeness of God.
 
The following url takes you to a Creationist site that discusses the Evolution Theory scientifically
trueorigin.org/
Personally, I acept micro evolution to have taken place but when it comes to reptiles becoming birds I think it’s just a lot of baloney.
 
We see some phenomena that might be best explained by evolution, although God miraculously changing things works as well. If you take a view of the first few chapters of Genesis as a very poetic, figurative description of nonetheless real events caused by God, the two fit together. For example, the earth being formless and a void – as long as we believe the big bang was initiated by God and then based on the rules he set forth expanded into the galaxies we have now, this works out. The earth coelesced from gas and dust into the planet and was later populated somehow (again another act of God) with the right chemicals and was imbued with life – small to larger plants, fish, then birds, and mammals and finally people. The Biblical description follows the general flow of the types of animals. If you consider that the 7 days of creation are epochs, it’s not necessarily that far off. Actually genesis is best read as the prologue to Exodus based on how and why it was written.

THe biggest issue with evolution and the big bang – is who started it? how did we beat the random odds of getting all the physical constants right, getting the right conditions for earth, and getting some spark??? to start life? Of course, we also believe that God performs a new act of creation everytime a child is conceived and is imbued with a new soul created at that moment by God. Interesting that man represents potentially the very synthesis of miraculous creation (our soul) and the procreation of evolved life (our bodies).
 
frommi said:
I have never understand all this debate about evolution and creationism.

As Catholics we don’t take a great deal of the bible literally…but we recognize that God made everything…and made everything good.

Isn’t that enough? Why do we have to know exactly how God did it?
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Yes, indeed it is enough. Our puny little minds will never be able to fully grasp, in this life, God’s plan. My son-in-law, a brilliant and very Catholic young evolutionary biologist, sums it up thus: Evolution is God’s “modus operandi.” Really nothing to get our knickers in a twist about.
 
The artificial separation of the Bible from science is a falsehood. Certain ideas are being spread across the internet but none of them are true according to the Word of God.

There is no evidence of one animal turning into another animal.

The ancient sheep herders of Biblical times were just so lacking in modern knowledge that God could not have explained evolution to them if He tried. To suggest that God did not effectively communicate with His people makes the entire Bible open to question.

Jesus said that in the beginning, he made them male and female, not asexual protozoa.

An insistence, through repetition, that Genesis is not literal, when Jesus Himself talks about the laying of the foundation of the world.

To concern oneself with man’s knowledge without reference to Biblical knowledge is an invitation to accepts man’s word at all times, while knowing men lie.

God bless,
Ed
 
edwest2 said:
The ancient sheep herders of Biblical times were just so lacking in modern knowledge that God could not have explained evolution to them if He tried. To suggest that God did not effectively communicate with His people makes the entire Bible open to question.

God bless,
Ed
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But God DID effectively communicate with his people - in a manner that He knew their minds could understand and digest - through the use of imagery, parables, stories, symbolism, in the literary custom of the time. None of that changes the essential, everlasting truth, as pertinent to us today as to the ancient sheepherders. We must simply realize that we are trying to put God “in a box” and understand Him within the scope of our own human intelligence. Who are we to limit Him in that way?

Discoveries relating to evolution are ongoing and numerous. To be sure, ideas and theories will be “tweaked” as we discover more (we are only in the very infancy of such discoveries) but there is so much evidence of creatures adapting to their environment, the best-suited surviving, the less-suited dying off, over millions (yes, millions) of years that we allow ourselves to be dismissed as backwards when we insist it isn’t so.

Bottom line: God is the Prime Mover, and He moved (moves) in His own time and own way, which is beyond the scope of our little minds. As my son-in-law the Catholic evolutionary biologist says, the more he discovers about the natural world, the more awe and reverence for God it inspires in him.

Blessings!

Marie
 
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