Reconciling Evolution with Adam and Eve

[drpmjhess]

Can you list one or two Catholic theologians who develop this idea?

A link to an online article giving an overview of it would be appreciated as well.

Homeric, here is a brief bibliography of works dealing with theology and evolution. Among the best are (1) those by English scholar Celia Deane-Drummond (she has doctorates in both biology and theology), (2) Georgetown theologian John Haught, (3) Marty Hewlett and Ted Peters, who are a biology-theology team, and (4) Denis Edwards, an Australian Catholic priest. I’m still looking for an article-length treatment for you of the theology of sin as an evolved moral awareness. A lot of work is being done on the evolution of morality, both in hominids and in other higher animals. You might find the work of Marc Bekoff stimulating.
prayerfully yours,
Petrus

Bibliography:
Conway Morris, Simon, Life’s Solution: Inevitable Humans in a Lonely Universe, Cambridge University Press
Deane-Drummond, Celia. Biology and Theology Today. London: SCM Press, 2001.
Deane-Drummond, Celia. Brave New World: Theology, Ethics and the Human Genome. Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 2003.
Edwards, Denis. The God of Evolution: A Trinitarian Theology. Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1999.
Gilkey, Langdon. Creationism on Trial. Minneapolis: Winston Press, 1986.
Haught, John F. God after Darwin: A Theology of Evolution. Westview Press, 2000.
Haught, John F. Deeper than Darwin: The Prospect for Religion in the Age of Evolution. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 2003.
Hefner, Philip. The Human Factor: Evolution, Culture, and Religion. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993.
Hess, Peter M. J., and Paul L. Allen, Catholicism and Science. Greenwood Press, 2008.
Martinez Hewlett, and Ted Peters. Can you believe in God and evolution?: a guide for the perplexed. Nashville, TN : Abingdon Press, 2006.
McMullin, Ernan, ed. Evolution and Creation. University of Notre Dame Press, 1985.
Miller, Kenneth R. Finding Darwin’s God: A Scientist’s Search for Common Ground between God and Evolution. New York, NY: HarperCollins, 1999.
Peters, Ted, Robert John Russell, and Michael Welker, eds., Resurrection: Theological and Scientific Assessments, Wm. B. Eerdmans
Polkinghorne, John, and Michael Welker, The End of the World and the Ends of God: Science and Theology on Eschatology, Trinity Press International
Tracy, Thomas F., ed., The God Who Acts: Philosophical and Theological Explorations, Pennsylvania State University Press

 

[homeric]

Excellent!

Thank you for taking the time to provide a thorough bibliography.

 

[homeric]

Petrus,

If it doesn’t stray too much from the topic of the thread, I would appreciate your thoughts on something.

As a Catholic, I often worry that embracing scientific research leaves little room for God’s involvement in the universe. When we accept evolution and say that God is still the First Mover behind everything, it seems like God is no longer in control of the particulars. It seems like deism is the logical conclusion!

Do you have any thoughts on being a Catholic and accepting the power of scientific theories without losing a sense of wonder about the world?

 

[drpmjhess]

Petrus,

If it doesn’t stray too much from the topic of the thread, I would appreciate your thoughts on something.

As a Catholic, I often worry that embracing scientific research leaves little room for God’s involvement in the universe. When we accept evolution and say that God is still the First Mover behind everything, it seems like God is no longer in control of the particulars. It seems like deism is the logical conclusion!

Do you have any thoughts on being a Catholic and accepting the power of scientific theories without losing a sense of wonder about the world?

Homeric, this is a great question. I don’t know how to start a new thread (I’ve looked all over the website for instructions) but it probably belongs on a new thread on “Divine Action” or something like that.

What you ask is really the crux of the matter, and I don’t have a clear answer to this question for myself. Scholars in the science and religion dialogue distinguish between (1) methodological naturalism, the legitimate restriction of scientific method to what can be known about nature through reason alone, and (2) metaphysical naturalism, or the declaration that the only reality that exists is that which can be known through empirical naturalistic methods.

Methodological naturalism is quite legitimate. We look for naturalistic explanations for natural phenomena: we explain earthquakes by plate tectonics; why things fall down by gravity; why chordates have homologous body plans by evolution. We no longer explain why rocks fall in terms of divine vengeance, but rather in terms of the theory of gravity. We rightly reject explanations for the earth sciences like the one I heard offered in 2005 by Muslims in the southern part of Sumatra for why Muslims in the north were killed by the tsunami, namely that God sent it because they were sinful! But metaphysical naturalism is also rightly rejected, as it leaves no room for God, or for religious experience, or for theology. So what are we to do?

An interesting exploration of this problem was made by theologians and scientists under the sponsorship of the Vatican Observatory and the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences (CTNS) for whom I worked for six years. Over a decade and six conferences, these scholars discussed, argued, disagreed and agreed about the problem of how to envision divine action in a world investigated by science. Of course, they reached no definitive conclusions in their five volumes (ctns.org/books.html)), but they offered some intriguing possibilities. Some argued that the locus of divine action is at the level of quantum indeterminacy – God acts where quantum changes are undetermined. Although I don’t understand the physics that well, I have some doubts about this, because it might be a God-of-the-gaps solution; what happens when and if quantum events are more thoroughly understood? Some scholars argue for a both-and solution: although neuroscientists seem to have connected events of neuro-electrical excitement with reported claims of mystical experience, couldn’t both be true? Could God be communicating a mystical experience while at the same time the subject of the experience is undergoing a frontal lobe epileptic fit? I have a friend who achieved sobriety through an extraordinary experience of what she really believes can only have been God’s redeeming grace, although the circumstances of this she knows are quite explainable in naturalistic terms. I know a priest who experienced both his call to become a Catholic and his vocation to the priesthood through receiving the Eucharist while still a Protestant Fundamentalist!

In short, to your fascinating question, “Do you have any thoughts on being a Catholic and accepting the power of scientific theories without losing a sense of wonder about the world?” I would say that yes – I have developing thoughts on this, but far more to learn. I will ask two biologist friends who are better versed in this subject, Celia Deane-Drummond and Marty Hewlett.

Prayerfully,
Petrus

 

[buffalo]

An interesting exploration of this problem was made by theologians and scientists under the sponsorship of the Vatican Observatory and the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences (CTNS) for whom I worked for six years. Over a decade and six conferences, these scholars discussed, argued, disagreed and agreed about the problem of how to envision divine action in a world investigated by science. Of course, they reached no definitive conclusions in their five volumes (ctns.org/books.html), but they offered some intriguing possibilities. Some argued that the locus of divine action is at the level of quantum indeterminacy – God acts where quantum changes are undetermined. Although I don’t understand the physics that well, I have some doubts about this, because it might be a God-of-the-gaps solution; what happens when and if quantum events are more thoroughly understood? Some scholars argue for a both-and solution: although neuroscientists seem to have connected events of neuro-electrical excitement with reported claims of mystical experience, couldn’t both be true? Could God be communicating a mystical experience while at the same time the subject of the experience is undergoing a frontal lobe epileptic fit? I have a friend who achieved sobriety through an extraordinary experience of what she really believes can only have been God’s redeeming grace, although the circumstances of this she knows are quite explainable in naturalistic terms. I know a priest who experienced both his call to become a Catholic and his vocation to the priesthood through receiving the Eucharist while still a Protestant Fundamentalist!

There will always be a least one gap, unless you are God.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

Homeric, this is a great question. I don’t know how to start a new thread (I’ve looked all over the website for instructions) but it probably belongs on a new thread on “Divine Action” or something like that.

What you ask is really the crux of the matter, and I don’t have a clear answer to this question for myself. Scholars in the science and religion dialogue distinguish between (1) methodological naturalism, the legitimate restriction of scientific method to what can be known about nature through reason alone, and (2) metaphysical naturalism, or the declaration that the only reality that exists is that which can be known through empirical naturalistic methods.

Methodological naturalism is quite legitimate. We look for naturalistic explanations for natural phenomena: we explain earthquakes by plate tectonics; why things fall down by gravity; why chordates have homologous body plans by evolution. We no longer explain why rocks fall in terms of divine vengeance, but rather in terms of the theory of gravity. We rightly reject explanations for the earth sciences like the one I heard offered in 2005 by Muslims in the southern part of Sumatra for why Muslims in the north were killed by the tsunami, namely that God sent it because they were sinful! But metaphysical naturalism is also rightly rejected, as it leaves no room for God, or for religious experience, or for theology. So what are we to do?

An interesting exploration of this problem was made by theologians and scientists under the sponsorship of the Vatican Observatory and the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences (CTNS) for whom I worked for six years. Over a decade and six conferences, these scholars discussed, argued, disagreed and agreed about the problem of how to envision divine action in a world investigated by science. Of course, they reached no definitive conclusions in their five volumes (ctns.org/books.html)), but they offered some intriguing possibilities. Some argued that the locus of divine action is at the level of quantum indeterminacy – God acts where quantum changes are undetermined. Although I don’t understand the physics that well, I have some doubts about this, because it might be a God-of-the-gaps solution; what happens when and if quantum events are more thoroughly understood? Some scholars argue for a both-and solution: although neuroscientists seem to have connected events of neuro-electrical excitement with reported claims of mystical experience, couldn’t both be true? Could God be communicating a mystical experience while at the same time the subject of the experience is undergoing a frontal lobe epileptic fit? I have a friend who achieved sobriety through an extraordinary experience of what she really believes can only have been God’s redeeming grace, although the circumstances of this she knows are quite explainable in naturalistic terms. I know a priest who experienced both his call to become a Catholic and his vocation to the priesthood through receiving the Eucharist while still a Protestant Fundamentalist!

In short, to your fascinating question, “Do you have any thoughts on being a Catholic and accepting the power of scientific theories without losing a sense of wonder about the world?” I would say that yes – I have developing thoughts on this, but far more to learn. I will ask two biologist friends who are better versed in this subject, Celia Deane-Drummond and Marty Hewlett.

Prayerfully,
Petrus

I just have some random statements. I’m not sure they help the dialogue. I’m utterly fascinated by what you two have written, and these thoughts came to mind.

I think of God as prime mover, setting all the laws and then letting her rip. I don’t see God as a meddler, that seems to contradict his all-knowingness, all-powerfulness, but mostly his total lovingness. I guess I think God set his own boundries when he Thought, and the universe became.

I’m told by those fancy physicists that sub-particles don’t move randomly, but sometimes “choose” their direction.

I’m told that by merely looking at something, we’ve changed its natural movement.

i guess I see intelligence within everything, and God is that intelligence. When God meets up with one of his evolved creatures who has attained sentience, then God actively enters the world in a big way. Jesus is the prime example of that.

I’m not sure if I’ve understood correctly. It’s that "out of the mouths of …well Im not a kid…but…ya know, I might inadvertently say something valuable.! …lol…

Thanks you guys, I’m learning a lot and soaking it up like a sponge.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

Do you have any thoughts on being a Catholic and accepting the power of scientific theories without losing a sense of wonder about the world?

A can never cease being awed by the universe and this planet and all it contains. And God, in my mind, knew just what to do, to a perfection, knowing that His Universe would mix and remix his elements until such wonders were accomplished. View a Humpback whale,and then look at the hummingbird, then drop 7 miles into the trench of the Atlantic or Pacific, and see jelly fish that light up the pitch black, things more strange than anything imaged in science fiction. And I can communicate with this Master Builder! Me…little me…if that doesnt humble ya, nothing will.

 

[drpmjhess]

I’m utterly fascinated by what you two have written, and these thoughts came to mind.

I think of God as prime mover, setting all the laws and then letting her rip. I don’t see God as a meddler, that seems to contradict his all-knowingness, all-powerfulness, but mostly his total lovingness. I guess I think God set his own boundries when he Thought, and the universe became.

I guess I see intelligence within everything, and God is that intelligence. When God meets up with one of his evolved creatures who has attained sentience, then God actively enters the world in a big way. Jesus is the prime example of that.
.

Dear SpiritMeadow,

These are interesting questions you raise. I am not a physicist, but I have heard physicists at interdisciplinary conferences refer to the self-direction of particles. The math is beyond me!

I am myself cautious about using Aristotelian “prime mover” language to refer to God, particularly if it can be interpreted in a deistic sense of “setting all the laws and then letting her rip.” The problem you point to is how (1) to conceive of God as endowing the universe with its own integrity to evolve and unfold in myriad ways, but (2) not to conceive of God as so divorced from the cosmos that God’s personal involvement is ruled out.

Theism requires that the way be open for divine contact at some level.
(1) In order for revelation to happen (Torah, Bible, Qur’an, other scriptures) the universe cannot be hermetically sealed off from God.
(2) For Christians, of course, the paradigmatic instance of divine intervention is the relationship between God and Jesus – divine transcendence in union with divine immanence.
(3) Religious experience presupposes communication between God and God’s creation. A Native American scholar I know has had deep religious experiences that deism would not permit.
(4) Miracles also presuppose an openness of the created order to the divine

As to your suggestion that “intelligence [is] within everything, and God is that intelligence,” I wonder if you’re speaking about the interesting proposal, made by a number of theologians, of “panentheism.” Pantheism is of course ruled out: the idea that all is God (or God is all) is incompatible with the Christian idea of a God-world, Creator-creature duality. But Panentheism – the notion that everything in the universe resides in God, and therefore in a sense God is in everything – has possbilities. Nicholas of Cusa (1401-1464), a German philosopher, mathematician, and astronomer later created cardinal, developed interesting arguments in De Docta Ignorantia (Of Learned Ignorance). Cusa contributed the concept of the infinitesimal to mathematics, and demonstrated his unity of vision in applying the famous saying that God is “a sphere of which the center is everywhere and the circumference nowhere” (originally from a twelfth-century pseudo-Hermetic treatise) to the universe as a whole. The universe might be said to reside within the sphere that is God.

I think we need to maintain very carefully the distinction between creator and creation – and here I would reject a Hindu monism in which the world emanates from and returns to God – and yet recognize the importance of Cusa’s insight.

What do you think?
Petrus

 

[SpiritMeadow]

Petreus,

Your education is much greater than mine. I know I’m dangerously close to heretical stuff here. And I think I need to research and be clear what I understand between deism, theism, pantheism, and the other you mentioned. I have considered that God created out of Himself without diminishing Himself in any way. And I then struggle with how God actively interacts and when. I have difficulty with a loving God, and the reality of an incredibly violent planet, one in which billions have now died horrible deaths after mostly thankless lives. To posit an active God who intervenes regularly and at will who allows this and somehow fashioned all this death as part of a “plan” is a concept I don’t know as I wish to swallow, let alone can.

I’m going to spend some time researching. Perhaps, I’ll have a better answer tomorrow. In any case you sure make me think which is darn rare on the internet I’m finding.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

Petrus,

After doing some research I am most definitely aligned with the panentheism crowd. I can definitely reject the other three as being incorrect in my opinion. There is an interesting article on it at Wikipedia. I was most amused to find that non-Catholic faith systems which, you guessed it, came from a panentheistic viewpoint,( native americans for one) are one;s I’ve always felt a resonance with.

Figuring out God is like putting a puzzle together I find…lol…It’s just that as soon as you think you’re close, you find another 500 pieces that need to find a home …

I think I’m still not heretical.

 

[Johenz]

A nice, short discussion (maybe 250 pages) for laymen which reconciles science and Genesis is “The Science of God” by Gerald Schroeder. His discussion correlating the Biblical seven days to the scientific 15 billion years is fascinating (even if I don’t follow all the math).

Dr Schroeder is a physicist (?) and Jewish Biblical scholar, and some of his insights based on Jewish Rabbinic tradition and kabbalah (the real Jewish mysticism, no the ersatz stuff so popular today) is really cool.

He has a website at www.geraldschroeder.com.

 

[drpmjhess]

SpiritMeadow, you’re not heretical to find panentheism a useful insight, but it is only one dimension of the God-world relationship. In Christian theology the Incarnation in Jesus is part of the paradigmatic instance of God’s involvement with the world (the other part is God’s continuing presence through the Holy Spirit). We can read the Incarnation in light of a panentheistic ontology, but panentheism by itself is not sufficient.

As to your other question – the problem of suffering – that is an ongoing conundrum. Too many theologians lightly dismissed it, or twisted the science to justify it. I have a friend who has written eight books on the relationship between science and religion, who made the extraordinary and unconvincing claim that when a deer is torn apart by a lion it goes into shock and thus feels no pain. The best treatment I can recommend is an essay Jack Haught published last year entitled “What if theologians took evolutionary suffering seriously?” He hits the issue head on, and declares that no theology is sufficient hat does not honestly address the problem of hundreds of millions of years of pain involved in the predation that drives natural selection (at least after the evolution of complex nervous systems). He envisions God as taking up this suffering into the divine experience, not standing aloof and watching us creatures suffer. Haught, John F. “What if theologians took evolution seriously?” New Theology Review 18:4 (2005), 10-20.

Best wishes,
Petrus

 

[richardwy]

answersingenesis.org/

I’ve no problem at all with evolution because I am happy to believe the Gensis account.

Revelation and reason. It’s nice to have such good company as the Saints and Doctors of the Church.

I also like the stance of the Answers in Genesis folks which is roughly God says ABC and Y’all say XYZ. We go with God. And they dig into the science too. They are not anti-truth at all.

This linky lays out simply what they see to be the crux of the matter: answersingenesis.org/articles/nab/could-god-have-created-in-six-days

 

[SpiritMeadow]

SpiritMeadow, you’re not heretical to find panentheism a useful insight, but it is only one dimension of the God-world relationship. In Christian theology the Incarnation in Jesus is part of the paradigmatic instance of God’s involvement with the world (the other part is God’s continuing presence through the Holy Spirit). We can read the Incarnation in light of a panentheistic ontology, but panentheism by itself is not sufficient.

**I see you point here I will give this additional thought.Does God interject Jesus and the Holy Spirit in an attempt to pull back a recalcitrant humanity from the brink of disaster? You’re making my head swirl with possibilities. **

As to your other question – the problem of suffering – that is an ongoing conundrum. Too many theologians lightly dismissed it, or twisted the science to justify it. I have a friend who has written eight books on the relationship between science and religion, who made the extraordinary and unconvincing claim that when a deer is torn apart by a lion it goes into shock and thus feels no pain. The best treatment I can recommend is an essay Jack Haught published last year entitled “What if theologians took evolutionary suffering seriously?” He hits the issue head on, and declares that no theology is sufficient hat does not honestly address the problem of hundreds of millions of years of pain involved in the predation that drives natural selection (at least after the evolution of complex nervous systems). He envisions God as taking up this suffering into the divine experience, not standing aloof and watching us creatures suffer. Haught, John F. “What if theologians took evolution seriously?” New Theology Review 18:4 (2005), 10-20.

**Yes, my difficulty has been if God can intervene and does intervene, then He doesn’t intervene enough. If God chooses never to interevene in the day to day business but only as I suggested above, then I am okay. I do believe that God enters into our suffering, as he enters into all our emotions. Everything for me flows from a belief that God is love, thus all objective reality must be squared with that, God cannot act unlovingly. I find arguments that we are children who need chastisement and correction to be basically childish arguments and an attempt to graft parenthood onto God. I don’t see Jesus’ reference to God as his father as that literal, but more suggestive of a blood relationship in terms of deep closeness. **

Best wishes,
Petrus

blessings Petrus, and keep me thinking!

 

[drpmjhess]

answersingenesis.org/

I also like the stance of the Answers in Genesis folks which is roughly God says ABC and Y’all say XYZ. We go with God. And they dig into the science too. They are not anti-truth at all.l]

Richardwy, you’re right that Faith and reason are integrally related. Regrettably, Answers in Genesis rejects reason in favor of an impoverished faith. The new “museum” is not a natural history museum by any standard, but a sort of Fundamentalist “Disneyland” complete with dioramas of children happily playing with (presumably vegetarian!) baby Tyrannosauri rex.

Here is the statement signed in May, 2007 by 1,000 scientists in the tri-state area (Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana):

“We, the undersigned scientists at universities and colleges in Kentucky, Ohio, and Indiana, are concerned about scientifically inaccurate materials at the Answers in Genesis museum. Students who accept this material as scientifically valid are unlikely to succeed in science courses at the college level. These students will need remedial instruction in the nature of science, as well as in the specific areas of science misrepresented by Answers in Genesis.”

 

[richardwy]

I’m aware that coming out and saying, “Yes, I believe Genesis is so,” will yield responses such as, “these folks say it’s bunk.”

Even so, I believe.

 

[drpmjhess]

I’m aware that coming out and saying, “Yes, I believe Genesis is so,” will yield responses such as, “these folks say it’s bunk.” Even so, I believe.

Richard, even though Matthew and Luke offer contradictory and incompatible genealogies for Jesus – and genealogies that are in any case useless for establishing the virginally-conceived Jesus’ descent from David – I don’t think many Catholics would say “It’s bunk.” We would say that we believe the gospel writers had sound theological intentions in articulating their own differing versions of Jesus human integration into the Abrahamic-Mosaic-Davidic salvation history of the Jewish people.

Likewise, we believe the spiritual truth of Genesis 1-3:
(1) God created the world
(2) The world is fundamentally good
(3) Humans – as a rational species – have a special role to play in God’s creation
(4) Human actions carry deep moral consequences
(5) There is a disharmony in the cosmos that can only be addressed through God’s atoning work.

None of this is bunk, and none of it is incompatible with the vision of an ancient, dynamic and evolving universe.

Petrus

 

[richardwy]

When I used the word “bunk” I was thinking of the scientific crowd.

Would you mind explaining and fleshing out what you mean by “The world is fundamentally good?”

Thanks!

 

[drpmjhess]

Would you mind explaining and fleshing out what you mean by “The world is fundamentally good?”

Thanks!

In Genesis, God recognizes six times that the created world is good (Gen. 1:10,12 18, 21, 25, 31).
Petrus

 

[richardwy]

I agree wholeheartedly. Unfortunately, something happened after that. As I look out my window I see the world albiet a tiny part of it. I’m not looking at the world of Genesis 1 and 2 but of Genesis 3.