I would like to address something specific because I bring seemingly extraneous arguments into the discussion like racism, abortion, and genocide; linking them to the evolution discussion. It is not an accusation of those who hold natural evolution as a valid explanation to either the origin of life or the diversity of life on Earth; it is an observance of how the natural evolution arguments support the ‘justification’ of racism, abortion and genocide among other things.
Is the bolded just a popular euphemism?
Hypatia said:
Beyond this guy being totally sick and the disgusting light it shines on the royal family, it also raises the problem of the sub-human status that most Asians have in the Gulf states.
There are many ways to debate these as it relates to evolution:
CHIMPANZEE HEALTH IMPROVEMENT,. MAINTENANCE, AND PROTECTION ACT
Spain’s parliament recently passed a resolution granting legal rights to apes.
Reaction has been mixed.
Evolutionists didn’t realize that when they were implying that humans are almost apes, they were also implying that apes are almost human. The
double-edged sword did not go unnoticed by animal rights activists, however.
About a month ago a group of two dozen Animal’s Rights experts were seeking to save some aquatic life off the coast of Greenville, Liberia. Liberia is located in Western Africa and borders the North Atlantic Ocean between Sierra Leone and Cote d’Ivoire. As they were about to provide food (human food) for the aquatic species that they were seeking to save, they were informed that a hundred babies in a nearby village needed the food in order to survive. The Animal’s Rights people responded by saying that the aquatic craniate vertebrates they were seeking to save would die in a day without the food. They were then told that the babies would die in a day without the food. The Animal’s Rights group responded by saying:
Evolution teaches the survival of the fittest. The aquatic life we are seeking to save is stronger and has a better chance of survival than the babies in the nearby village. Therefore, we owe it to the “bony fishes” and to the theory of evolution to the save these aquatic vertebrates.
My concern and objection to a pure ‘natural’ origin of life/evolution proposition is that it removes most all discussion about God in the process particularly of late (last 10 yeras or so) by religious scientists. Most of those pro-evolutionists debating in this thread never make the distinction between the origin of life and evolution but there needs to be- each and every time evolution is discussed.
I do not doubt the evidence that shows common descent for things but such evidence does not answer how the first organism came to be or in what form it was. When science proved the Earth was not the center of the universe as the Church once held, I do not think it changed the theology of the Created universe/human. Geologic evolution is not in conflict with theology but biologic evolution seems different. It seems to me at times an over reaction to embrace so fully the incomplete science of origin of life/evolution as a means harmonize it with theology.
As a Catholic I say often and believe the Creed in which it says Christ was begotten, not made. I have no expectation for the non-Catholic (religious or the non-religious) to accept that truth as I hold it, but it makes me question what ‘made’ means. So I use the example of the miracle of feeding the 5000 with fish that could be said to have been ‘made’; not just existing fish transported from a nearby lake to the empty baskets as an example of what being ‘made’ might mean as opposed to begotten with respect to those fish.
I do expect that the Truth of God is not contradictory so the true understanding of evolution cannot logically be misused for evil by either the religious or non-religious on purpose or out of ignorance. There are things in my faith that lead me to believe the human being is not just another evolved animal; from the physical bodily resurrection we hope to experience to the Eucharist as examples of the unique quality applied to human beings not applied to animals. I do not think the human soul is the only unique non-evolved quality to human beings that makes that so, nor do I think it is a geneitic shift at some point in the past.
I feel unless we (Catholics specifically) do not keep God in the equation of origin/evolution the information can be misused or misunderstood as noted in some examples above. Unless we keep theology we hold true in the equation we allow others to be led down a false path of information without proper guidence so my arguments are centered on that point more than if things change over time. It is why I think a reconclliation is needed between science and theology as it regards origin/evolution.
(hah! I remembered the smilie this time!)
I will await a Magisterial teaching that tells me the former teaching was in error. Until then you and I will be rehashing for the benefit of other lurkers and participants.
