Why do fundamentalists believe the world is 6000-10000 years old?

[itinerant1]

•        We must believe any interpretation of Scripture that the Fathers taught           unanimously on a matter of faith or morals (Council of Trent and           Vatican Council I).

•        All the Fathers who wrote on the subject believed that the Creation days           were no longer than 24-hour-days. (Consensus of the Fathers of the           Church)

•        St. Peter and Christ Himself in the New Testament confirmed the global           Flood of Noah. It covered all the then high mountains and destroyed           all land dwelling creatures except eight human beings and                all kinds of non-human creatures aboard the Ark (*Unam           Sanctam*, 1302)

•        The historical existence of Noah’s Ark is regarded as most important           in typology, as central to Redemption. (1566 *Catechism           of the Council of Trent*)

Why do you creationists keep repeating your posts even though they have bee shown to be flawed? This is one of your oft repeated posts that has been adequately addressed as flawed.

For example,

1. “All the Fathers who wrote on the subject believed that the Creation days were no longer than 24-hour-days. (Consensus of the Fathers of the Church).” This statement statement is deliberately misleading because, (a) the Church typically invokes the “consensus of the Fathers” in matters of faith and morals and a literal reading of “days” in Genesis 1 does not lie within matters of faith and morals according to, “We must believe any interpretation of Scripture that the Fathers taught unanimously on a matter of faith or morals (Council of Trent and Vatican Council I)”; and (b) there was absolutely no consensus of the Church Fathers on the “days” in Genesis 1.

I have posted enough quotes from the Church Fathers regarding “1b” that your re-posting of the list uncorrected shows you are not interested in facts. I say get the facts first. Present the facts. And then you can distort them later.

1. “The historical existence of Noah’s Ark is regarded as most important in typology, as central to Redemption. (1566 Catechism of the Council of Trent).” On the contrary, no statement by the Council of Trent requires an interpretation of the Ark as literal and historical. The Council of Trent was interested in the typological meaning of the Noah story as can be seen by the following quotes from Catechism of the Council of Trent:

“She (the church) is also called universal, because all who desire eternal salvation must cling to and embrace her, like those who entered the ark to escape perishing in the flood.” “… the ark of Noah … was a symbol of the Church, which God has so constituted that all who enter herein through Baptism may be safe from danger or eternal death, while such as are outside the Church, like those who were not in the ark are overwhelmed by their own crimes.”

“…and, long before, we trace a figure and striking resemblance of the Church in the ark of Noah, which contained not only clean, but also unclean animals.”

“Following no chief but Christ, I am united in communion with your Holiness, that is, Avith the chair of Peter. I know that on that rock is built the Church. Whoever will eat the lamb outside this house is profane: who ever is not in the ark of Noah shall perish in the flood.”

“Amongst these figures the ark of Noah holds a conspicuous place. It was constructed by the command of God, 1 in order, no doubt, to signify the Church, which God has so constituted, as that who ever enters her, through baptism, may be safe from all danger
of eternal death, while such as are not within her, like those who were not in the ark, are overwhelmed by their own crimes.”

“…united in communion with your Holiness, that is, Avith the chair of Peter. I know that on that rock is built the Church. Whoever will eat the lamb outside this house is profane : who ever is not in the ark of Noah shall perish in the flood.”

The same conclusion holds for Unam sanctum, which says, “There had been at the time of the deluge only one ark of Noah, prefiguring the one Church, which ark, having been finished to a single cubit, had only one pilot and guide, i.e., Noah, and we read that, outside of this ark, all that subsisted on the earth was destroyed.”

Again, the same conclusion hold to references to the “days of Noah” and so on in the New Testament. The references lie within the literary tradition and do not constitute proof that the Deluge was global or that remnants of the Ark may someday be found on top Mt. Aratat.

BTW, when do plan on posting your flawed and erroneous list again?

 

[Mystic_Banana]

Anyone who is intellectually honest will admit that the earth is over 4 billion years old and that all living things including the human body (not the soul) are the products of evolution. This is in no way contrary to the faith or a threat to the faith. We need Faith and Reason! And it also is worth mentioning that the last two popes have agreed with this as well. God is infinitely greater than we could ever imagine, why do we have to limit him to creating exactly as said in the (two) genesis creation accounts. The bible is not a scientific document, nor has it ever been claimed to be.

Anyone who is intellectually honest will admit that all the ‘proofs’ of the age of the Earth are pretty dodgy, if not desperately conspirational, and that really, we don’t have anything vaguely honestly resembling a good idea of how old it is - scientifically speaking, of course

 

[itinerant1]

Anyone who is intellectually honest will admit that all the ‘proofs’ of the age of the Earth are pretty dodgy, if not desperately conspirational, and that really, we don’t have anything vaguely honestly resembling a good idea of how old it is - scientifically speaking, of course

Explain how proofs of the Earth’s age are “dodgy”? I am not sure what you mean.

There are many conspiracy theories which I believe, but the dating of the Earth’s age will never be one of them. Explain this alleged conspiracy with supporting documentation.

If you can’t provide good evidence, then you have no grounds for your ideological views.

 

[dz102789]

Ed,

The Church is not an authority on science, but certainly it has a duty to combat scientism (as we obviously see in the prevailing attitudes of many secularists toward abortion and stem cell research). There is nothing contrary to the faith in evolution, what is contrary to the faith is using such scientific findings to try and dismiss God. I respectfully stand by my statement that intellectual honesty requires one to be open to the fact that evolution is “more than a theory” as the late and great Pope John Paul II said. I believe that the dismissal of evolution has more to do with it being seen as a threat to the faith than with one not being able to accept the evidence. Our faith stands up to all truths because it has It’s origin in Truth itself!

 In Christ,

               Dave

 

[itinerant1]

Can you provide a Church document that indicates how old the earth or the universe is?

Please read Part 64 of this document:

vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/cti_documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20040723_communion-stewardship_en.html

bringyou.to/apologetics/p81.htm

Pope Benedict XVI

Monod nonetheless finds the possibility for evolution in the fact that in the very propagation of the project there can be mistakes in the act of transmission. Because nature is conservative, these mistakes, once having come into existence, are carried on. Such mistakes can add up, and from the adding up of mistakes something new can arise. Now an astonishing conclusion follows: It was in this way that the whole world of living creatures, and human beings themselves, came into existence. We are the product of “haphazard mistakes.”

What response shall we make to this view? It is the affair of the natural sciences to explain how the tree of life in particular continues to grow and how new branches shoot out from it. This is not a matter for faith. But we must have the audacity to say that the great projects of the living creation are not the products of chance and error. Nor are they the products of a selective process to which divine predicates can be attributed in illogical, unscientific, and even mythic fashion. The great projects of the living creation point to a creating Reason and show us a creating Intelligence, and they do so more luminously and radiantly today than ever before. Thus we can say today with a new certitude and joyousness that the human being is indeed a divine project, which only the creating Intelligence was strong and great and audacious enough to conceive of. Human beings are not a mistake but something willed; they are the fruit of love. They can disclose in themselves, in the bold project that they are, the language of the creating Intelligence that speaks to them and that moves them to say: Yes, Father, you have willed me.

Peace,
Ed

Why do you keep posting this? First, you know the Church is not going to make official statements on what are matters for science alone. And you also know if Pope Benedict made a reference to the earth as billions of years old you would just say it’s not a matter of faith so no one has to believe it.

Communion and Stewardship objects to Darwinian materialist ideology only and makes no criticism whatsoever of evolution theory itself. So, what is your point?

The bottom line is your repetitive post has no relevance to anything being discussed here.

 

[itinerant1]

“satisfy reason”? I’ve done street witnessing. How is reason satisfied by saying Jesus died for your sins? One reply I got was: “Show me God. If you can show me God I might believe in him.” This man’s reason could not be satisfied unless I showed him God. You see?

Could you provide a Church document that indicates what the Church holds to be the age of the universe or the age of the earth?

Peace,
Ed

You have either misunderstood or you are misrepresenting by your responses what the Deacon said. The Deacon is unarguably correct. Your fundamentalist ideology is like a set of blinders that keeps you from seeing the truth.

 

[itinerant1]

Ed,

The Church is not an authority on science, but certainly it has a duty to combat scientism (as we obviously see in the prevailing attitudes of many secularists toward abortion and stem cell research). There is nothing contrary to the faith in evolution, what is contrary to the faith is using such scientific findings to try and dismiss God. I respectfully stand by my statement that intellectual honesty requires one to be open to the fact that evolution is “more than a theory” as the late and great Pope John Paul II said. I believe that the dismissal of evolution has more to do with it being seen as a threat to the faith than with one not being able to accept the evidence. Our faith stands up to all truths because it has It’s origin in Truth itself!

 In Christ,

               Dave

Right on, new guy!

 

[Namesake]

Ed,

(as we obviously see in the prevailing attitudes of many secularists toward abortion and stem cell research).

Just to correct you a little bit. Maybe, instead of saying “stem cell research”, you could say embryonic stem cell research? Adult stem cell research is providing many helpful advances in the treatment of a lot of problems afflicting humans without engendering the negative associations of abortion.

 

[dz102789]

Just to correct you a little bit. Maybe, instead of saying “stem cell research”, you could say embryonic stem cell research? Adult stem cell research is providing many helpful advances in the treatment of a lot of problems afflicting humans without engendering the negative associations of abortion.

Agreed!

 

[itinerant1]

Age of the Earth references posted earlier in this thread by Alec.

According to creationist ideologues, this is all a great conspiracy, LOL, to show the earth is billions of years old.

+++

Age of earth:
Claire Patterson, Age of meteorites and the earth, *Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta *10, 230 - 237

Wilde et al, Evidence from detrital zircons for the existence of continental crust and oceans on the Earth 4.4 Gyr ago, *Nature *409, 175 - 178

Wyche et al, 4350–3130 Ma detrital zircons in the Southern Cross Granite–Greenstone Terrane, Western Australia: implications for the early evolution of the Yilgarn Craton, Australian J Earth Sci 51, 31 - 45

Baker et al, Early planetesimal melting from an age of 4.5662 Gyr for differentiated meteorites, *Nature *436, 1127 - 1131

Manhes et al, U—Th—Pb systematics of the eucrite “Juvinas”: Precise age determination and evidence for exotic lead, *Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta *48, 2247 - 2264

Bowringand Williams, Priscoan (4.00-4.03 Ga) orthogneisses from northwestern Canada, Contributions to Mineralogy and Petrology 134, 3-16

Brent Dalrymple, The Age of the Earth, Stanford University Press, which includes references to many more that concur on a date of 4.54 billion years.

Age of universe since Big Bang:
Bennett et al, First Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe(WMAP) Observations: Preliminary Maps and Basic Results
Here

Spergel et al, First Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Determination of Cosmological Parameters
Here

Tegmark et al, Cosmological parameters from SDSS and WMAP

Spergel et al, *Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Three Year Results: Implications for Cosmology
*Here

+++
Looks pretty sinister and anti-Catholic to me!

 

[edwest2]

Ed,

The Church is not an authority on science, but certainly it has a duty to combat scientism (as we obviously see in the prevailing attitudes of many secularists toward abortion and stem cell research). There is nothing contrary to the faith in evolution, what is contrary to the faith is using such scientific findings to try and dismiss God. I respectfully stand by my statement that intellectual honesty requires one to be open to the fact that evolution is “more than a theory” as the late and great Pope John Paul II said. I believe that the dismissal of evolution has more to do with it being seen as a threat to the faith than with one not being able to accept the evidence. Our faith stands up to all truths because it has It’s origin in Truth itself!

 In Christ,

               Dave

Hi Dave,

The Church is an authority on science. It needs to completely understand new technologies and new discoveries in order to guide the faithful regarding them. It has written about embryonic stem cell research, cloning and in-vitro fertilization. The Church must have a full understanding of these issues so that she can teach the faithful.

There is the Pontifical Academy of Sciences:

vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_academies/acdscien/own/index_10121999.htm

And the National Catholic Bioethics Center:

ncbcenter.org/NetCommunity/Page.aspx?pid=183

Just to name a few.

You should read Part 64 of Communion and Stewardship and realize that the Church does not recognize just one theory but many and some are contrary to Catholic teaching:

vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/cti_documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20040723_communion-stewardship_en.html

Regarding this subject, the only prudent and intellectually honest position I can take is to be obedient to clear Church teaching, and recognize when it is being distorted for temporal gain.

Peace,
Ed

 

[spn82756]

Ah, that deliberate renaming. It’s like taking drugs through customs, and fooling them by referring to heroin as “powdered bulbweed seed” and cocaine as “powdered cola plant” - and them being convinced

Ah yes…all who believe that the universe is 13.7 billion years old are on drugs. The drug of reality.

 

[itinerant1]

Ah yes…all who believe that the universe is 13.7 billion years old are on drugs. The drug of reality.

I gonna take another big hit of that drug tonight by reading some astronomy books. I will be co-teaching an online astronomy course for homeschoolers. They will be learning about Big Bang, the age of the universe, and how to deal with creationist ideologues.

 

[dz102789]

Hi Dave,

The Church is an authority on science. It needs to completely understand new technologies and new discoveries in order to guide the faithful regarding them. It has written about embryonic stem cell research, cloning and in-vitro fertilization. The Church must have a full understanding of these issues so that she can teach the faithful.

Ed,

I agree that the Church need to understand new technologies and discoveries in order to guide them in their use. This falls under the Faith and Morals area which the Church and only the Church is THE authority on, but this does not make the Church an authority on science, but rather on the moral use of it. It is obvious that the Church (with the exception of scientists within the Church) is not making scientific discoveries or proclaiming scientific truths (which it does not have the authority to do, nor was it given the authority to do).

In Christ,

 Dave

 

[edwest2]

edwest2;6150423:

Hi Dave,

The Church is an authority on science. It needs to completely understand new technologies and new discoveries in order to guide the faithful regarding them. It has written about embryonic stem cell research, cloning and in-vitro fertilization. The Church must have a full understanding of these issues so that she can teach the faithful.

Ed,

I agree that the Church need to understand new technologies and discoveries in order to guide them in their use. This falls under the Faith and Morals area which the Church and only the Church is THE authority on, but this does not make the Church an authority on science, but rather on the moral use of it. It is obvious that the Church (with the exception of scientists within the Church) is not making scientific discoveries or proclaiming scientific truths (which it does not have the authority to do, nor was it given the authority to do).

In Christ,

 Dave

Dave,

Anyone can learn science. The Church has commented on science as science. Look up a monk named Gregor Mendel. And the Church has a relationship with science that was articulated by Pope John Paul II. It has always been that way.

Peace,
Ed

 

[kimmielittle]

I gonna take another big hit of that drug tonight by reading some astronomy books. I will be co-teaching an online astronomy course for homeschoolers. They will be learning about Big Bang, the age of the universe, and how to deal with creationist ideologues.

Hiyas

When will your course be available, please?

 

[itinerant1]

Hiyas

When will your course be available, please?

Howdy Kimmie,

I will PM you sometime later on Sunday with info on various courses coming up, including the Astronomy course.

Thomas

 

[spn82756]

Howdy Kimmie,

I will PM you sometime later on Sunday with info on various courses coming up, including the Astronomy course.

Thomas

Don’t listen to him Kimmie!!! He will poison you with the truth!

Steve

 

[Mystic_Banana]

Explain how proofs of the Earth’s age are “dodgy”? I am not sure what you mean.

There are many conspiracy theories which I believe, but the dating of the Earth’s age will never be one of them. Explain this alleged conspiracy with supporting documentation.

If you can’t provide good evidence, then you have no grounds for your ideological views.

Well, I’ve read a book about it recently, and actually, I’ve just noticed that it argues the Earth is 4.5 billion years old based on, erm, radiometrically testing a meteorite, which is assumed to have been created when the solar system and Earth were created. This was only pursued because the previous figure of 3 billion years didn’t match what the cosmologists thought it was . Why assume the meteorites came from the birth of the solar system? Best they could think of? Apparently…

The 13.7 billion year figure on the Universe comes from Sandage, examining the spectral characteristics of star clusters. The thing that gets me about cosmology is that ultimately, stars are far away, we can only really go on what we can see. We can’t verify that they are made of what we think they are, and I somehow doubt that we can even (genuinely) prove they are a) as far away as they are, b) as big as we think they are or c) have properties sufficiently consistent with our sun to allow us to calulate what goes on with them to any real degree of sufficiency. Didn’t the Universe shrink about 10 years ago (or rather, wasn’t it decided that it was smaller than previously thought about 10 years ago)?

Every time I encounter scientific fact, it reveals itself to be an assumption sitting on top of a whole lot of other assumptions. Hey-ho!

 

[Mystic_Banana]

Don’t listen to him Kimmie!!! He will poison you with the truth!

Steve

There is only one wholly irrefutable truth for each of us, scientifically speaking. The rest is just what is currently agreed on. If you don’t realise that… are you lot just ceaselessly rereading your textbooks until any other possibilities are driven from your brains?

Mind you, it’s all such an orthodoxy these days, I suppose you don’t really have to