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THE CATHOLIC CHURCH EMBRACES EVOLUTION!!!!
MuscleHead Revolution ^ | 11.14.2005 | Kevin McCullough

Posted on 11/14/2005 5:12:54 AM PST by jodiluvshoes

In a remarkably odd statement this past week, the Vatican has issued a stout defence of Charles Darwin!

In fact Cardinal Paul Poupard, head of the Pontifical Council for Culture said that "if the Bible were read correctly" that the Genesis description of how God created the universe and Darwin's theory of evolution were "perfectly compatible."

"The fundamentalists want to give a scientific meaning to words that had no scientific aim," he said at a Vatican press conference. He said the real message in Genesis was that "the universe didn't make itself and had a creator".

He went on to advocate that the idea of creation is a theological one, while the substance of origins is a scientific one and that Catholics should "know" how science sees such things so as to "understand better."

(Excerpt) Read more at muscleheadrevolution.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Miscellaneous; News/Current Events; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: catholicchurch; darwin; evolution; intelligentdesign; shazam
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To: Sensei Ern
I am not a Catholic, but your thread verily drips with anti-Catholic venom.
All of the inventions that made the modern world what it is today were invented during the Middle Ages: the lens, the mechanical clock, distilling, crop rotation, the harness, the magnetic compass, gunpowder, the movable printing press, cheap pulp-type paper, etc. Many of these were invented in monasterys, which acted as R & D centers, as well as repositories for both secular and religious knowledge. Please get your facts straight before you go on a rant. You only reveal your lack of sophistication.
181 posted on 11/14/2005 10:35:37 AM PST by attiladhun2 (evolution has both deified and degraded humanity)
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To: swain_forkbeard

The entire TOE is based on random chance and meaninglessness. God never does anything without a purpose, and usually many purposes.

One can speculate about the nature of God for billions of years, to no avail.

Or one can undertake seriously a spiritual path to know the truth.

Your choice.


182 posted on 11/14/2005 10:38:24 AM PST by little jeremiah
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To: Blessed

No sir, you are confusing Evangelical, with evangelical.

One is a noun, the other is an adjective.

evangelical

adj 1: relating to or being a Christian church believing in personal conversion and the inerrancy of the Bible especially the 4 Gospels; "evangelical Christianity"; "an ultraconservative evangelical message" 2: of or pertaining to or in keeping with the Christian gospel especially as in the first 4 books of the New Testament 3: marked by ardent or zealous enthusiasm for a cause


183 posted on 11/14/2005 10:43:25 AM PST by HamiltonJay
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To: SoothingDave

To try to fit God the creator into the TOE, one has to deny the very premise of the TOE.

All scriptures of the world that I am familiar with state that God created all life forms at the very beginning of creation. He didn't evolve them.

People want to fit the concept of God the creator into the TOE because they don't want to be labeled as knuckle dragging fanatics by the educated elites.

Well, I say screw the educated elites. I don't care about thier opinions, which only serve as weights about their necks.


184 posted on 11/14/2005 10:43:41 AM PST by little jeremiah
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To: little jeremiah
To try to fit God the creator into the TOE, one has to deny the very premise of the TOE.

Fine by me. If the "very premise" of evolution is that there is no God, and everything is random, I have no problem abandoning that. This doesn't mean we throw out the baby with the bathwater.

All scriptures of the world that I am familiar with state that God created all life forms at the very beginning of creation. He didn't evolve them.

What is the difference? God created you, too, from before the beginning of time, and yet you didn't come into existence until a long chain of humans before you were born and then mated.

People want to fit the concept of God the creator into the TOE because they don't want to be labeled as knuckle dragging fanatics by the educated elites.

Are you allowed to use psychoanalysis? There's no mention of that in the Bible?

SD

185 posted on 11/14/2005 10:48:43 AM PST by SoothingDave
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To: attiladhun2
Many of these were invented in monasterys, which acted as R & D centers, as well as repositories for both secular and religious knowledge

Correct. Many famous scientists, like Gregor Mendel, were monks (gunpowder was actually invented by the Chinese.)

186 posted on 11/14/2005 10:48:49 AM PST by A Ruckus of Dogs
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To: attiladhun2
"I am not a Catholic, but your thread verily drips with anti-Catholic venom. All of the inventions that made the modern world what it is today were invented during the Middle Ages: the lens, the mechanical clock, distilling, crop rotation, the harness, the magnetic compass, gunpowder, the movable printing press, cheap pulp-type paper, etc. Many of these were invented in monasterys, which acted as R & D centers, as well as repositories for both secular and religious knowledge. Please get your facts straight before you go on a rant. You only reveal your lack of sophistication."

Gunpowder must have been made by Chinese Catholics.
Much of what you listed was from the voyage of Marco Polo.

Although the banter of these posts make it seem otherwise, I do not hate Catholics. I do not have any patience for religious tyranny and mis-information.

187 posted on 11/14/2005 10:49:57 AM PST by Sensei Ern (Now, IB4Z! http://trss.blogspot.com/)
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To: HamiltonJay

>>>Evolution does not debunk God.<<<

It proclaims the opposite of the God of Israel and Christianity who gives us prophecy. Prophecy can only be fulfilled if the future is preordained. Evolution is based on a lack of preordination (e.g., a lack of intelligent design).

Of course, a reasonable person might ask, "If God designed life then why did he make liberals?" Well, God did imply he created some mistakes, but those mistakes will eventually be corrected or destroyed.

>>>The Catholic Church at least from the 1950s on (possibly even before) has stated that evolution is not in conflict with the faith.<<<

New-fangled constitutional interpretions include a "Wall of Separation of Church and State", which is also nonsense.


188 posted on 11/14/2005 11:02:42 AM PST by PhilipFreneau ("Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." - James 4:7)
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To: SoothingDave

First of all, I don't use the Bible as my only source of knowledge about God, His purposes, and so on.

Second, I am not the physical body, so "my" existence did not start with the conception of the body.

Regarding psychoanalysis, it's another speculative method to try to understand consciousness. Partly right and a great deal wrong, like all efforts based on speculation.


189 posted on 11/14/2005 11:05:20 AM PST by little jeremiah
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To: little jeremiah
First of all, I don't use the Bible as my only source of knowledge about God, His purposes, and so on.

I have no clue why you would say this. You seem to want to erect a strawman that says "'evolution' means all is random and there is no God; therefore God could not have created through a process of gradual change in species over time."

Second, I am not the physical body, so "my" existence did not start with the conception of the body.

So, did God create your body or not?

Regarding psychoanalysis, it's another speculative method to try to understand consciousness. Partly right and a great deal wrong, like all efforts based on speculation.

Apply this to your previous statement about the motives of thse who disagree with you.

SD

190 posted on 11/14/2005 11:12:02 AM PST by SoothingDave
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To: PhilipFreneau
Evolution is based on a lack of preordination (e.g., a lack of intelligent design).

The theory of evolution does no such thing. It says changes occur over time, due to stimulus of their environment, it does not say that such changes are not directed by larger forces. It is a theory explaining the HOW, not the WHY.

Change itself is visible evidence of God, and has been an accepted tenament of Catholicism since at least the 1200's if not before.... St. Thomas Aquina first mover postulate has been accepted since its publication, if not before.

191 posted on 11/14/2005 11:13:53 AM PST by HamiltonJay
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To: Sensei Ern
Your point about Father. Despite whether calling one's sperm donor father is correct or not, it still does not justify the Catholic Church's adopting a title that Christ explicitly said don't.

Despite your thinking you know what Christ explicitly said, and despite your interpretation of what you think Christ said, it still does not justify you offending me with your anti Catholic bigotry.

192 posted on 11/14/2005 11:26:04 AM PST by jgorris
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To: SoothingDave

Gotta run out the door, so I can't address all your points. But this one - because I consider psychoanalysis extremely flawed, I can't determine motives? That's an odd connection. Just because psychoananysis may be more wrong than right, no one can understand peoples' minds?

The fact is that the TOE proponents themselves state that there is no God in control and everything developed by random chance. I don't see a straw man at all.


193 posted on 11/14/2005 11:26:33 AM PST by little jeremiah
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To: little jeremiah
People want to fit the concept of God the creator into the TOE because they don't want to be labeled as knuckle dragging fanatics by the educated elites.

Exactly. Can't put it anymore simply than that.
194 posted on 11/14/2005 11:28:07 AM PST by JamesP81
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To: little jeremiah
The fact is that the TOE proponents themselves state that there is no God in control and everything developed by random chance. I don't see a straw man at all.

But that's not what Catholics are saying. What we are saying is that God may have (may have, mind you) used evolutionary evolving in the way He created the world. There is nothing in the scientific record which precludes a Creator being the driving force behind seemingly "random" occurences.

SD

195 posted on 11/14/2005 11:33:01 AM PST by SoothingDave
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To: JamesP81

I'll have you know that my knuckles are several inches off the ground, and I have a great many (well, more than half) of my natural teeth.


196 posted on 11/14/2005 11:36:57 AM PST by little jeremiah
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To: SoothingDave

Yes, but if the events are not really random, then that completely undercuts the TOE basic claims.

Really gotta run now!

Fascinating discourse. You've read "Shattering the Myths of Darwinism" or "Darwin on Trial"?


197 posted on 11/14/2005 11:39:44 AM PST by little jeremiah
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To: JamesP81
There is no middle ground with the Bible. Either God created the Earth in 6 days, or the Bible is wrong.

Six days for God is not necessarily the same thing as six days in Earth time.
198 posted on 11/14/2005 11:42:57 AM PST by joseph20
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To: little jeremiah
Yes, but if the events are not really random, then that completely undercuts the TOE basic claims.

I'm not interested in what the "TOE" claims. I am interested in the truth and what the Church says about it. It's not necessary to equate evolutionary processes with "godlessness." If the Church says that one may believe that there are evolutionary processes at work, this does not mean there is no God. There is no conflict.

The conflict people have is with their tortured reading of Genesis and conflicts between the 6 day creation found there and scientific evidence otherwise.

SD

199 posted on 11/14/2005 11:43:13 AM PST by SoothingDave
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To: Wolfstar
I also understand fully that there is no use discussing such subjects with rigid religious fundamentalists, no matter what religion they practice.

Here's a misconception: christianity is not a religion. It's a personal relationship with God through Christ. Dogmatic legalism is generally against Christianity, but this fact doesn't seem to be well known.

Just for reference and future study, give me some examples of other religious fundamentalists with similar attitudes as mine if you don't mind.
200 posted on 11/14/2005 11:49:06 AM PST by JamesP81
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