[PatrickHenry]

You might find this interesting, especially paragraphs 67-70, which bear on the science issue. Paragraph 69 discusses Intelligent Design. The document was developed during the period 2000-2001. A note at the end says that it "... was then submitted to Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, the President of the Commission, who has give his permission for its publication." COMMUNION AND STEWARDSHIP: Human Persons Created in the Image of God.

[StJacques]

"You might find this interesting, especially paragraphs 67-70 . . ."

Thank you for that link. I remember seeing at least portions of this tract at a neighbor's house one day, over three years ago if I remember correctly, when he brought it out, remembering as he did that we had once discussed the topic.

I think the truly key paragraphs in that section you pointed me to are 68, and especially 69. I'd like to do a little quick excerpting if I may:

From Paragraph 68:

. . . In freely willing to create and conserve the universe, God wills to activate and to sustain in act all those secondary causes whose activity contributes to the unfolding of the natural order which he intends to produce. Through the activity of natural causes, God causes to arise those conditions required for the emergence and support of living organisms, and, furthermore, for their reproduction and differentiation. . . .

It's the part about all those secondary causes whose activity contributes to the unfolding of the natural order that creates a distance between materialistic science and metaphysical inquiry. The material is secondary to the metaphysical. And the use of the phrase God causes to arise those conditions required for the emergence and support of living organisms, and, furthermore, for their reproduction and differentiation cannot be very comforting to Young Earth Creationists and Intelligent Design advocates, but really does show why the Theory of Evolution is not incompatible with Catholic Doctrine, since it does not see man as demeaned if the material causes of his physical origin -- Paragraph 70 makes very clear that God is the immediate cause of man's spiritual origin -- were of the natural world, since God caused the emergence of that natural world.

And from Paragraph 69:

. . . The nub of this currently lively disagreement involves scientific observation and generalization concerning whether the available data support inferences of design or chance, and cannot be settled by theology. But it is important to note that, according to the Catholic understanding of divine causality, true contingency in the created order is not incompatible with a purposeful divine providence. Divine causality and created causality radically differ in kind and not only in degree. Thus, even the outcome of a truly contingent natural process can nonetheless fall within God’s providential plan for creation. . . . Any evolutionary mechanism that is contingent can only be contingent because God made it so. . . .

For the Young Earth Creationists, and even for many supporters of Intelligent Design, the statement; true contingency in the created order is not incompatible with a purposeful divine providence, is just too much to swallow.

And I didn't read anything in all of that which I would take to be supportive of Intelligent Design whatsoever, from the Catholic perspective.