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To: doc30; metmom; betty boop; Fichori; valkyry1; MrB; GodGunsGuts; Alamo-Girl; CottShop; ...
True Christians are smart enough to know a literal reading of the Bible is superficial and decidedly non-Christian.It belittles the greatness of God. The Catholic Church has learned that when physical reality and the Bible do not agree, it is the human interpretation of Scripture that needs to be re-examined.

I'm speechless.

65 posted on 01/08/2009 1:21:00 PM PST by tpanther (The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing---Edmund Burke)
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To: tpanther

“physical reality” -

notice, not even a nod to the idea that evidence of “physical reality” could be what is being misinterpreted.

For example, there once was an interpretation of physical reality that grain left in a box turns into mice.


66 posted on 01/08/2009 1:28:16 PM PST by MrB (The 0bamanation: Marxism, Infanticide, Appeasement, Depression, Thuggery, and Censorship)
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To: tpanther; doc30; Alamo-Girl; metmom; hosepipe; Fichori; valkyry1; MrB; GodGunsGuts; CottShop
doc 30: True Christians are smart enough to know a literal reading of the Bible is superficial and decidedly non-Christian. It belittles the greatness of God. The Catholic Church has learned that when physical reality and the Bible do not agree, it is the human interpretation of Scripture that needs to be re-examined.

tpanther: I'm speechless.

Why are you speechless tpanther? Doc30 is stating an assertion, and it can be rationally examined.

As written, the assertion itself seems ambiguous to me, IMHO. Though I grant that a man who thinks he can be the "measure" of all things — to make his own judgment the standard by which either Scripture or the Creation is to be assessed and understood — is seriously misguided.

My own view is that God declares Himself to Man through His twin revelations of Holy Scripture and "the Book of Nature." I have absolutely no reason to believe that the Book of Nature refutes anything in the Bible, which is the Source of Truth, according to whose criteria the "truth" of scientific activity seeking to explicate the laws of Nature ultimately must be judged.

For God is Logos; and in His two revelations He does not contradict Himself. (If He did, the world as we know it probably would not exist, and we — assuming we'd still be here at all — would have reason to doubt the "existence" of God....)

Holy Scripture ultimately defines what is possible for us to truthfully know about the Creation. It is the guide to human understanding of "our" world, sine qua non. This is a statement of faith; but it is not "unreasonable."

Moreoever, I don't think that the Magisterium of the Church trims itself to the findings of science, which often enough these days are matters of "fashion," and thus subject to change when the next new "fashion" gains currency. Timeless Truth does not change with time.

Truth is Truth, and implicates Beauty and the Good, with all its moral implications. It seems to me that the truly excellent scientists — at least some of them, such as Roger Penrose — know this, and take it as the guide to their own work — which is essentially a work of discovery of that which exists from the foundation of the world, not some kind of humanly conceived "new creation."

Not to say that Penrose holds himself out as a "religious" man. But I definitely sense he does not think or believe that there's anything "accidental" about the structure and order of the Universe. Man's job is simply to discover the fundamental nature of what exists, which is a divine "given."

Well, my two cents worth anyhoot, FWIW. One struggles to find adequate language to convey such insights....

86 posted on 01/08/2009 2:39:52 PM PST by betty boop
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