Actually, he hasn't distorted the view of the Catholic Church on evolution. From the old Catholic Encyclopedia(1909):
"This is the gist of the theory of evolution as a scientific hypothesis. It is in perfect agreement with the Christian conception of the universe; for Scripture does not tell us in what form the present species of plants and animals were originally created by God." And:
"The theory of evolution as a philosophical conception considers the entire history of the cosmos as an harmonious development, brought about by natural laws.. This conception is in agreement with the Christian view of the universe."
From John Henry Newman (1874: "I see nothing in the theory of evolution inconsistent with an Almighty Creator and Protector." From "The Question Box", Rev. Bertrand Conway, (1929), a Catholic book that sold millions of copies and was widely used in Catholic schools in the 1930s:
Q: “May a Catholic believe in evolution? …”
A: “As the Church has made no pronouncement upon evolution, Catholics are perfectly free to accept evolution, either as a scientific hypothesis or as a philosophical speculation. … [quoting Wasmann] “the most probable explanation of the origin of organic species.”
“Evolution is in no sense at variance with the theistic or Christian theory of life.”
The Catholic Church never condemned evolution or Darwinism.
Catholics who believe otherwise are simply very ignorant of the Church's teaching, probably because for the last 40 years no one has been taught anything about the history or teachings of the Catholic Church. (The best Protestant thinkers, such as C.S. Lewis, also saw nothing objectionable in the the theory of evolution as a biological theory.)
The pope does say that evolution should not be taken as a global view of all reality, a "theory of everything," which makes everything essentially meaningless.