Posted on 06/11/2014 7:36:49 PM PDT by Zionist Conspirator
What has Darwinism got in common with Modernism? Everything! They are two edges of the same blade.
A century ago, how could any Catholic dare question the Church’s dogmatic teaching and not be excommunicated as a heretic? The answer is that natural science has allegedly shown that nothing in the realm of the created world is immutable. It has proved thereby that the Church was wrong in dogmatically declaring that fully operating living beings with stable natures were produced from nothing.
The knowledge now amassed from biology, physics, and chemistry is already sufficient to render the notion of creation ex nihilo totally ridiculous. Magisterial teaching proclaiming such things as revealed truth has to stop! Thanks to Charles Darwin, Catholics have been liberated from centuries of ignorance imposed by the Church. Modernism is doing nothing more than seeking emancipation for the downtrodden. Only this morning, the parish priest told his congregation they had no need to worry, all their sins would be forgiven them (with the caveat regarding sins against the Holy Spirit) on the basis of Mark 3:28: Truly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the children of man, and whatever blasphemies they utter. To follow this logic, no one needed to have gone to church in the first place!
The troubling question remains, of course, whether Darwin got it right. Did he? Ay, there’s the rub…
Caving in to "science"
It appears that data from the disciplines of biology, physics and chemistry — now far more developed than they were in his day — are demonstrating the fatal flaws in the evolutionary hypothesis. Perhaps the God of Creation did not mislead his people for so many thousands of years after all…
Needless to say the hierarchy not only is unaware of this but refuse to listen to anyone who brings it to their attention. Indeed, the Pontifical Academy of Science admits no one to their number who contests evolution, and shields Church leaders from anti-evolution dissidents. Moreover, the seal of obedience of consecrated persons to their superiors guarantees that the hierarchy’s acceptance of Darwinism cannot be questioned. (In any case, how many clerics would want to debate such matters as the existence of pseudo-genes and whether they have a function?) “Leave natural science to trained scientists examining empirical facts,” they are told; “and leave religion to theologians who can discern the supernatural from the natural.”
Looking at the situation today, why are loyal Catholics so dismayed? What is seen today to be a catastrophe is only a natural development of what went almost unnoticed years ago. As the dragon slipped into the unguarded side-gate of Eden, so Darwin under the trappings of “science” got into the Church. Some discerning Catholics saw the signs, but tragically too few.
To accommodate the demands of evolutionary “science” over the years the Church’s hierarchy has become increasingly tolerant of what can now be clearly seen as abuses of Christ’s teaching. It had already reached the point over half a century ago where from the pulpit priests professed God creator of the world and all its contents from nothing, whilst simultaneously denying that doctrine in the schools. Successive generations of intelligent students recognized the blatant hypocrisy of that position and did the logical thing: they abandoned their religion.
Modernist progression
I wonder if readers have read Roberto de Mattei’s incisive writings, sometimes carried in Christian Order, especially his recent articles. He is an Italian historian, much respected in Catholic intellectual circles. I noticed Chris Ferrara referred to him recently in one of his Remnant articles. Mattei sees evolution as the Church’s number one enemy. The interest of his articles is the light they throw upon the current problems facing Catholics. They explain how the terms “Modernist” and “Modernism” apply today to the quasi-totality of Catholics. They show why the shocking statements made by members of the Curia — like Cardinal Kasper’s recent admission that ambiguities were deliberately inserted into the documents of Vatican II — are nothing new. In fact the former render a service by merely articulating more clearly the thinking that has come to shape the views of most of the “faithful.”
In tracing the recent history of Modernism his most significant points are:
1. Dominican, Garrigou-Lagrange, one of the most respected theologians of the 20th century, saw truth being reduced to “religious experience.” He wrote in 1946: “The truth… is no longer the conformity of judgment with objective reality and its immutable laws, but…with the demands of action and human life, which is continually evolving.”
2. Today’s Modernism comes from Luther’s belief: “all that is dogma and theological reflection is nothing other than the symbolic transcription of a collective religious experience in continual evolution.”
3. The replacement of doctrine by “feeling and experience.” As an example, he cites George Tyrell (1861–1909) who after converting from Protestantism became a Jesuit. He then challenged the Order’s teaching. For Tyrell religion is a union of the heart with God that does without the truth of dogmas.
4. Henri Brémond S.J. (1865–1930) befriended Tyrell when the latter was excommunicated. The former wrote to Tyrell that the ideal would be a “clerical life without dogma.”
5. Henri de Lubac L.C. (1896-1991) followed the same line — the possibility of encountering God by one’s own efforts.
The message is clear. The Protestant Revolution of the 16th century has become a prototype for a Modernist/Evolutionist revolution in the Catholic Church today. The latter started at the end of the 19th century with the Biblical School of Jerusalem (Ecole biblique de Jérusalem), and Soviet infiltration of seminaries in the early 1900’s. Evolutionary philosophy was largely promoted at first by the Dominican order, and then by the Jesuits. Finally it encroached upon teaching in Catholic schools, monasteries and convents throughout the Church. No institution was spared.
Evolutionism and Catholicism — irreconcilable!
Although this is perhaps a fair summary of the current situation, it requires more than a basic grasp of Darwinism to bring it into focus.
From the time of the Apostles, all of the Fathers, Doctors, Popes and Council Fathers in their authoritative teaching held that God created all things by fiat for man and that the natural order did not begin until God had finished creating Adam and Eve as the crowning work of creation.
At the beginning of the so-called Enlightenment, Rene Descartes became the first thinker of note in Christendom to speculate, without evidence, that it would be more reasonable to explain the origins of everything in nature in terms of presently observed material processes, rather than by the creative action of God. As the culmination of more than a century of Enlightenment propaganda, the evolutionary hypothesis purported to explain the origin of the world and living things by natural processes: divine intervention was categorically excluded!
Today, those Catholics who consider themselves members of the Mystical Body of Christ, as traditionally defined, yet still believe in evolution, risk succumbing to a severe psychological disorder. They are obliged to subscribe to two opposing truths. God the omnipotent Creator; and the omnipotence of evolution. The aberration is assumed to be justified by the worn expression; “God used evolution to create.” Those ignorant of orthodox Church teaching could possibly be excused for this incoherence, but not the qualified custodians of the traditional Magisterium.
Evolutionism-as-Modernism — triumphant!
God created alone by his own omnipotent power. No secondary productive causes such as the evolution of existing beings into beings of a different nature were involved. Lateran IV and Vatican I define this as a revealed truth. The majority Modernist creed, however, adds the caveat “unless such assumed truth is preempted by natural science.” The abandonment of the traditional metaphysics of the Catholic tradition, noted by then-Cardinal Ratzinger in 1989, has made it almost impossible for modern theologians to recognize the absurdity of the Modernist’s unsupported assumption that he can extrapolate from the material processes going on in nature today to explain how everything in nature came to be in the beginning!
To make matters worse, for several decades, arguments from the Church’s magisterial teaching have only carried weight with the Catholic hierarchy where there is no clash with evolutionary teaching. In this regard, the present Pope is no more blameworthy than his predecessors. Although they were less outspoken on some issues than Pope Francis, the end result is the same. Modernism fuelled by evolutionism has triumphed within the Church.
It must be remembered that Pius XII did not discount evolutionary cosmology, John Paul II in 1986 said that evolution theory could be reconciled with Genesis, and Benedict XVI’s 2006 meeting at Castel Gandolfo entitled “Creation and Evolution” claimed there was proof for evolution.
The silence on the subject from those in the Church presenting themselves as traditionalists suggests that they have not seen the connection between the success of Darwinism and the Modernist destruction of orthodoxy — or are they too intimidated by scientism?
Geological time-scale invalidated
Happily, one straightforward body of evidence is enough to floor the evolutionary Goliath: and it is ready and waiting for recognition by the Church. It is the research published by the Russian Academy of Sciences (www.sedimentology.fr) invalidating the standard geological time-scale — without which the hypothesis of biological evolution is rendered completely untenable. Had members of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences recognized the importance of this research when it was first published, they could have countered some of the negative effects of faith in the evolutionary hypothesis on scientific research.
Modernism has largely eroded traditional Catholic values from society. These were encapsulated in the Beatitudes now swamped and replaced by the pop-culture of materialism. Nonetheless they still represent the way back. For the record, here they are:
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.>br> Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.
Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven.
Yeah, I don’t see BN saying any such thing.
"But of this one thing be not ignorant, my beloved, that one day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." 2 Peter 3:8 I would be careful about using this verse because it still doesn't support millions of years of evolution.
The point I was trying to make is that since the author of Scripture is God, not man,
Egad! Protestant heresy! Everyone knows that "real Catholics" (and Orthodox) believe that the writing of the Bible was a synergistic cooperation between G-d (just a little bit) and a bunch of ignorant, stone-age savages (most of it). You better watch out or you'll get yourself excommunicated! And btw, why does everyone quote the quote in the "new testament?" Why not quote the original source in the TaNa"KH?
the word "day" means what God intends it to mean, not what man interprets it to mean. IIRC, Sts. Augustine and Aquinas held this view.
Catholics always use Augustine and Aquinas to justify evolutionism. I can't speak to the hyper-rationalist Aquinas, but Augustine did not believe that the six days were six thousand years. He believed everything was created in a single instant and the six days were "visions" of the creation which He then showed to the angels. You're being very sloppy if you're hanging on to Augustine to "prove" that the Catholic Church has taught evolution from the beginning. No, it has simply changed its teaching.
Read his posts defending the right of science's right to overrule the literal meaning of the Biblical text in light of the current laws of physics.
Since the literal interpretation of Genesis is alien to both liberal and traditionalist Catholics, apparently it's all of them.
Have you ever been to those Catholic forums where even pre-VII traditionalists respond to any doubter of evolution by inquiring something on the order of which trailer park he resides in?
Actually I have been on a number of Traditionalist forums and have never seen this. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen but more often than not I see Trads that believe in the literal Creation.
You've been defending evolution and the "right" of science to overrule Divine Revelation in giving us the facts of how G-d created the world. All one has to do is read your posts.
Seriously? Perhaps you need your glasses checked.
Then why are you asserting that "six days" doesn't mean "six days?" Why are you insisting that scientists have the right to tell us how the Creation was accomplished?
I’m going to guess that the “trads” you’re encountering are those who are “smells and bells” trads who really are VII Catholics who “prefer” the Latin Mass. And that’s about the extent of tradism.
Officially, it has not. Even VII doesn't profess evolution. Having said that, recent popes have made it seem that the teaching has changed.
Ew!
If not, then why does someone who denies that Jesus Christ is God in the flesh and says all Christians are dupes of the giant fraud of Christianity care what such dupes believe about the Creation??
Why does a former Lutheran who converted to Catholicism care what Protestants believe?
Obviously, they only care as a means to their end of attacking one group of people they call dupes of the fraud Jesus Christ more than another group of said dupes of the fraud Jesus Christ.
One group admits that it is engaged in an act of archeologism in order to restore something that was lost long, long ago. The other is a gigantic fraud that claims that its teachings are absolutely identical and unchanged from the very first day down to this one--which is blatantly and obviously untrue.
Also one sounds like a bunch of liberals when it screams about "bigots," "nativists," "ignoramuses," "Bobble-toters," "snake-handlers," "Cletuses," "intolerant," etc. I don't believe in American Protestantism either, but surely one can avoid such liberal-copyrighted terms when sparring with one's opponents?
Then there's the ethno-cultural component. The Catholic Church is made up of certain "Catholic" ethno-cultures. American "rednecks" are not only not a member, they are positively excluded because (unlike illiterate Guatemalan peasants), their brains simply aren't brilliant enough to contain and comprehend the deep intellectual glory of "the Catholic faith." In fact, G-d even set up Fundamentalist Protestantism because even undesirable polecats whom no one wants to associate with have the right to be "saved."
No, it has simply changed its teaching.
Officially, it has not. Even VII doesn't profess evolution. Having said that, recent popes have made it seem that the teaching has changed.
Now we're getting to the crux of the matter!
If what you assert is true, then why do so many Catholics, very much including conservative FReepers and clergy and theologians (whose job it is to explain Catholic teachings) not understand this? Why are online Catholic sites and forums full of ridicule for doubters of evolution or the documentary hypothesis and attacks on their alleged "Protestantism?" Why are Catholics on this thread claiming that 'the Church has never had a problem with evolution?'"
Why do Catholic publications (OSV, Catholic Answers, Liguorian, Catholic Digest, US Catholic, etc.) constantly promote both evolution and higher criticism and attack "Biblical literalism" and traditional authorship of the Bible with such venom? Even The Wanderer believes in evolution! And with all these voices and the utter lack of any disagreement by "traditionalist Catholics," may not one be forgiven for assuming that both evolution and higher criticism are official Catholic teachings?
Incidentally, what about all those Catholic bibles with nihil obstat and imprimatur that teach both evolution and the documentary hypothesis? Haven't they been approved by bishops, successors of the apostles, and "free from error?"
Just what is one to make of all this? Is it really supposed to be "self-evident" that the Catholic Church doesn't teach these things when every organ and spokesman does in fact teach them? Even Catholic Answers attacks the literal Genesis chronology as "un-Catholic!"
Now . . . before you respond to me further, why don't you have a nice private conversation with your two co-religionists (pinged above) who maintain that Catholicism is indeed anti-literal and perhaps always has been? The total lack of any correction by other Catholics does not do the cause of "literalist Catholicism" any good.
Your post deserves a longer response which I can’t give right now, but....
Catholic Answers???? LMAOROFL.
I think I've been pretty clear on what Traditional Catholicism teaches. Your need to constantly slap my wrist over this makes me question your sincerity and your motives. Perhaps I shouldn't continue the discussion with you after all.
According to traditional Catholic teaching, the exact meaning is an open question.
For example, according to "The Sources of Catholic Dogma" (Denzinger), in response to Question VIII - "Whether in that designation and distinction of six days, with which the account of the first chapter of Genesis deals, the word (dies) can be assumed either in its proper sense as a natural day, or in the improper sense of a certain space of time; and whether with regard to such a question there can be free disagreement among exegetes?", the Biblical Commission, June 30th, 1909, answered, "In the affirmative".
Why are you insisting that scientists have the right to tell us how the Creation was accomplished?
Why keep repeating something so patently false?
And yet Catholics are the epitome of Bible literalists when it comes to supporting their doctrine of the eucharist.
Funny that.
What part of, “some parts are literal, some parts are not,” are you not quite getting? How can one be an “anti-literalist” when one believes large chunks of Scripture are indeed to be understood literally?
Your insistence on putting words in my mouth and your implications that I hold beliefs that I don’t is getting quite dull.
http://www.johnsalza.com/p/miscellaneous.html
Regarding interpreting Genesis literally, all of the early Church Fathers did so (Augustine had an alternative interpretation that everything was creating instantaneously, never over millions of years). You should know that the Church dogmatically teaches us (Trent and Vatican I) that we are not to depart from the interpretation of the Fathers when there is a consensus, because the consensus means the Fathers' teaching came from the apostles. All the Fathers believed in a six-day creation, and thus no Father ever believed in evolutionary theory. This means that we are not to depart from their interpretation. The Church also teaches that we are to interpret the Scriptures in their literal and obvious sense, unless the interpretation is untenable. Interpreting Genesis literally is not only not untenable, it reflects the faith of our Fathers which are are bound to follow. That, coupled with the papal teachings against evolution, require us to reject the false theory of evolution.
There does not seem to be a compelling reason to depart from the literal and obvious sense of the following Scriptures which teach, both implicitly and explicitly, that the earth does not move.
The writer apparently pays no heed to St. Augustine's warning about undermining the Faith by making ridiculous claims.
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"Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the cycles of the years and the seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he hold to as being certain from reason and experience. Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men. If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods and on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason? Reckless and incompetent expounders of Holy Scripture bring untold trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by those who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books. For then, to defend their utterly foolish and obviously untrue statements, they will try to call upon Holy Scripture for proof and even recite from memory many passages which they think support their position, although they understand neither what they say nor the things about which they make assertion. [1 Timothy 1.7]"
http://www.pibburns.com/augustin.htm
"Desiring to be teachers of the law, understanding neither the things they say, nor whereof they affirm." [1 Timothy 1.7]
Which link is your first quote from in post #57?
Nevermind. I see now that John Salza is a geo-centrist.
It’s interesting that Geocentrism is not brought up in these discussions. I would like to hear what ZC has to say about that. Personally, I don’t see the apparent contradiction between the Bible and heliocentrism the same as the issue with evolution.
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