The Vatican Evolves

MrBishop

MrBishop

Well-Known Member
Evolution in the bible, says Vatican

By Martin Penner
07-11-2005
From: The Australian


THE Vatican has issued a stout defence of Charles Darwin, voicing strong criticism of Christian fundamentalists who reject his theory of evolution and interpret the biblical account of creation literally.

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

His statement was a clear attack on creationist campaigners in the US, who see evolution and the Genesis account as mutually exclusive.

"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".

This idea was part of theology, Cardinal Poupard emphasised, while the precise details of how creation and the development of the species came about belonged to a different realm - science. Cardinal Poupard said that it was important for Catholic believers to know how science saw things so as to "understand things better". His statements were interpreted in Italy as a rejection of the "intelligent design" view, which says the universe is so complex that some higher being must have designed every detail.
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I Missed this one entirely
 
Heck, they've de facto accepted it since the mid-fifties. Still stinging over that whole Copernicus/Galileo center of the universe thing, I guess. :lol:

"perfectly compatible" if the Bible were read correctly.
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Ah.
 
Strange. The Vatican gets shit for condemning Gaileo & banning his works while the atheists, doing virtually the same thing against the church, get congratulated.
 
It's pretty obvious that intelligent design and evolution are compatible. You don't need the Bible to tell you that. Evolution only describes how species adapt and change over time, it offers no explanation on how life originated on this planet. I honestly cannot fathom the problems there seem to be in the US with this issue in schools.

Trying to argue evolution does not occur is like trying to argue the sky is not blue.

That said, I went to a Catholic school and we were always taught that the story of creation in the Bible was not to be taken literally.
 
It's pretty obvious that intelligent design and evolution are compatible.
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If you say so.
Evolution only describes how species adapt and change over time, it offers no explanation on how life originated on this planet.
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Sure it does.
Trying to argue evolution does not occur is like trying to argue the sky is not blue.
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We agree on this, at least.

Note that the theories of evolution (there are in fact many more than one) all offer possible explantations of "how" we evolved, they do not question "that" we evolved.
 
Gonz said:
Strange. The Vatican gets shit for condemning Gaileo & banning his works while the atheists, doing virtually the same thing against the church, get congratulated.
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No we don't. We get ridiculed and ostracized by friends and family largely belive that there is something seriously wrong with us. Try to keep up. ;)
 
chcr said:
If you say so.

Sure it does.
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Intelligent design is as valid an explanation for the origin of life as more "scientific" ideas, such as abiogenesis.

Evolution describes a process which occurs over time. How the process started is open to speculation.
 
chcr said:
No we don't. We get ridiculed and ostracized by friends and family largely belive that there is something seriously wrong with us. Try to keep up. ;)
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You poor baby.
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Just kidding lol.
Funny my experience was largely the same only the polar opposite. My dad has been a staunch athiest/agnostic and studies physics and astoronomy and has the same contempt for religion that you do CH so you can imagine his shock when his firstborn son who also studied physics and astronomy bacame a christian. :laugh5: It was hell those first few years but i'm surrounded by these people so i eventually got used to it and even opened a few minds in the process. It would definetely be a better world if we could just except people for where they're at.
 
Bobby Hogg said:
Intelligent design is as valid an explanation for the origin of life as more "scientific" ideas, such as abiogenesis.

Evolution describes a process which occurs over time. How the process started is open to speculation.
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Sorry, I should have said that there are several possible theories for how life began. And yes, intelligent design is self-consistent in and of itself. Given the scientific evidence however, and no outside influence (no one says so), I very seriously doubt that anyone would postulate an intelligent designer.

The whole idea comes from something someone told you is so.
 
HeXp£Øi± said:
You poor baby.
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Just kidding lol.
Funny my experience was largely the same only the polar opposite. My dad has been a staunch athiest/agnostic and studies physics and astoronomy and has the same contempt for religion that you do CH so you can imagine his shock when his firstborn son who also studied physics and astronomy bacame a christian. :laugh5: It was hell those first few years but i'm surrounded by these people so i eventually got used to it and even opened a few minds in the process. It would definetely be a better world if we could just except people for where they're at.
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It's a matter of being different from the perceived norm, Hex. I suspect that your experience is a lot rarer than mine though.
 
It's not necessarily because someone tells us so, intelligent design need not imply the Christian God is real, or that anyone's God is real for that matter. There are myriad stories of creation throughout history from many different cultures, suggesting intelligent design is a possibility is no comment on the validity of any of them, only that it's a possibility.

However it has no real place being taught in any real depth (beyond a cursory mention) in a science classroom.
 
Bobby Hogg said:
It's not necessarily because someone tells us so, intelligent design need not imply the Christian God is real, or that anyone's God is real for that matter.
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You say tomato, I say to-mah-toe... :shrug: I didn't say "christian" god. I said intelligent designer. :shrug: I don't have anything against christianity specifically, it's my belief that all religions are myths.

There are myriad stories of creation throughout history from many different cultures, suggesting intelligent design is a possibility is no comment on the validity of any of them, only that it's a possibility
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In other words, someone said so...
 
chcr said:
It's a matter of being different from the perceived norm, Hex. I suspect that your experience is a lot rarer than mine though.
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The thing is we both see ourselves in the minority. You lump all religious followers together because you feel they are on the apposing side where as i tend to lump the large majority of religious peoples into the same catagory as athiests/agnostics. (i realize that these are very generalized statements)Why? Because statistics say that the majority believes in God yet how most of them don't even attempt to live for change. Very few. The norm is people clinging to some abstract notion of God as a crutch. This is just as much of a thorn in my side as religion is to you. The fact is we both percieve that we are in the minority and we are both correct from our perspectives, respectfully. The only way to win is to be honest with yourself and not let contempt prior to investigation, ignorance or emotion be your primary motivating force.
 
HeXp£Øi± said:
studies physics and astoronomy and has the same contempt for religion that you do CH so you can imagine his shock when his firstborn son who also studied physics and astronomy bacame a christian.
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Intersting. Both Darwin & Gaileo believed in God. Neither set forth the machinery that says you can't have God (in any of the varoius incarnations) and science, simultaneoulsy. If there were an intelligent designer, wouldn't he be locked to the same principles (science & mathematics) as he created?
 
OK, all non-believers, you've been forewarned

Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson warned residents of a rural Pennsylvania town Thursday that disaster may strike there because they "voted God out of your city" by ousting school board members who favored teaching intelligent design.

All eight Dover, Pa., school board members up for re-election were defeated Tuesday after trying to introduce "intelligent design" _ the belief that the universe is so complex that it must have been created by a higher power _ as an alternative to the theory of evolution.
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Source
 
Gonz said:
Intersting. Both Darwin & Gaileo believed in God. Neither set forth the machinery that says you can't have God (in any of the varoius incarnations) and science, simultaneoulsy. If there were an intelligent designer, wouldn't he be locked to the same principles (science & mathematics) as he created?
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Well obviously if there is a God he is a God of logic however the scientific community nowadays are insulted and even offended by God. They often literally turn and run at the mear mention of the subject. However this is to be expected as humans throughout history have proven again and again to generally be biased, illogical and emotionally driven nomatter what their beliefs.
 
Gonz said:
Intersting. Both Darwin & Gaileo believed in God. Neither set forth the machinery that says you can't have God (in any of the varoius incarnations) and science, simultaneoulsy. If there were an intelligent designer, wouldn't he be locked to the same principles (science & mathematics) as he created?
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In fact Darwin did not (although he professed, perhaps even held such a belief in his youth).
At present the most usual argument for the existence of an intelligent God is drawn from deep inward conviction and feelings which are experienced by most persons. But it cannot be doubted that Hindoos, Mahomedans and others might argue in the same manner and with equal force in favour of the existence of one God, or of many Gods, or as with the Buddhists of no God...
....This argument would be a valid one, if all men of all races had the same inward conviction of the existence of one God; but we know this is very far from being the case. Therefore I cannot see that such inward convictions and feelings are of any weight as evidence of what really exists....
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Galileo did, just not in the correct manner by the prevailing theological authority of the day.
I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect intended us to forgo their use.
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Oh, and Pat Robertson may blow me at his very earliest convenience... :swing:
 
Bobby Hogg said:
This is the attitude I do not understand. Intelligent design has simply nothing to do with evolution. It has no place in a science class, either.
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It's simple. Accepting Intelligent design would be an perceived ideological victory for creationists in the eyes of the average evolutionist. It's no more complex than this.
 
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