Pope prepares to shift Vatican's view of evolution

John Hooper in Rome
Monday August 28, 2006
The Guardian


Philosophers, scientists and other intellectuals close to Pope Benedict will gather at his summer palace outside Rome this week for intensive discussions that could herald a fundamental shift in the Vatican's view of evolution.

There have been growing signs the Pope is considering aligning his church more closely with the theory of "intelligent design" taught in some US states. Advocates of the theory argue that some features of the universe and nature are so complex that they must have been designed by a higher intelligence. Critics say it is merely a disguise for "creationism" - a literal belief in the Bible's account.

A prominent anti-evolutionist and Roman Catholic scientist, Dominique Tassot, told the US National Catholic Reporter that this week's meeting was "to give a broader extension to the debate. Even if knows where he wants to go, and I believe he does, it will take time. Most Catholic intellectuals today are convinced that evolution is obviously true because most scientists say so."

In 1996, in what was seen as an unconditional capitulation to scientific orthodoxy, John Paul II declared that Darwin's theories were "more than a hypothesis".

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/religion/Story/0,,1859760,00.html

But he is not John Paul II.

And not just for the funeral either. :(

by science and scientific progress, they'd eventually figure it out, wouldn't you?

Ha ha! Yeah, right!

I've been using Pope John Paul II as an example of how one can be a believer in God AND believer in evolution-- this sucks.

ARRGHHH IT'S THE DARK AGES

We were taught evolution in science classes (long before John Paul II, in the '70's) and a "sort of" intelligent design in religion classes. Though I am no longer Catholic by any measure, this really saddens me.

And about the overwhelming numbers of faculty in Catholic universities.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

Who has that picture? Anyone know? It's creepy and effective.

:rofl:

Assuming that some sort of deity is the "intelligent designer" then calls into question His/Her/It's abilities.

Also, assuming that "God" is, as advertised, omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent, (All knowing, All Powerful, and everywhere), then could He not foresee that the vast majority of His experiments were going to fail? 1/10 of 1% of all species that ever existed are still existent. They rest have all been flops.

The Supreme Boob wouldn't have made it through His first semester of Biology let alone Engineering.

the Church doesn't even know what's good for itself. Tassot is a more or less obscure French fundie and not a "scientist". And this Pope isn't particularly popular.

We are the captains of our own souls, after all. I still consider myself a Catholic (eh, more or less), but if I followed every stupid ass thing I've heard from one Papa or another, well, I might as well be a Southern Baptist.
John
I like your name, tocqueville. Alexis visited my hometown (Saginaw, Michigan) in the 1830s when it was still a tiny, hinterland village. He (a) almost got et by a bear about 20 miles south of here at what is today Pine Run and (b) noted that the Saginaw River reminded him of the Seine at Paris.
Longfellow gave the Saginaw a shout-out in "Evangeline," too.

there is a lot that unites us on each side of the pond

I wonder if the Jesuits will secede

Along with all other Catholic intellectuals.

to a major schism.

And one that is perhaps long overdue.

I can't imagine a decision like "intelligent design" passing through without a big fight.

It also looks like Ratzinger was supposed to pave the wave for Schonborn, next.

Ugh.

just hit a new high...I will never call this man anything other than Ratzinger.

I respect Catholics and mean no offense. I too, once counted myself among the former. But Ratzinger, I truly believe is malevolent--I get the same horrendous vibes when I see his picture or image on tv that I do when I see Cheney.

I firmly believe that Ratzinger will do more to harm the Church, its followers, and the world at large, than I'd ever thought possible. John Paul II was not progressive on most issues, but certainly by comparison one would be forgiven for thinking so.

I, too, never call him Pope.

Or sometimes, Ratstinker.

Or Ratfinker?

:toast:

is a bad idea. One is based on fact. One is based on faith. Trying to merge the two does a disservice to both.

Mz Pip
:dem:

I doubt that they will go along meekly.

Hard to see this crap going over well at University of Detroit-Mercy.
John
Like I said above "yeah, yeah, yeah -- whatever."

any independence or autonomy for the Jesuits.... Sounds like a strategy (not unfamiliar to those of the Bush* administration)...:mad:

are they just going to roll over and play dead?

There were Dinosaurs on the Ark! Duh!

When Pope John Paul II ruled OTHERWISE. Some of these reports are wishful thinking on part of some Conservative Catholics. While it can happen, I just do NOT see it happening. The Catholic Church has always pride itself as willing to work with Science provided Scientists do not try to interfere with its basic teachings.

The classic case of this was the problem with Galileo. The Catholic Church had no problem with the theory that the Earth rotated around the Sun, provided that theory was used as a theory to explain the know facts of how the planets, the Sun the Moon moved in the sky (In fact the Pope who condemned Galileo was the same person who was the Science Adviser to the previous Pope and had advocated that Copernicus's theory was NOT heresy). The Catholic Church had not problem with Copernicus's theory unless people start to state it as "Fact". The Catholic Church held that the theory could NOT be "fact" for the theory could NOT be proved true under the Rules of Aristotle Logic. Please note, the rules of Aristotle Logic are quite strict and thus even today you can not "PROVE" that the Earth revolves around the Sun under those rules, even through the theory that the earth rotates around the sun is the best explanation of how the planets and their moons rotate in relations to the Earth.

Thus the problem with Galileo was NOT his advocacy of the Theory that the earth rotated around the Sun, but his statement that such rotation as a FACT and how that "Fact" affected how people would interpret parts of the Bible that could be read otherwise (Even William Jennings Bryan in the Scopes Monkey Trail conceded that the Earth rotated around the Sun, but then pointed out that the passages in the Bible stating otherwise had to do with the prospective of the writer NOT whether the Earth or the Sun rotated around the other, and then site Einstein Theory of Relativity that everything is relative to each other and thus everybody's prospective is derived from how he or she is viewing what is going on).

Back to my point, I view this meeting as more of an attempt to satisfy the Anti-evolutionary priests within the Catholic Church then an attempt to reverse John Paul II ruling. Pope Benedict is NOT that much different in his outlook as to religion than John Paul II and will NOT risk embarrassing the Catholic Church by taking a stand different from John Paul II when it comes to Science. Nor will Pope Benedict embarrass the Church when it comes to a concept that is widely accepted in the Scientific Community.

On the other hand Pope Benedict may rule that it is WRONG to use the Theory of Evolution when it comes to Social Sciences as the means as how one is to view your fellow man. The Catholic Church has NEVER liked the concept of Social Darwinism, and will oppose Social Darwinism and will continue to condemn Social Darwinism. I just do not see Pope Benedict taking the position of William Jennings Bryan that to oppose Social Darwinism, you must also oppose the teaching of the theory of Evolution (Bryan had no problem with the Theory of Evolution per se, except if teaching Evolution would also attack teaching traditional Jewish-Christian values of helping one's neighbor and turning one's check and replacing it with Social Darwinism concept of leaving only the "Fit" to survive, that was the position Bryan was advocating in the Scope's Monkey Trial). What I see Pope Benedict doing is advocating that one MUST follow traditional Catholic teachings as to one's need to do "Good Works" and condemning people who use the theory of Evolution to advocate Social Darwinism. I just do not see the Pope doing more than that.

Thanks for you insight!

from Thomas Aquinas in the first place--the "Prime Mover" theory. Creation implies a Creator. It's one of his "Five Proofs" of the existence of God. Aquinas was a rational mind struggling with Fundie Politico Witch-burners and Inquisitionists of Rome of a previous age. He had to find a way to "prove" that which they imposed with the sword and with prisons around the human spirit: that God exists (and associated irrationalities that Aquinas doesn't address, that the Pope speaks for God, that the Pope is a man, because Saint Peter was a man and Jesus was a man, ergo God is a man--cogito ergo I am a prick.)

Sorry. These people crack me up. I don't have a problem with "Intelligent Design." I do have a problem with "Intelligent Designer." I think that is us--WE are the Intelligent Designers--unique among earth's creatures who see design everywhere, even where it may not exist, who long for design, who create design, who re-design everything around us, who count things, who name things, who put things in order, who create systems, who move mountains, who build dams, who create chaos theories, and theories of every kind, who start designing from the moment we are born and maybe in the womb (ever watch a baby's hands?--it is creating designs), who make art, who design dresses and ridiculous costumes cities, who put rock upon rock to make great cathedrals and towers of babel (libraries, internets), who find design in the skies and create whole astrologies of kinship with the stars, who count buttons and sort them into colors and shapes just for play, who weave beautiful baskets, who create numerologies and mathematics and geometries, who organize everything we see into patterns, in our passion for design. Don't know what it comes from. Survival of the fittest seems hardly an adequate explanation.

We are the Designers. We are designing our own evolution even now. And I think, in all of this, we design God and Gods, and project them as if they were real beings who care about us and have a design for us. The One God idea is a Father God--a man--in all three of the religions that seem to be gearing up for yet more religious war. Christianity, Judaism and Islam. Bad design. Many of us can feel it. Unbalanced. We need the Goddess of Life and Fruitfulness to balance this design. It is otherwise leading to Armageddon, the extinction of all life on earth. The worst projection of all three religions. Punishment. Guilt. Suicide. Annihilation.

The Father God has long past his usefulness. I've no doubt it had usefulness. Might have had something to do with the development of mathematics, ideas of perfection, and of course men think that is them. The most human. The most perfect. Women are somewhat defective. Pope John-Paul actually said this: woman can't be priests because they don't physically resemble Jesus, a man. No prick, in other words. Brains, eyes, hands, language, song, two legs, two arms--nothing else matters. And the assholes of the 5th century had many arguments about whether or not women have souls. The Jews fancied Adam first, Eve second (made from Adam!). We are not so far removed from those days, are we? Me big man, me make war, me God.

And here I am designing the balance. The Mama God. Mother Earth. She holds you in Her arms at birth, at death. A beauty as a youth, as a loving mother, as a wise old woman.

Design, design, design. I don't see why it can't be a subject for scientific discussion and investigation--why we like design so much, whether or not we impose design, whether or not design exists. Science isn't just engineering (how things work). It is also understanding. Are we imposing evolutionary theory, from our very truncated position in time? There seems to be sense in it, nature's choices (whatever works, survives), but there is also something...very wild and arbitrary about it, and we seem to be the wildest factor of all. The designing species. The species who thinks up an Intelligent Designer. The species that moves everything around in patterns, and exterminates other species by the whole handfuls, thoughtlessly, and sometimes even exterminates whole tribes and races of other humans, and reaches for the stars, and even imagines going there, and even took one small step. Why would evolution favor these crazy, suicidal, tragic, God-projecting beings? Can we save ourselves and the earth that seems to have created us for no particularly good reason? To invent nukes, GMOs, pollution? To trash it all?

problem. I was trying to get at it, above--but I didn't quite get there. The stupid debates they engender, pitting the Rationalists vs. the Religionists, are a great big distraction. We--the members of the great progressive majority--feel it as oppression, and get all defensive about science. And there is an aspect to it, certainly, that is oppressive and dangerous--the way all tyrants use religion to oppress and kill and rob. We've seen it throughout history. But this Reason vs. Religion thing is very old, and it is off point somehow. Science has become almost a wholly owned subsidiary of the Corporate Rulers. To defend it in the classroom as a pristine subject, apart from the concerns of ethics, religion and spirituality seems...oh, strange...when we have corporations patenting human DNA and seeds, the grains of life. More later. I've got to go consume some of these grains of life. I'll get it. What's wrong with this debate? That is my question.

What a bunch of hypocrites.