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Yesterday, Pope Francis, the head of the Roman Catholic Church, said that Darwinian evolution is real, and so is the Big Bang, according to the Telegraph. Elsewhere in his speech to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, the Pope said:
“When we read about Creation in Genesis, we run the risk of imagining God was a magician, with a magic wand able to do everything. But that is not so,” Francis said.
He added: “He created human beings and let them develop according to the internal laws that he gave to each one so they would reach their fulfilment.
The Pope's stance on evolution and cosmology still leaves room for a divine creator, says the Telegraph, but places his or her role in the time before the birth of the universe as we know it.
The view, obviously, doesn't fully align with current scientific thought, says Cnet. Yet Giulio Giorello, a philosopher of science, said that he thinks the move is meant to “'reduce the emotion of dispute or presumed disputes' with science,” writes the Telegraph.
As io9 pointed out when Francis was first anointed, the new Pope's quasi-heretical claim isn't anywhere near the first of its kind. The church first brought evolution into the fold in 1950 with the work of Pope Pius XII, writes io9. “At the same time, Catholics take no issue with the Big Bang theory, along with cosmological, geological, and biological axioms touted by science.”
[I]n fact, the Roman Catholic Church has recognized Darwinian evolution for the past 60 years. It openly rejects Intelligent Design and Young Earth Creationism saying that it "pretends to be science." But the Church’s unique take on the theory, what it calls theistic evolution, still shows that Catholics have largely missed the point.
The idea that the idea of a creator and the tenets of Darwinian evolution overlap, writes Dvorsky, is a "'want my cake and eat it too' proposition that largely ignores the potency of Darwin’s dangerous idea as a God killer.”
Darwin’s theory provides for a stand alone system. Evolution is fully autonomous process that does not require any guiding “rationality” (Benedict’s term) to function. It’s an agonizingly slow, brutish, and insanely methodical process, but it works."
Pope Francis' statements yesterday bring the church's stance back in line with its historical position on scientific thought, and away from the creationist- and intelligent design-leaning views of his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI.
Vatican endorses Darwinian evolution
Подпишитесь на нас в GoogleThe Vatican has admitted that Charles Darwin`s theory of evolution should not have been dismissed and claimed it is compatible with the Christian view of Creation.
Archbishop Gianfranco Ravasi, head of the Pontifical Council for Culture, said while the Church had been hostile to Darwin`s theory in the past, the idea of evolution could be traced to St Augustine and St Thomas Aquinas.
Father Giuseppe Tanzella-Nitti, Professor of Theology at the Pontifical Santa Croce University in Rome, added that 4th century theologian St Augustine had "never heard the term evolution, but knew that big fish eat smaller fish" and forms of life had been transformed "slowly over time". Aquinas made similar observations in the Middle Ages.
Ahead of a papal-backed conference next month marking the 150th anniversary of Darwin`s On the Origin of Species, the Vatican is also set to play down the idea of Intelligent Design, which argues a "higher power" must be responsible for the complexities of life.
The conference at the Pontifical Gregorian University will discuss Intelligent Design to an extent, but only as a "cultural phenomenon" rather than a scientific or theological issue.
Monsignor Ravasi said Darwin`s theories had never been formally condemned by the Roman Catholic Church, pointing to comments more than 50 years ago, when Pope Pius XII described evolution as a valid scientific approach to the development of humans.
Marc Leclerc, who teaches natural philosophy at the Gregorian University, said the "time has come for a rigorous and objective valuation" of Darwin by the Church as the 200th anniversary of Darwin`s birth approaches.
Professor Leclerc argues that too many of Darwin`s opponents, primarily Creationists, mistakenly claim his theories are "totally incompatible with a religious vision of reality".
Earlier this week, prominent scientists and leading religious figures wrote to The Daily Telegraph to call for an end to the fighting over Darwin`s legacy.
They argued that militant atheists are turning people away from evolution by using it to attack religion while they also urge believers in creationism to acknowledge the overwhelming body of evidence that now exists to support Darwin`s theory.
The Church of England is seeking to bring Darwin back into the fold with a page on its website paying tribute to his "forgotten" work in his local parish, showing science and religion need not be at odds.
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