Theistic Evolution: A Contradiction to The Genesis Account

Theistic Evolution: A Contradiction to The Genesis Account

You can't get through any secular education or even some Catholic education without being told that evolution is a scientific fact. The pressure that the scientific community has on adopting this religion of evolution is high indeed. You are looked upon as unscientific if you adopt the ideas of specific creation or even Theistic Evolution, which is the stance of many Catholics and Christians. However, Theistic Evolution is thought to contradict with the Genesis account and original sin.

In my last post on this subject. I presented Dr. Kreeft's notion that evolution does not contradict creationism per se, because they are two distinct questions, improperly phrased into one argument. He basically states that evolution may have been the method by which God chose to create the human body. 

Suppose he did use this method, it does not contradict the credit due to God for being the artist of life or the primary cause of evolution contrariwise to natural causes. Hence the erroneous argument of  creationism vs evolution-ism is analogous to saying: "He wrote that blog." and the antagonist says "No he didn't, the blog was typed on a computer." Its a difference of who vs how man came to be. However the statements are predicated, both end in the same primary cause, i.e. God.

Disappointingly Kreeft does not go into any detail as to the implications evolution holds towards the dogma of original sin and our need of redemption; which is where evolution starts to become shaky ground for Catholics.

The notion that God could have used evolution mentioned above, is an example of Theistic Evolution. This is one of three views one can take, but all are incompatible with each other. The other two are Atheistic Evolution and Special Creation. Everyone must choose which of the three beliefs to take; the right answer is Special Creation. 

What Evolution Is

Evolution is a transformation of one species to another by some mechanism, which is an improvement from the previous species by gaining some higher genetic trait by a mutation for the better. This is a prevalent understanding of how species came to be. It has practically inundated social thought and most definitely the media. I  challenge you to pay attention when you are watching a show on Discovery Channel or something of the like and listen to the ideas of evolution propagated. There is a whole exhibit on evolution at the Perot Museum in Dallas; hundreds of children view this daily. The false theory of a species mutating into a better form of itself can be refuted by the realization that "you cant give what you haven't got." This breaks the second law of thermodynamics; nothing has been observed that breaks this law. It can be defined as: Natural processes tend to disorder rather than order and the simple will never produce the more complex. Evolution requires something disordered to become ordered (Wallace). This error is fatal to the theory of evolution and their only explanation is that energy from the sun is the catalyst for orginization; yet energy alone cannot produce order from disorder and this is demonstrated by any effects of radiation on living organisms.  

The interesting thing about Theistic Evolution is that you must believe in constant divine intervention from God as opposed to a natural evolution in a group of a specific species. This thought rejects the Flood of Noah and also must ignore the sin of Adam.

Humani Generis and Polygenism

Before we get further into some of the details, I want to throw out what the Church has taught regarding these topics.The Church teaches that the rational soul of Adam and Eve were created by God in acts of special creation, but Pope Pious the XII in his encyclical Humani Generis ads to this by making it mandatory to believe that Adam and Eve were real people from whom all mankind have descended — not symbolic representations of mankind. He also states in this encyclical that discussion is allowed between specialists as to the possible evolution of Adam's body. This is not an ex cathedra endorsement of evolution, simply an invitation for talk. It is permissible for experts in the sciences to engage in discussions of the theory, provided they had expertise. There is no freedom of the laity to embrace the theory of evolution because most theories stand on a premise of polygenism. 

The faithful cannot embrace any notion that Adam represents a number or group of first males and that there were other men outside of the garden of Eden. You must believe that every soul is created by God. Also, that even if you accept evolution of the body, you must accept that the entire human race descended from one couple, i.e. Saints Adam and Eve. That is monogenism, as opposed to polygenism. Here is a quote from the encyclical touching on polygenism: 

[T]he Teaching Authority of the Church does not forbid that, in conformity with the present state of human sciences and sacred theology, research and discussions, on the part of men experienced in both fields, take place with regard to the doctrine of evolution, in as far as it inquires into the origin of the human body as coming from pre-existent and living matter…..When, however, there is question of another conjectural opinion, namely polygenism, the children of the Church by no means enjoy such liberty. For the faithful cannot embrace that opinion which maintains that either after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin through natural generation from him as from the first parent of all, or that Adam represents a certain number of first parents. Now it is in no way apparent how such an opinion can be reconciled with that which the sources of revealed truth and the documents of the Teaching Authority of the Church propose with regard to original sin, which proceeds from a sin actually committed by an individual Adam and which, through generation, is passed on to all and is in everyone as his own (Humani Generis, 36-37).[My Emphasis]

If polygenism were true, then not everyone would be tainted by original sin. There would be millions of other people without the taint of original sin. I know this goes without saying, but original sin must be believed or you have no need for sacrifice or a savior and our faith is truncated. There are few evolutionists who believe in monogenism, they adhere to a group theory of evolution. If they didn't, they would be positing a theory which  by happenstance, one woman appeared on the evolutionary pathway and one man, they happen to find each other and then reproduce; the chances of this are unbelievable. Few if any evolutionary theories are compatible with Catholic belief and primarily Genesis. 

The bottom line is that all Catholics are bound to the first man Adam: 

Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned—….Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous. (Rom 5:11, 19)

For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive (1 Cor 15:22)

Letter to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences: On Evolution
Pope John Paul II

Saint JP II issued a statement to pontifical academy of sciences saying that, "[t]oday, more than a half-century after the appearance of that encyclical(Humani Generis), some new findings lead us toward the recognition of evolution as more than an hypothesis." [My Emphasis]

The pope is speaking about science, not on faith or morals; therefore, although it must be given due deference, it is not dogma. The Church has been reaching out to protestants ever since Vatican II, but these papal statements are scandalous to clear headed Protestants who adhere to special creation. Most Protestants do not understand that the Popes statements on this subject are not dogma but an opinion only and therefore it must be explained to them them that this statement is not binding if the situation arises.

Theistic Evolution:
Listening to a lecture on the topic given by Chris Ferrara and Michael Davies, they give insight on some of the problems with Theistic Evolution: namely, the chance meeting of two evolved individuals —so called Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. These two spontaneously mutated progenitors, ironically happen to meet up, found the Garden of Eden,  and the rest is history. But if men by divine intervention were evolved from apes, then when "Adam" was born, he suckled at the breast of an ape women, would have been infused with a soul at some point, left his ape parents and went on to start the human race with Eve. Eves case however, cannot be reconciled with this view because the interpretation of Eves creation is not easily explained away. "And the Lord God built the rib which he took from Adam into a woman: and brought her to Adam. And Adam said: This now is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, because she was taken out of man." (Genesis 2: 22-23)
Eve could not possibly have evolved. It is binding on conscience for Catholics to believe that Eve was created from the flesh of Adam according to Genesis. Flesh of flesh bone from bone. 

We are bound to believe that the whole human race has descended from Adam and Eve and that we inherit the state of original sin from our parents. The Council of Trent posits on how original sin is acquired: "this sin of Adam, which in its origin is one, and by propagation, not by imitation, transfused into all, which is in each one as something that is his own;" i.e. direct transmission of original sin (Trent, par. 3).  This means that sin is not a behavior that was learned from parents and sibling, but inherited similar to genes, from parents. i.e. everyone grows up in a sinful atmosphere, so they get tainted by this sinful atmosphere and this is original sin —Trent condemns this view.

We are particularly obliged to believe that a particular couple committed the sin, but also that Satan appeared, under the form of a serpent and tempted eve. Otherwise the verse where she crushes the head would be meaningless. It would be a mere allegory; there was a serpent whose head was crushed. 

Another bizarre scenario is God plucking two ape people out of some group, making them fully human, and then placing them in the Garden. But this is not evolution; it is a Grimm's fairy tale as Mr. Ferrara says and again contradicts the creation of Eve. 

Another problem with these two scenarios is the fact that animals cannot sin; they lack the rational. Even a 99% human could not have initiated the fall, simply because he isn't fully human. Michael Davies states, "Our fist parents must have been fully capable of making a moral choice to choose the evil over the good." Therefore, Theistic Evolution is left to figure out when man became rational and intelligent enough to sin.

Theistic Evolution is difficult to reconcile with our faith because there are too many details that are left for conjecture as is seen. Also, why would God reveal the creation account as it is, while leaving out the intricate details of the process He used? It would be an insult to Moses and to us to think that God didn't think we could understand the intricacies, but instead gave us a fairy tale or metaphor of how He created us. Theistic Evolution makes the Genesis account a myth and remains to be untenable by the still remaining fact of no record of transitional species and the contradictions to original sin and consequently no need of redemption. 

Immaculate Conception
One other factor that must be reconciled is the dogma of the Immaculate Conception. Mary is the only person born without original sin. If evolution were true and there were no original sin, then this dogma is erroneous, hence making the declarations of the Catholic Church erroneous. Removing any small thread from the creation account and the whole fabric of faith would unravel.

If you toss aside anything in genesis then the whole faith is undermined. If there were not an actual place where satin actually tempted Adam and eve to actually sin, at an actual moment in time, then the entire basis for original sin collapses and with that Christianity. Evolution cant be reconciled with the dogma with the immaculate conception. 

November 1996 Pastoral and Homiletic review. Theistic Evolution a tragic misunderstanding and a grave error. Christians should realize that evolution is not part of genuine natural sciences but is an excuse invented by man to reject God.

References:

1. Davies, Michael and Chris Ferrara. "What The Church Teaches on Evolution."  keepthefaith.org 

2. Johnson, Wallace. "A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing." keepthefaith.org.

3. Keane, Gerard. Creation Rediscovered: Evolution and The Importance of The Origins Debate. Illinois: Tan, 1999

4. Pious XII. Humani Generis. Accessed August 23, 2015. http://w2.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-xii_enc_12081950_humani-generis.html

5. Saint John Paul II.  [MESSAGE TO THE PONTIFICAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES:
ON EVOLUTION]. Accessed August 23, 2015. https://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/JP961022.HTM#note.

6. THE COUNCIL OF TRENT Session V: "[Decree Concerning Original Sin]".  Paul III. Par. 3. Rome. 1546. https://www.ewtn.com/library/COUNCILS/TRENT5.HTM#1

Rebound: My Way of Life and Christ in The Gospels

Here are a couple of old Catholic classic books I rebound and made slip cases for. They both came out good. I read them both as devotionals as often as I can and they feel and look great. Christ in the Gospels is very difficult to find online now. I finished building a workshop in the backyard, so I hope to get more bookbinding done. That may be difficult seeing that I start full time school in about a week, work full time and have 6 kids and 1 on the way. Wahoo! Praise God.

 Marbled paper on the slip case. Hand tooled lettering on black goat skin leather. 

Hand gilded edges with pre-sewn  headband and tapered fore edges. 

My Way of Life: leather bound hand tooled gold lettering in a marbled paper covered slipcase. 

Both books on display onthe bookshelf. 

Green leather gold tooled label on front cover. As you can see in the next pic the color of the leather was a little different from the painted green edges. 

Marbled paper end-sheets. Ooh Ahh!

All papers, leather and lettering was hand made on original text block. 

Liturgical Revolution Series

I have just finished reading the Liturgical Revolution series by Michael Davies. It took me about 8 months of sporadic reading to get through them and I must say, this is a set of books which I will utilize as reference material for years to come for its in depth look into the changes in the Church from the protestant revolution to the post conciliar era in which we reside.

This serious is no small amount of reading. It weighs in at about 1500 pages of highly researched information Davies has compiled. The series is broken down into three themes; the English Reformation, titled Cranmer's Godly Order(CGO), the history of corruption and infiltration of the liberals during the council in Pope John's Council(PJC), and a detailed analysis and history of how the liberal attempted to turn the Roman Rite into a Protestant Communion Service in Pope Paul's New Mass(PPNM).

I couldn't put CGO down, because it read very much like a history novel and covered the details of the battles, politics, trials and tribulations of all parties involved. His enumeration of the changes to the English liturgy were revealing and served as a precursor to the changes in the Novus Ordo Missae which parallel the Communion Service of Cranmer in way that must be more than ironic.

In PJC, Davies commands extensive knowledge of the happenings of the council from first hand sources; all of his works are heavily footnoted and accurately referenced. He spotlights the underhanded deceit of the Rhine Group in gaining power and manipulating the pope and the council in ways no one thought possible. This too was an enthralling volume which pulls you into council with surprising details.

I lost my momentum when I started PPNM. Not that it didnt start well, but it may have been due to my intimidation of the size of the text; it is over 700 pages. Once I got going however, I could not wait for reading time to find out more concerning the liturgy. And that is what volume was for me mostly: an instruction on the old and new mass. Davies brakes down all of the changes and parallels them to not only to the Cranmer's Communion Service, but also to many other forms and rites of the Mass. I learned more about the Roman Rite then I expected. I think the most interesting truths gained from this book was that most of the scandalous novelties in the Novus Ordo Missae, were added after the council and were not in the original texts. Communion in the Hand, Communion under both Species and Versus Populum are few of the specific novelties referred to.

If you are interested in more complete understanding of who, what, when, where, and how the Church has changed so much and in such a short period, then I highly recommend the Liturgical Revolution Series By Michael Davies. I would also like to mention this is not a super trad/sedevacantist type work. He never mentions anything of that flavor, but simply presents his life long research with professionalism and responsibility. I hope to blog on a number of the major points heretofore especially on the three novelties mentioned previously.

Are Creation and Evolution Compatible

The debate of over creationism and evolution has been going on for a long time and there is tons of arguments supporting either cause.There is an interesting point that I heard from Dr. Peter Kreeft in a lecture recently that put the whole debate into perspective. His point is that the original arguments do not negate either position.

One side says that God created everything, the other that we have evolved by natural selection. Putting it in perspective Kreeft says that the argument is like saying, "I have written this blog." and the other side says "this blog was typed on a computer." Neither statements are wrong one statement is general the other is more specific to the method. Likewise, the statements of creation and evolution would seem not to contradict each other; however, each has significant consequences.

Creation

The following data come from multiple works of Dr. Kreeft, both his Modern Scholar lectures "Faith and Reason" and Thomas Aquinas, as well as "Handbook of Christian Apologetics".
I think its good to begin with the statement ex nihilo; nihil fit (out of nothing; nothing comes). We know that it is impossible for something to come from nothing; yet, here we are, existing and asking questions like these. Everything has a cause and if we regress far enough we come to the first cause and creator whom we call God. Since God is not matter, the law ex nihil; nihil fit  does not bind God, because he transcends nature. Something that is finite cannot create from nothing; therefore, God is infinitely powerful and can create infinite change from non-being to being.

You say "well, who created God"? The simple answer is nobody. God is infinite -from everlasting; he is the adequate cause of nature.  Again God is pure actuality, i.e. He is not in potentiality —He is complete perfection. To say who made god is a contradictory statement, because it is like saying who changed the unchangeable.

The consequences of creation effect what we know of God and that is: his omnipotence (he must be all powerful to create from nothing; omniscience; omni-benevolence (He created us simply for our sake, since we are not necessary for Him). Likewise, we know that nature being created by God is intelligible, good (Christians should not believe that the physical world is evil; this is Manechaeism and Gnosticism which are heresies.), and real (Christians also believe in the reality of existence; we do not exist in someones conscious or unconscious mind).

Lastly, the final conclusion of Creationism is that if the universe is created by God, then we are subject to Him. Do your children have authority over you (parents have authority over their children in the hierarchical order and government of God)?  Does the play or story a poet writes lord it over the author — this sounds like nonsense, but for all those who deny Gods reign —the atheist, agnostic, and disobedient, their dissidence is very apparent.

Evolution

I will start by saying that the verdict on evolution is not conclusive. There are some in and outside of the Church who will elevate evolution to a substantial theory, rather than a mere hypothesis. Regardless of this fact, if evolution were true, the creationist may use the argument that since God is omnipotent, evolution could be the modus operndi for creating specific species including Humans —he is all powerful after all and thus it is possible.

The bottom line if evolution is true aside from God, we should have a completely materialistic philosophy toward life —God and religion become meaningless. Some argue that belief in evolution completely takes God out of the picture —Kreeft does not think so. If however, God chose to use evolution as his process for developing the human species, then at what point did the ape acquire a spirit and intellect? That important question is whether we have an eternal soul; scripture tells us we do, as well as all the other phenomena surrounding the saints and near death experiences. Furthermore, souls do not evolve because they are not formed of mater. "[Y]ou cannot get a wholly different thing —thought, consciousness, reason, self-awareness—from mere bits of matter. Awareness of the material universe is not one more part of that universe. "(Kreeft)

The three meanings of "evolution" commonly are: the fossil record, natural selection and absence of intelligent design. There prior two senses of evolution may not contradict the Bible, but the last does. We know there is absolutely zero empirical evidence for transitional forms in the fossil record, nor the inheritance of characteristics outside of specific species. With this in mind the stated adopted notion of evolution requires just as much faith if not more to believe rather than creationism.

The absence of intelligent design does contradict the bible however, and I will be honest it would take a blind dumb and def man to not see order and hierarchy saturating our world. A macro-cosmic example of order in the universe, is the recent discovery that all of the galaxies in the universe are evenly spaced verified by deep space images by the Hubble telescope. The micro example one could look at and which is become popular are the arguments found in genetics, which reveals the evidence not merely of individual features of biological complexity but rather of a fundamental constituent of the universe: information. I cant comment in any detail on it now, simply because these topics become highly scientific and I want to keep this short. Genetics has come a long way since the 1950's and I hope to write more on it in the future. The stamp of intelligence is best put by Farrel in My Way of Life:

The Stamp of intelligence is printed deep in the very being of the universe of unintelligent things; for the theme of that cosmic poem is a them of law and order shining forth from creatures totally incapable of themselves of disposing things to any end, let alone to cosmic ends. Whether we look at the harmony of the universe and see order written in the capital letters of unvarying procedure and of microscopic details in the leaf of a tree, the ear of an animal, or the eye of a man, there is that same clear evidence of a gigantic, an infinite intelligence. We have been given a share in that intelligence that we might read the poem that only infinite intelligence and meaning of it is reserved to the mind that wrote it.

To wrap this up, here is the gist:
Q. Can a Catholic believe in evolution?
A. Although there is no evidence for evolution, it is possible for God to have used it to form species This view does not contradict Gods initial Creation of the universe, provided you do not believe there is no intelligent design and order in the universe. However, the question still remains at what point does the soul come into the picture, seeing that it is not matter and cannot evolve.

I have not sufficiently put forth all the arguments opposing evolution and its implications; I hope to remedy this soon, while providing  the teaching of the magestierium in conjunction with those arguments.