Wednesday, February 11, 2009

This a nice change from burying the hatchet in his back

Vatican buries the hatchet with Charles Darwin.
The Vatican has admitted that Charles Darwin was on the right track when he claimed that Man descended from apes.
Now that doesn't sound so bad, does it?  But thet had to ruin it with this:
A leading official declared yesterday that Darwin’s theory of evolution was compatible with Christian faith, and could even be traced to St Augustine and St Thomas Aquinas. “In fact, what we mean by evolution is the world as created by God,” said Archbishop Gianfranco Ravasi, head of the Pontifical Council for Culture.
Ah well, baby steps.
And they get a bit of redemption for smacking down the creationists:
The Vatican also dealt the final blow to speculation that Pope Benedict XVI might be prepared to endorse the theory of Intelligent Design, whose advocates credit a “higher power” for the complexities of life.

Organisers of a papal-backed conference next month marking the 150th anniversary of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species said that at first it had even been proposed to ban Intelligent Design from the event, as “poor theology and poor science”. Intelligent Design would be discussed at the fringes of the conference at the Pontifical Gregorian University, but merely as a “cultural phenomenon”, rather than a scientific or theological issue, organisers said.

Drop by drop, wave by wave, tide by tide reality is eroding away at the foundations.

Recommend this Post

4 comments:

Suzanne said...

Never trust the media on "the Vatican." While it's true that many accept many aspects of evolution, there are several aspects that may be incompatible with some points of the theory.

I think this report lacks nuance. It was written by someone who doesn't understand the Church, written for people who don't understand.

Anonymous said...

The Vatican isn't the problem. The United States of Control All Thought; that is the problem.

sassy said...

Perhaps I did not understand (see Suzanne's comment) but, when I read that article in the Times yesterday and thought it was just in time for Darwin's Birthday ;)

Constant Vigilance said...

I agree sassy. I thought it was a gentle retreat on the Vatican's part. The timing was gracious as well (imho).