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VATICAN CITY - The Big Bang theory and evolution do not eliminate the existence of God, who remains the one who set all of creation into motion, Pope Francis told his own science academy.

And God's existence does not contradict the discoveries of science, he told members of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences Oct. 27.

When we read the account of creation in Genesis, we risk thinking that God was a magician, complete with a magic wand, able to do everything. But it is not like that, he said. He created living beings and he let them develop according to the internal laws that he gave each one, so that they would develop and reach their full potential.

God gave creation full autonomy while also guaranteeing his constant presence in nature and people's lives, he said.

The beginning of the world is not a result of chaos, he said, but comes directly from a supreme principle that creates out of love.

The Big Bang, which today is held as the beginning of the world, does not contradict the intervention of the divine creator, but requires it, he said. Evolution in nature is not at odds with the notion of creation because evolution presupposes the creation of beings that evolve.

Members of the academy, many of them renowned scientists and philosophers, were meeting at the Vatican Oct. 24-28 to discuss Evolving Concepts of Nature.

Science, philosophy and religion have all contributed to how people see the world, how it began and what it all means, said the introduction to the academy's program.

Despite many scientific advances, many mysteries remain, said Rafael Vicuna, professor of molecular genetics and molecular biology at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile. While Charles Darwin shed light on the origin of species, one of the most perplexing questions is the actual origin of life, Vicuna said.

How is it that inert, inanimate matter turned into something living, and how is it that the first living single-celled organisms were still so amazingly complex, he asked in his talk Oct. 27.

Chemistry, biology and genetics have been able to identify the tiniest components and basic building blocks of living organisms, but there is something more than just what they are made out of that makes them living, he said in an interview with the Catholic newspaper, Avvenire.

I can know perfectly what a cell is made up of, but how it works deep down, what really is the dynamism that makes it move -- that is, life -- I don't know, Vicuna said. A refrigerator and a car are complex structures that move, but only with an immense amount of energy from the outside. Life, in its deepest essence, remains something that escapes us.

In his talk to academy members, Vicuna said the laws of chemistry and physics do not suffice to grasp the whole of life ... that life is more than molecules.

Another mystery is how everything in the universe, from the smallest atomic particles to every galaxy, is spinning and orbiting, another academy member said.

Rudolf Muradyan, a quantum and mathematical physicist who also works in cosmology, said in his talk that spin is the most important problem in our universe. It is the only thing that prevents the universe from totally collapsing.

Without bodies rotating on an axis or orbiting each other, everything would fall: all the stars would become one giant black hole, the earth would crash into the sun and the moon would collide into the earth, he said.

He said the problem with the Big Bang theory is it explains linear motion, with everything moving outward and expanding from one common point as a result of the bang, but it does not account for the rotation of celestial objects, and theories that the universe was born spinning.

Philosophy and religion have to be careful to not make the mistake of trying to solve the mysteries in nature by making God responsible for a natural process that escapes scientific explanation, Vicuna said.

An example of this, he said, can be found in the intelligent design movement, which accepts that life has evolved over eons but asserts that it is so complex that its development must have been guided by a supreme being or intelligent agent.

Not only are intelligent-design proponents denying nature's autonomy, but they are also revealing some degree of ingenuousness, because science has already provided explanations for the development of structures they had considered to be too complex to occur naturally, he said.

However, there is an argument for the apparent design, order and purpose observed in nature, he said, which is not to be confused with intelligent design and the God of the gaps.

Pierre Lena, a French Catholic astrophysicist, told the assembly that there are laws at work in the entire universe that are eternal, creative, uniform in space and time and stable enough to be fairly predictable.

But these laws have a mystery. Why are they there? We can't touch them, but they act. They are not God, he said, but they are a sign of the supranatural existence of something.

He told Catholic News Service that scientists can observe laws working exactly the same way over time and space. This strange property means scientists can figure out what most likely happened one billion years ago, as well as in a remote galaxy and here in this room with the same accuracy.

If the laws were changing, science would not be possible, Lena said.

Early philosophers like Plato, St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Augustine all felt nature's wonder and beauty reflected the beauty and perfection of their maker, Vicuna said.

However, the existence of a divine creator of life and the universe comes from personal belief and conviction, not scientific proof; science cannot empirically prove or disprove a God that transcends the natural sciences, he said.

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Pope: Evolution, Big Bang do not push aside God, who set it in motion

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VATICAN CITY - The Big Bang theory and evolution do not eliminate the existence of God, who remains the one who set all of creation into motion, Pope Francis told his own science academy. And God's existence does not contradict the discoveries of science, he told members of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences Oct.

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If you'd like to explore further, here are the links to Parts 2, 3 and 4 of "Did Darwin Kill God?"

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If you'd like to explore further, here are the links to Parts 2, 3 and 4 of "Did Darwin Kill God?"

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Take a second look at the questions you answered at the start of the lesson. Do you need to change your answers to any of the questions? Explain why.

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Q: I saw a poll that said 57 percent of evangelical Christians reject the theory of evolution, and it got me wondering: What does the Catholic Church teach about it? Can Catholics believe in evolution?

A: This is a question I look forward to answering! As you may know, my undergraduate studies were in the natural sciences and I have a Bachelor of Science in geology. So I'm excited to discuss evolution from both a theological and a scientific perspective.

Pope Francis recently said, "The evolution of nature is not opposed to the notion of Creation, because evolution presupposes the creation of beings that evolve." What's most remarkable about the pope's statement is that there's nothing remarkable about it at all. Seriously.

Pope Francis' statement was simply a continuation of previous papal observations that there is no inherent conflict between the process of evolution and the teaching of the Catholic Church. St. John Paul II called Darwin's theory of evolution "more than a hypothesis" in 1996. Before he was elected as Pope Benedict XVI, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger commented in 2002 that "converging evidence from many studies in the physical and biological sciences furnishes mounting support for some theory of evolution to account for the development and diversification of life on Earth." In his 1950 encyclical Humani Generis, Pope Pius XII wrote, "The Church does not forbid that ... research and discussions ... 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."

If so many popes have said that the process of evolution is not necessarily incompatible with Christianity, then we might wonder what all the controversy is about. Before I get to that, I want to stress that the Catholic Church has neither denied nor affirmed the theory of evolution to be a matter of fact. Rather, it has simply said that this theory is not inherently incompatible with Christian faith. That is an important distinction to remember.

Let's get back to the controversy and why it exists. The main reason for controversy concerns what is meant by the term evolution and to what it can refer. We need to understand the difference between evolution as an autonomous principle and evolution as a divinely guided process. We also need to understand what can be generated through the process of evolution and what cannot. Lastly, we need to understand how human cultural and moral development influences evolution itself.

There are some who believe that evolution is a principle unto itself and that living creatures randomly come into existence based on chance and circumstance. This view would see the evolutionary process as a kind of autonomous process that just happened to generate the lifeforms we see today. This understanding of evolution as an autonomous principle is fundamentally atheistic and is incompatible with the Christian belief in God as Creator.

However, there is another understanding which considers evolution to be the process through which God's creative power is manifested. According to this understanding, God is always the principal agent in the creative order, and evolution is the process that explains how God works. It is this understanding of evolution that is compatible with Christianity because it affirms the primary creative power of God.

It should also be noted that human beings are distinct from the rest of creation in that we possess an immortal soul. The soul is spiritual in nature and not part of the evolutionary process. Rather, the soul is a gift from God elevating human beings to a higher order and granting them the capacity to be in relationship with the Creator now and forever. While evolution may explain the process by which we received our physical bodies, it cannot explain or provide for the reception of our immortal soul.

This question about evolution also raises the larger issue about the relationship between the Catholic Church and science in general. There are those who mistakenly believe that the Catholic Church is somehow anti-science. Nothing could be further from the truth. As St. John Paul II stated in his 1998 encyclical Fides et Ratio, "There can never be a true divergence between faith and reason, since the same God who reveals the mysteries and bestows the gift of faith has also placed in the human spirit the light of reason."
Read the Spanish version of this column. Northwest Catholic - November 2017

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Q: I saw a poll that said 57 percent of evangelical Christians reject the theory of evolution, and it got me wondering: What does the Catholic Church teach about it? Can Catholics believe in evolution? A: This is a question I look forward to answering!

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There is a great misperception in the culture that Catholicism is anti-science. Many college students confront this error when they encounter reductionism, rationalism, and materialism through their professors. These students do not know how to respond-and far too often-dismiss Catholicism outright because they don't realize answers to their questions exist within the Church's 2000-year history. One of greatest causes of confusion is the topic of evolution.

The reason for this confusion is two-fold. First, many Catholics do not realize the Church's position on evolution and may not even look for answers before accepting the materialist position. Second, the abandonment of philosophy as the joining discipline between science and theology has destroyed much of the dialogue that has taken place between these two fields over the centuries. An example is the bridge created through St. Thomas Aquinas' first-cause argument. The first-cause argument grounds scientific inquiry in the first-cause, who is God. Without this argument, science quickly devolves into materialism, and ceases to look out beyond itself.

The divorce from philosophy creates an environment where both theology and the natural sciences overstep their bounds. This is most evidenced by the rationalist-materialist declaration that there is no God, while the biblical literalist tells us the world is only 6000 years old, even though God-given reason tells us otherwise, on both accounts. Answers to the complexities of life are reduced to either a material level or turned into a faith-based system devoid of reason. The Catholic approach is not an either/or, it is a both/and system. We say yes to scientific discovery, yes to Aquinas and Aristotle, and yes to the Book of Genesis. That's far more yeses than we are given from either the scientism camp or the creationism camp. I only have the space to provide a brief overview of the Church's view of evolution, but I will return to the philosophy problem at a later date.

Today I will briefly outline the Church's historical position on evolution through a series of documents and talks given by Popes in the last 66 years. First, it is important to understand that the Church makes no official pronouncements on matters of science. That is not within her authority. She promulgates teachings of faith as given to us through Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition. She cannot overstep her boundaries and make judgments on matters of science. The only time she formally responds to scientific matters is when theological or spiritual issues are involved. Popes and theologians discuss scientific discoveries, but the Church has no official position on any scientific theory. Which leads us to the Church's first discussion of evolution.

Humani Generis: The Church formally speaks on evolution for the first time.

In 1950 Pope Pius XII issued the encyclical Humani Generis, which deals with various intellectual trends in matters of science, philosophy, and theology. Darwin's theory of evolution was nearly 100 years old and clearly influencing all disciplines within the natural sciences. Humani Generis demonstrated a position held by the Church throughout those 100 years, but one that had not been formally recognized until its promulgation. Evolution of the body and nature does not contradict Catholic doctrine, so long as it is held that God is the first cause of the universe.

[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 - for the Catholic faith obliges us to hold that souls are immediately created by God. However, this must be done in such a way that the reasons for both opinions, that is, those favorable and those unfavorable to evolution, be weighed and judged with the necessary seriousness, moderation and measure, and provided that all are prepared to submit to the judgment of the Church.

Humani Generis addresses two issues in this section. First, there can never be evolution of the soul because it is created with God as its first cause. Since the soul is immaterial it cannot evolve as things in the material universe evolve. This means the faculties of the soul-intellect and will-do not evolve as the body evolves. The Church has a clear obligation to clarify this position for the Mystical Body and the world.

Second, the Church wants to make it clear that no one is required to submit to evolutionary theory and that open and reasoned dialogue should take place between persons on this topic. Each member within the Church is permitted to agree or disagree with various aspects of evolutionary theory, but the Church also dismisses outright, an overly literal interpretation of Genesis as a book of science.

Why is the Church open to the possibility of evolution?

The Church does not presume to limit the creative power, will, and scope of God. The Church herself holds that God acts primarily through secondary causes [i.e. an antibiotic curing an infection]. This is why the cause for sainthood is such a rigorous and scientific process. God rarely acts as the first cause in healing a person or through other direct interventions in the natural order. If God is found to be the primary cause, after rigorous scientific inquiry, then a miracle is declared. The Church recognizes the natural order God created including the powers and potentialities that exist within nature.

The use of intermediary [i.e. secondary] causes does not indicate a God who is less intelligent and powerful than one who would make things directly, but one who is more intelligent and powerful. Getting non-intelligent beings to participate in the production of the world is more difficult than doing everything oneself-one has to design the instruments (the elements) themselves in such a way as to allow them to share in this task...making things not only to be, but to be causes shows greater power.

Christopher T. Baglow, Faith, Reason, & Science: Theology on the Cutting Edge, quoting Marie George, 179-180.

Saint John Paul II on evolution.

In 1986, Saint John Paul II returned to Humani Generis while expanding in light of new scientific findings. It has become increasingly clear through the research of multiple disciplines-not just biology-that evolution is proving to be more than a hypothesis in numerous cases. While many in the scientific field may be impatient with the Church's cautious attitude, scientists need to remember that the Church lives according to the virtue of prudence. For example, the Church took hundreds of years to formally clarify her Christology. Plus, the Church is never going to make any formal declarations on the validity of evolution. This does not mean the Church is not involved in scientific study and discussions on a wide range of topics. Saint John Paul II continues the discussion on evolution:

There are no difficulties in explaining the origin of man in regard to the body by means of the theory of evolution. According to the hypothesis mentioned it is possible that the human body, following the order impressed by the Creator on the energies of life, could have gradually been prepared in the form of antecedent living beings [i.e. living beings that existed prior to humanity].

John Paul II, " Humans are Spiritual and Corporeal Beings ", April 16, 1986.

In 1996 John Paul II addressed the Pontifical Academy of Sciences on the topic of evolution stating that new scientific findings "lead us toward recognition of evolution as more than a hypothesis."

The limitations of evolution.

While this may be the case, it by no means leads us to conclude that evolution is the answer to everything, which is the mistaken belief of far too many people today. Pope Benedict XVI stated in 2007:

But the doctrine of evolution does not answer everything and does not answer the great philosophical question: Where does everything come from? And how does everything take a path that ultimately leads to the person? It seems to me that it is very important that reason opens up even more, that it sees this information [about evolution], but that it also sees that this information is not enough to explain all of reality.

" Pontiff: Evolution Does Not Exclude a Creater", in Zenit: The World Seen from Rome Daily Dispatch, July 27, 2001.

Evolution is a valuable theory in explaining how God uses secondary causes within the universe. Science is a good that should be pursued and God gives us reason so that we can come to know him through the beauty, wonder, intelligibility, and grandeur of his Creation. The natural sciences, however, do not tell us everything we need to know about the natural order of things. Science cannot address matters related to the immaterial, or spiritual, realities of man and God. Science can never penetrate the ontological level of mankind. This is why philosophy and theology are essential. Philosophy and theology help us to understand God, human beings, the universe, and eschatology at the deeper level of faith guided by reason.

The Church walks the middle road. She always walks the middle road, which is why she is derided by both sides during most battles. The Church teaches us that God is the first cause of the universe. He spoke Creation into being through a gratuitous act of charity. God is "to be" itself. Man and woman are material and immaterial, "embodied spirits" per Saint Thomas Aquinas. The body may be a product of God driven evolution, but the soul does not evolve. The soul is created by God as its first cause.

It is important for us to remember that faith and reason must always be ordered to truth. That means no scientific finding can ever contradict the teachings of the Faith. When we understand this reality we can live in freedom, rather than in fear and confusion. It is also important to look for the Church's answers rather than assuming they do not exist. This type of mentality is a form of intellectual laziness, which needs to be discarded. As Catholics, we have an obligation to seek out answers to questions that arise. Seeking truth goes to the very heart of what it means to be human.

This is a very brief introduction on the topic of evolution and the Church. Hopefully, it will lead people to examine the relationship between Catholicism and science more closely. The Catholic Church is where science, philosophy, and theology all converge as mankind continues on its journey towards truth, who is the Triune God.

Constance T. Hull is a wife, mother, homeschooler, and a graduate with an M.A. in Theology with an emphasis in philosophy. Her desire is to live the wonder so passionately preached in the works of G.K. Chesterton and to share that with her daughter and others. While you can frequently find her head inside of a great work of theology or philosophy, she considers her husband and daughter to be her greatest teachers. She is passionate about beauty, working towards holiness, the Sacraments, and all things Catholic. She is also published at The Federalist, Public Discourse, and blogs frequently at Swimming the Depths ( www.swimmingthedepths.com).

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A Brief Exploration of the Catholic Position on Evolution

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There is a great misperception in the culture that Catholicism is anti-science. Many college students confront this error when they encounter reductionism, rationalism, and materialism through their professors. These students do not know how to respond-and far too often-dismiss Catholicism outright because they don't realize answers to their questions exist within the Church's 2000-year history.

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Work with a partner to answer the questions. Use the links below to help you.

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"In the Beginning..."
Read the following section from Pope Benedict XVI's homily on The Creation of the Human Being and in a couple sentences discuss your first impressions.

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Select true or false for each of the statements prior to going through the lesson. Fill in your answers in the left column.

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Read through the following questions and   answer them as you watch the video about Christianity's views on evolution.
1. What is ultra-Darwinism?
2. What is a fundamentalist?
3. According to the video, why is each view incorrect?
4. What is the value of looking at the Creation story allegorically versus literally?
5. How is the use of the word "myth" different than the everyday use of the word?
6. Pick one of the following quotes from the video and discuss what it means to you. You can choose another line from the video if you prefer.

"One hundred and fifty years ago, his (Darwin's) theory changed mankind's perception of life on Earth forever." 0:09

"And I believe that religious alternatives such as Creationism and Intelligent Design are nonsense. You may think that makes me an atheist, but I'm a Christian. I believe in God." 0:20

"The arrival of Darwin's theory of evolution is seen by many as the death of Divine Creation and the birth of atheism." 3:07

"Is it a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics." St. Augustine 10:10

"If we take the Bible only literally, we will have an impoverished account not a richer one and there will no room for theological reflection." 10:18