March 4, 2009

After 150 years, evolution debate continues among people of faith

By Dennis Sadowski

WASHINGTON (CNS)—When scientists, theologians and philosophers gather March 3-7 in Rome for a Vatican-sponsored congress marking the 150th anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin’s theory on evolution, they hope to help Catholic Church officials better understand some of the current thought and research related to evolutionary biology.

“The program is to reorient the conversation between the Catholic Church and modern natural science, to get a new kind of conversation going,” explained Phillip Sloan, professor of liberal studies at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana and a congress planner.

“It’s establishing a dialogue on science and theology because of the great challenges that modern sciences are presenting to traditional theological understanding,” he said.

Sponsored by the Pontifical Council for Culture under its Science, Technology and the Ontological Quest project, the University of Notre Dame and several of Rome’s pontifical universities, the gathering of international scholars and Vatican officials is one of a series of events surrounding the publication of Darwin’s landmark work.

Darwin’s theory, which several popes have accepted as compatible with Catholic teaching, remains a contentious topic in the United States. The arguments have focused on whether the Genesis story of creation should hold the same stature as evolution in the classroom.

The discussion has taken on an added dimension with the growing movement to promote intelligent design, which accepts that life has evolved over the eons but that because it is so complex its development has been guided by a supreme being or intelligent agent, which some identify as God.

Sloan said that how society sees evolution has been shaped by the popular media, which omits any role for God in creation. Without God somewhere in the equation, it becomes a lot easier for people of faith to reject Darwin’s premise about the existence of life.

A Gallup Poll released Feb. 12, the 200th anniversary of Darwin’s birth, showed that 39 percent of Americans accept evolutionary theory while 25 percent do not. Another 36 percent of respondents had no opinion.

Popes Pius XII, John Paul II and Benedict XVI in particular have expressed interest in biological evolution. Pope Pius XII wrote in a 1950 encyclical that there was no conflict between evolution and faith, as long as there were certain firm points of faith where no concession can be made.

More than half a century later Pope John Paul II cited the encyclical in offering firm support for Darwin’s work, telling the Pontifical Academy of Sciences in 1996 that “new knowledge leads to recognition of the theory of evolution as more than a hypothesis.”

Despite such public support, Catholics have a shallow understanding of the issues that Darwin’s theory raises, Sloan explained in announcing the congress in September 2008.

Sloan told Catholic News Service the conference will be a step toward helping interject Catholics into the discussion, but with a focus on the nature of human existence.