DAY 21: The Catholic Church is opposed to science and rejects evolution

      I guess this is a fairly big misconception of the church because I've found it in a couple of " Top 10 Misconceptions of the Catholic Church" lists... so. here goes!

     Now, the Catholic Church has actually been behind many of the world's great scientific advances- remember Gutenberg's printing press?- and I actually have one example of such a discovery that may knock the socks off of your feet....either that or melt your face.... any guesses?... oh c'mon... really?... well you'll never guess so... it's the Big Bang Theory! ( No, not the show- sorry to everyone who loves Sheldon... ) Yep, the Big Bang Theory creator is credited be a Catholic Belgian Priest. (Yeah, I couldn't believe at first either, but it's on catholic education.org  and PBS say it's true...so it must be okay...right?) This Priest, Georges Lemaître, called the Big Bang "a day without yesterday" and proposed the theory in 1927, based on Einstein's theory of gravitation. Funnily enough, Einstein actually rejected Lemaître's  theory at first.

     And as for evolution? Well, the Catholic Church does not reject the theory. Our parameters are limited to our belief that God created the world from nothing. However, we (the church) have no conclusive evidence that evolution doesn't exist. In fact, many say that God himself created evolution and guides it. One website, http://www.catholic.com/library/Adam_Eve_and_Evolution.asp, states that there are three different views on evolution and the origin of mankind.

 1.)  special or instantaneous creation- basically the idea that there was nothing until...*POOF* things just came into being, like humans.
2.) developmental creation or theistic evolution-  essentially, a given thing develops from a previous state or form, but it's under God’s guidance. OR
3.) atheistic evolution- evolution is due completely to random forces alone...

     The website also says that Pope Pius XII claimed that "the teaching authority of the Church does not forbid that, in conformity with the present state of human sciences and sacred theology, 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—[but] the Catholic faith obliges us to hold that souls are immediately created by God"  So, in English, evolution may have created human bodies, but God gave them souls...and souls do not evolve.

     Well, I hope everyone finds this post as interesting as I did. It certainly is interesting learning new things, isn't it? You know what they say "You learn something new every day."