Dear Jonathan:

Thank you for your good wishes concerning my health. I am hangin in there.

Concerning the Theory of Evolution and the Church: While some fundamentalists and evangelicals are hard-core against the theory of evolution, the Catholic Church leaves such matters up to science to determine.

There are only three things that the Catholic Church insists upon concerning evolution:

1) the scientific theory of evolution does not disprove the existence of God (any science that tries to assert Evolution as an alternative to God or as proof that God does not exist or is not the Creator is out-of-line and to assert such a thing is not science, just as much as religious people may be out-of-line to assert religious theories as science when they are not)

2) there were an original pair of humans, which in Genesis story happened to be named Adam and Eve (actually science has pretty much proven that the human race can be traced to a single pair)

3) the Soul is not evolved, but is specifically and individually created by God imbued within the human person at the very moment of conception.

Other than these three provisos the Church has no problems letting science be science and do its job to try to explain with the scientific method the origins of species and the mechanism of creation.

From a religious point-of-view, God is God and he can create as he pleases. If he created the big bang and all the rest evolved from there, so be it. If he created the Grand Canyon in one second and only made it look like it was created over millions of years, he has the power to do that, so be it. Who cares, from a religious point-of-view?

From a religious point-of-view the Genesis story of creation is not science nor is it meant to be. The point of the Genesis story is not HOW the universe was created, but WHO created it. Anything beyond that is mere speculation theologically.

The attitude that some people on both sides of the fence reminds me of an interchange between Job and God in Job 38:

Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind: "Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?  Gird up your loins like a man, I will question you, and you shall declare to me.  "Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements--surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?  "Or who shut in the sea with doors, when it burst forth from the womb; when I made clouds its garment, and thick darkness its swaddling band,  and prescribed bounds for it, and set bars and doors, and said, 'Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stayed?

It is shear arrogance for evolutionist and materialist to tell God how to create the universe by insisting that God had nothing to do with it, that it was all natural processes. This applies puny human wisdom to the matter and oversteps the bounds of true science.

It is ALSO arrogant for religious people to tell God how to create the universe and to insist that He could not have created the world through the mechanism of evolution.

God has the power create as he desires. Did he create the world in six days? Unlikely, but He could if he wanted. Did he create the world through a process of evolution? The physical evidence seems to show that at least to some degree. God can work that way if he wants.

Bottomline, for a Christian: God is the creator, regardless of the mechanism.

I personally do not care how He did it (create the universe), I only care that He did do it and I thank Him for doing it and making me a part of this wonderful and beautiful universe.

God Bless,
Bro. Ignatius Mary