>The london times internet edition - available via
>http://www.sunday-times.co.uk/
>
>Oct 25. In World news tells us that (note the name of the reporter!?!);
>
>Pope places some faith in Darwin's theory of evolution
>
>FROM RICHARD OWEN IN ROME
>
>THE Pope risked the wrath of the religious Right yesterday by declaring
>that Darwin's theory of evolution was compatible with Christian faith. In a
>message to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, which advises the Vatican on
>scientific matters, the Pope said the theory of natural selection was "more
>than just a hypothesis".
>
>The Pope, who appears fully recovered from his appendix operation two weeks
>ago, was responding to requests for clarification from the 80-member
>Academy, which is holding its 60th anniversary meeting on "Evolution And
>The Origins Of Life".
>
>Darwin's theories, as formulated in Origin Of Species By Natural Selection
>and The Descent Of Man led to bitter controversy in the late 19th century,
>with leading churchmen denouncing them as incompatible with the account
>given in Genesis.
>
>Pope Pius XII broached the subject in 1950 in his encyclical Humani
>Generis, indicating that the Church should not reject Darwin's "serious
>hypothesis" out of hand. But he said that it could be misused by Communist
>"dialectical materialists" whose aim was "to remove any notion of God from
>people's minds".
>
>Pope John Paul II went further than Pius XII yesterday, saying: "It is
>noteworthy that the theory of evolution has progressively taken root in the
>minds of researchers following a series of discoveries in different
>disciplines."
>
>He added: "The convergence, neither sought nor provoked, of results of
>studies undertaken independently from each other in itself constitutes a
>significant argument in favour of the theory [of evolution]."
>
>The Pope appeared to side step the vexed theological question of whether,
>if the theory of evolution from apes and Australopithecus afarensis through
>Neanderthal man to Homo sapiens is correct, creatures before modern man had
>souls.
>
>But he said that, whatever man's origins, his soul was a divine creation,
>declaring: "If the human body has its origin in pre-existing living matter,
>the spiritual soul is immediately created by God." No theory was acceptable
>which held that the spirit emerged from "the forces of living material".
>
>Marghareta Hack, a leading Italian astronomer, said the pronouncement was
>an important step "because for the first time the Church is accepting
>evolution as a proven fact".
>
>Francesco Barone, a scientific philosopher, told Il Messaggero that, after
>Galileo's rehabilitation, acceptance of evolutionary theory was the latest
>in a series of steps which were "mending the tears" in the Church's
>relationship with science.
>
>Opposition to Darwinism remains staunch in the American Bible Belt.
>
>________
>
> Jeremy C. Ahouse
> Biology Department
> Brandeis University
> Waltham, MA 02254-9110
>ph: (617) 736-4954
>fax: (617) 736-2405
>email: ahouse@hydra.rose.brandeis.edu
>web: http://www.rose.brandeis.edu/users/simister/pages/Ahouse
>
>
>
-- David McFadzean david@lucifer.com Memetic Engineer http://www.lucifer.com/~david/ Church of Virus http://www.lucifer.com/virus/