I learned something new today. Apparently, the Catholic Church does not believe that the events described in B'reishit (Genesis) 1 literally took place. Check it out below:
God was behind Big Bang, universe no accident: Pope
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - God's mind was behind complex scientific theories such as the Big Bang, and Christians should reject the idea that the universe came into being by accident, Pope Benedict said on Thursday.
"The universe is not the result of chance, as some would want to make us believe," Benedict said on the day Christians mark the Epiphany, the day the Bible says the three kings reached the site where Jesus was born by following a star.
"Contemplating it (the universe) we are invited to read something profound into it: the wisdom of the creator, the inexhaustible creativity of God," he said in a sermon to some 10,000 people in St Peter's Basilica on the feast day.
While the pope has spoken before about evolution, he has rarely delved back in time to discuss specific concepts such as the Big Bang, which scientists believe led to the formation of the universe some 13.7 billion years ago.
Researchers at CERN, the nuclear research center in Geneva, have been smashing protons together at near the speed of light to simulate conditions that they believe brought into existence the primordial universe from which stars, planets and life on earth -- and perhaps elsewhere -- eventually emerged.
Some atheists say science can prove that God does not exist, but Benedict said that some scientific theories were "mind limiting" because "they only arrive at a certain point ... and do not manage to explain the ultimate sense of reality ..."
He said scientific theories on the origin and development of the universe and humans, while not in conflict with faith, left many questions unanswered.
"In the beauty of the world, in its mystery, in its greatness and in its rationality ... we can only let ourselves be guided toward God, creator of heaven and earth," he said.
Benedict and his predecessor John Paul have been trying to shed the Church's image of being anti-science, a label that stuck when it condemned Galileo for teaching that the earth revolves around the sun, challenging the words of the Bible.
Galileo was rehabilitated and the Church now also accepts evolution as a scientific theory and sees no reason why God could not have used a natural evolutionary process in the forming of the human species.
The Catholic Church no longer teaches creationism -- the belief that God created the world in six days as described in the Bible -- and says that the account in the book of Genesis is an allegory for the way God created the world.
But it objects to using evolution to back an atheist philosophy that denies God's existence or any divine role in creation. It also objects to using Genesis as a scientific text.
Interesting philosophy there, Your Holiness. We actually agree on a few things. I find our agreement fascinating.
You and I absolutely agree that "Contemplating it (the universe) we are invited to read something profound into it". As a religious existentialist, I take a "leap of faith" and reach my belief that God exists. However, I still strongly feel that I can't take that "leap of faith" without a little bit of evidence, a small experience or sensing of God's presence. After I take that "leap of faith", I still find it comforting and amazing that I can still have and hope for experiences and senses of God's presence. (I wrote a d'var once about Parashat Re'eh based on my teacher Rabbi Neil Gillman's Sacred Fragments. Writing the d'var helped me to articulate my personal theology and specifically my experiences of the intersection between the empiricist and religious existentialist approaches to belief in God. This is somewhat of a condensed version of that discussion.)
You and I also agree that science doesn't answer everything. I believe that the Big Bang happened; we have proof of it. We can also explain how stars are created, live, and die. But can science explain why I found the stars so beautiful tonight here? Well, science can explain why there weren't any clouds and why I can see the stars. Science can explain what happens in my brain when I see the stars. But science cannot fully explain my awe at seeing the constellations brightly shining in the sky. Upon seeing them, I thanked God - oseh ma'aseh v'reishit - Source of Creation. I didn't say it thinking of God as the single Creator of the universe or the One Who motivates creation. But science does not explain everything about the universe, and when I reach the point when I can't explain anymore, I call that God. For me, God is somewhat synonymous with the beauty of the universe; God is benevolent.
This, however, should not be taken to mean that I believe that God is omnipotent. Your Holiness, I cannot agree with you that God has "inexhaustible creativity". God doesn't control everything. I don't believe that God was behind the Big Bang. Until I was about 16 years old, I believed just as you do. I dealt with the accounts of creation that I heard in school (the Big Bang and evolution) by believing that God set up the world so that His creation would be carried out in that way. After the Big Bang came the days of creation. It didn't seem too far-fetched to me that Adam and Eve could have evolved from animals in the Garden of Eden, nor did I seem to mind that Adam and Eve could have been prehistoric beings like Lucy. Sometimes, I even believed that the Big Bang and evolution were just stories that were provided by God for humans to wrestle with until the moment when God spoke to us directly again and revealed His greatness ("oh my goodness, God is even greater than these stories!").
Notice the "His"? Yep. I'm done with that philosophy. When family illnesses happen and life starts to feel out of control, one starts to ask questions. Some of the questions sound like, "Why did everything go from just perfect to totally wrong?" "Everything was so manageable. Why is everything now so hard to deal with?"
My favorite refrain: "God, You were there to create the world and split the sea and do all these things that required so much power. Does it really require that much power to heal my family? Why won't You heal my family?"
Your Holiness, I couldn't deal with stories that didn't make sense anymore. God can't be all-powerful, or there would be no sadness or illness or any terrible thing. I believe that God is good. I see no reason to abandon that claim. The stars are still beautiful! Of course, one might ask why someone or something else couldn't be responsible for that beauty. That's when I go back to my "leap of faith." The world just doesn't show me proof for an omnipotent God and as hard as I've tried, I can't make that "leap of faith" anymore. There isn't a reason for everything. It also helps that there is evidence that the Bible was written by human beings and that the image of God as all-powerful may not literally be true. I believe that these humans were divinely inspired. The Catholic Church seems to acknowledge all of this in its belief that B'reishit 1 is an allegory. This, in my opinion, is admirable. Perhaps we won't agree about how much we'll leave to God directly, but at least we can agree that the metaphorical Hand of God has, does, and will touch the universe...
You and I absolutely agree that "Contemplating it (the universe) we are invited to read something profound into it". As a religious existentialist, I take a "leap of faith" and reach my belief that God exists. However, I still strongly feel that I can't take that "leap of faith" without a little bit of evidence, a small experience or sensing of God's presence. After I take that "leap of faith", I still find it comforting and amazing that I can still have and hope for experiences and senses of God's presence. (I wrote a d'var once about Parashat Re'eh based on my teacher Rabbi Neil Gillman's Sacred Fragments. Writing the d'var helped me to articulate my personal theology and specifically my experiences of the intersection between the empiricist and religious existentialist approaches to belief in God. This is somewhat of a condensed version of that discussion.)
You and I also agree that science doesn't answer everything. I believe that the Big Bang happened; we have proof of it. We can also explain how stars are created, live, and die. But can science explain why I found the stars so beautiful tonight here? Well, science can explain why there weren't any clouds and why I can see the stars. Science can explain what happens in my brain when I see the stars. But science cannot fully explain my awe at seeing the constellations brightly shining in the sky. Upon seeing them, I thanked God - oseh ma'aseh v'reishit - Source of Creation. I didn't say it thinking of God as the single Creator of the universe or the One Who motivates creation. But science does not explain everything about the universe, and when I reach the point when I can't explain anymore, I call that God. For me, God is somewhat synonymous with the beauty of the universe; God is benevolent.
This, however, should not be taken to mean that I believe that God is omnipotent. Your Holiness, I cannot agree with you that God has "inexhaustible creativity". God doesn't control everything. I don't believe that God was behind the Big Bang. Until I was about 16 years old, I believed just as you do. I dealt with the accounts of creation that I heard in school (the Big Bang and evolution) by believing that God set up the world so that His creation would be carried out in that way. After the Big Bang came the days of creation. It didn't seem too far-fetched to me that Adam and Eve could have evolved from animals in the Garden of Eden, nor did I seem to mind that Adam and Eve could have been prehistoric beings like Lucy. Sometimes, I even believed that the Big Bang and evolution were just stories that were provided by God for humans to wrestle with until the moment when God spoke to us directly again and revealed His greatness ("oh my goodness, God is even greater than these stories!").
Notice the "His"? Yep. I'm done with that philosophy. When family illnesses happen and life starts to feel out of control, one starts to ask questions. Some of the questions sound like, "Why did everything go from just perfect to totally wrong?" "Everything was so manageable. Why is everything now so hard to deal with?"
My favorite refrain: "God, You were there to create the world and split the sea and do all these things that required so much power. Does it really require that much power to heal my family? Why won't You heal my family?"
Your Holiness, I couldn't deal with stories that didn't make sense anymore. God can't be all-powerful, or there would be no sadness or illness or any terrible thing. I believe that God is good. I see no reason to abandon that claim. The stars are still beautiful! Of course, one might ask why someone or something else couldn't be responsible for that beauty. That's when I go back to my "leap of faith." The world just doesn't show me proof for an omnipotent God and as hard as I've tried, I can't make that "leap of faith" anymore. There isn't a reason for everything. It also helps that there is evidence that the Bible was written by human beings and that the image of God as all-powerful may not literally be true. I believe that these humans were divinely inspired. The Catholic Church seems to acknowledge all of this in its belief that B'reishit 1 is an allegory. This, in my opinion, is admirable. Perhaps we won't agree about how much we'll leave to God directly, but at least we can agree that the metaphorical Hand of God has, does, and will touch the universe...
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