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Reflections and Preaching

WHAT SHOULD SCIENCE TEACHERS TEACH ABOUT EVOLUTION?

By Benedict M. Ashley, O.P.

The evolutionists, creationists, intelligent designers are battling in the public media in a very confusing way. Catholics need to understand the true issues clearly and promote a way out of the dilemma. To do this we must face the following questions.

1). What are the intelligent designers claiming? They argue not one but two distinct theses. The first is that Neo-Darwinism is an inadequate explanation of what we know about the historical succession of species; the second is that a better theory of evolution would include an Intelligent Designer who guides evolutionary forces to produce something as complex as organic life and above all the humanity of the scientist himself. The leading theorist in this movement, Michael J. Behe, associate professor of biochemistry at Lehigh University, believes that evolution of species has taken place and that the causes on which Neo-Darwinian relies, namely, chance mutation of genes and “survival of organisms better adapted to different environment” may play a role in evolution. He is also open to an alternative theory of evolution that grounds it in some law inherent in matter. But he argues that Neo-Darwinism as the total explanation of evolution has recently been made utterly improbable by our discovery of the extreme chemical complexity of life.

2). Leaving aside for the moment the issue of the need for an Intelligent Designer, is it or is not true that Neo-Darwinism is a satisfactory scientific explanation of the paleontological succession of life forms? Neo-Darwinism greatly strengthened Darwin’s theory of natural selection by adding to it the Catholic priest Gregor Mendel’s that the genes transmit heredity and the subsequent discover that genes can change by chance mutations. This improved theory has been accepted by the great majority of modern scientists who therefore are no longer interested in views like those of Teilhard de Chardin, popular for awhile among Catholic theologians. Teilhard thought that there is a natural “law of evolution” inherent in matter, such as the natural laws of gravitation and electromagnetism, that would necessarily or at least with high probability predict that matter would evolve to produce life and ultimately Darwin! This type of evolutionary theory was proposed by St. Augustine who spoke of rationes seminales (seed principles) implanted by God in chaotic matter that would cause it to evolve to its present condition. Behe and other Intelligent Designers consider that a possibility. Many people, even those who have studied some science confusedly suppose that this is what modern evolutionists hold. In fact for Neo-Darwinism holds is the only law of evolution is what the popular advocate of that view Richard Dawkins calls “the selfish gene.” When some gene or genes of an organism mutate by chance (but not by any necessary law) it may be able to reproduce and survive environmental changes better than its generators. Gradually these new variations become new species. But, as Behe argued, this leaves the question of whether in fact life would ever exist in our universe or produce something as complicated as the human brain, completely in the dark. Thus another great advocate of evolution, the late Stephen Jay Gould, always said it was just as likely that the universe remain lifeless or that nothing but bugs should have evolved as that it should have produced life or man. All Behe adds to this is to conclude, as Gould did not, that since Neo-Darwinism is so inadequate we ought to conclude that evolution is ultimately due to an Intelligent Designer.

3). St. Thomas Aquinas accepted the Genesis account of the six days of creation as literally true, but left room for St. Augustine’s view. Aquinas (a) knew none of the scientific facts that today support evolution and (b) did not know the parallel texts of ancient pagan accounts of creation that to modern scholars show that Augustine was right in reading the Genesis account as metaphorical. Thus St. Thomas famous Five Ways to prove God’s existence no way depend on the facts that support Neo-Darwinism or Intelligent Design,, but are much more fundamental. Intelligent Design, as Behe presents it, is a mathematical theory of probabilities and as such itself only probable and dialectical. Aquinas’ arguments, however, and especially the First Argument from motion that he called the “most evident” of the five follows logically from the simple fact that the world we live in is changing and that every change is the effect of some cause or series of causes that cannot be infinitely long but must end in an uncaused cause. Since all scientific reasoning must be logically consistent and be based on the principle of causality and the fact of change, Aquinas’ proof holds for every possible scientific theory. The only important attempt to refute that argument was given by Immanuel Kant but only at the expense of ending in idealism, which no scientist can seriously accept. This proof, however, does not directly prove the existence of a personal, intelligent God, but this becomes evident when we realize that since we like the universe are produces of the First Cause, It must be super-intelligent. Thus Christians need not rely on current Intelligent Design arguments since belief in God is logically presupposed to the possibility of scientists or their science.

4). What then should our Public Schools teach about evolution in their science classes? The truth. What the teacher and the textbooks should make clear is something like this:

The great majority of scientists today hold that on the basis of fossil evidence an evolution of species, including the human species, has taken place. The best explanation they have yet found is that it was caused by the chance mutation of genes and the natural selection of organisms having particular genes in a changing environment. This explanation, however, like most scientific theories today remains only probable until we know the facts better. Moreover, it can be reconciled with a belief in a Creator, although some Christians interpret the Bible to deny that species have evolved and even give some scientific evidence for this but not enough to satisfy most scientists. Other Christians who do not interpret the Bible in this way, Jews, Muslims and the Eastern religions, may also accept evolution yet hold that this is the way in which God has chosen to create the world by using some parts of his creation to cause others to develop. Some who accept the fact of evolution use what is called the arguments form Intelligent Design to argue mathematically that the Neo-Darwinism is a theory that has too small a probability to be successful unless their is an Intelligent Designer, but more fundamental arguments for the existence of God have much wider acceptance. The fact that Neo-Darwinism is a open to criticism does not, however, deny its scientific importance, since all science progresses by improving existing theories. It is the business of this class to explain that theory. In other classes here and in your churches or synagogues or mosques you will learn about other views and be able to compare their arguments. That is what living in a democratic, multicultural society requires.

Posted 8/28/2005

Prayer

By Simon Felix Michalski, O.P.
October 28, 2004

There are a lot of ways to think about prayer. There have been a lot of books written about prayer, and there are a number of different definitions of prayer from the Baltimore Catechism classic, “ Raising ones mind and heart to God” to a contemporary teenager’s “ Hanging out with Jesus and getting to know him.”

Tonight, I want to think about prayer as gift. I want us to think about prayer, not such as something we do, but something God gives to us, by allowing us to participate in His goodness, in His holiness, in His divine thoughts, in short, we share in the life of the Holy Trinity. God shares His life with us, and wraps us in a blanket of love and mercy.

The best way for me to illustrate this point is for me to share with you some of the experiences of my prayer before and after I entered the Order of Preachers.

Before I entered the order I had to schedule my prayer life around my work. Now my prayer life is my work. This is gift
Before I entered the Order, I would have to make up my own schedule of prayers, sort of a lone ranger whispering in the desert. Now, I join together with my brothers, and pray the divine office. Not only with my Dominican Brothers, but also mystically with every religious order on the earth, and we join together to many streams come together to form a river, which empties into an ocean of praise for our God. This is gift. Before I entered the Order, I had a great desire to attend daily Mass. Unfortunately, it would have meant that I get up at 4:00 in the Morning, to attend 5:30 Mass, and then go to work. That wasn’t going to happen. Since I joined the order, I now begin everyday of my life by receiving the precious body and the precious blood of Jesus Christ. I receive Jesus, in the most intimate of way possible on this earth, everyday. It is the very foundation of everything I do.

Before I entered the order, I used many different forms of prayer. I used vocal prayer, and mental prayer, I tried to do contemplative prayer, but the truth is, I actually read more about contemplative prayer than actually practicing contemplative prayer. Bruce Lee once said about fighting, “ You can’t learn to swim on dry land.” It is also applicable to prayer. Since I entered the order, I have taught about contemplative prayer, and I know practice it on a daily bases, spending much time in silent, wordless, prayer; opening myself to God’s loving presence. This is gift. All of this is gift to me… from God. All of this is a privilege, beyond human words.

Let me put it this way. We as Dominicans like to speak about the various aspects of our life, as pillars. We speak about the four pillars of Dominican life as prayer, study, preaching, and community. I just want to tweak the metaphor a bit. Think of prayer as the foundation. As a great marble slab, that forms into a huge continuous pillar. This marble slab is made of my prayers. It is not only my prayers, but also the prayers of my brothers, who pray for me, and with me. Add into my base, the prayers of the people I left behind in Michigan, and my foundation get thicker. For surely my family and friends and my local parishes are praying for me. Add to that, all the people I have met since I have been in the order, our benefactors, and Dominican laity, our sisters, and Cloistered Nuns, and all our Dominica friends. I just met a couple last weeks, which is adding me into a prayer chain at their parish. Add into that all the people who I never met, worldwide, who are praying for vocations, praying for religious, and such. Add to that the Dominican saints, and the angels, who are prayer for me. This is the foundation upon which God builds his temple, in which the indwelling Holy Trinity lives in me, in which I live, and move, and have my very being. It is the same for you.

But God doesn’t stop there. God adds into His temples, grace. God gives us pre-vieninat grace, which helps us to pray, and actual grace while we are praying, and sanctifying grace that transforms us into what we are created to be.

But God doesn’t stop there. God then infuses into us the gift of the virtues. We receive, if we are willing, the cardinal virtues, and the theological virtues, which are added to our natural moral and intellectual virtues. These virtues, transform us, and make our very lives, acts of prayer.

But God doesn’t stop there. Unto the virtues, God gives us the 7 gifts of the Holy Spirit, from which flow the 12 fruits of the Holy Spirit. These gifts further, perfect us, and others. And to some God adds further, miraculous, supernatural gifts, to be poured out for his people.

But is not done giving yet. In addition to this He gives us a angelic persons, to protect, to light, and to guide our way through this process, And God couples that with human person’s living and dead, who also help to light, to guard, and to guide us, on this journey of union with God.

Now, I am not very far on this process. It is often depicted as a ladder stretching into the heavens. I am still down on the first few rungs. But, I now have a map to where I am going. I now have people to whom I can stop and ask directions. I have an eight hundred year old, living tradition, that can, and does help me become the person, that God created me to be, and send me out into the mission field to help others to be the people that God created them to be.

Gift, its all gift. Giving, and receiving, and giving back.

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