Theists: What is your stance on evolution?

[Fake Messiah]

I find it interesting that even the Catholic Church accepts Evolution as a fact, but of course they put God at the front of it as being the cause for everything and the events of evolution just being the explanation even though this greatly contradicts their bible. But at least they're willing to acknowledge evolution to an extent. That's progress right?

Catholic Church has neither officially affirmed nor denied the biological evolution, although it did reject the evolution of humans in Pope Pius XII’s 1950 encyclical “Humani Generis.”

It seems today that the Pope lets Catholics personally choose whether they will accept it or not, so that is why there are still many Catholics, including those in the clergy, that don't accept evolution.

[Mister Agenda]

Most Christians accept the scientific accounts of cosmology and biological evolution, though the percentage of acceptance is lower in the USA than in any other majority Christian country (about 54%, lumping 22% theistic and 34% natural processes together).

[T.J.]

Ah. I heard wrong then. My bad.

[Mister Agenda]

Ah. I heard wrong then. My bad.

I don't know, that leaves the US with 46% Creationists in one form or another, nearly half the population, and they're very vocal. The Americans who accept the theory of evolution probably includes most of the agnostics, atheists and the majority of Catholics, and liberal Protestants. 30-35% of Americans are Evangelical Protestants, and they're the bulk of our roughly 152 million Creationists.

[Ahriman]

Here's a radical idea......what if the universe was created, but evolution is real? Mind blowing.

[Mister Agenda]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's what the Pope thinks too.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

I find it interesting that even the Catholic Church accepts Evolution as a fact, but of course they put God at the front of it as being the cause for everything and the events of evolution just being the explanation even though this greatly contradicts their bible. But at least they're willing to acknowledge evolution to an extent. That's progress right?

Catholic Church has neither officially affirmed nor denied the biological evolution, although it did reject the evolution of humans in Pope Pius XII’s 1950 encyclical “Humani Generis.”

It seems today that the Pope lets Catholics personally choose whether they will accept it or not, so that is why there are still many Catholics, including those in the clergy, that don't accept evolution.

At the catholic school I attended in the late 1950's to early 1960's, evolution was accepted as true. We were also taught the book Of Exodus is not meant to be taken literally. The justification we were given for accepting evolution was that we simply have no idea of the duration of each of seven days of creation in Genesis.(could be billions/millions of years for all we know) That evolution was the result of god's plan. At the time, we all went "Right.  Glad that's settled "  The good brothers who taught me were not strong theologians. On asking a curly theological question, the reply was " Oh, that's a mystery of faith. We  just believe it" . I kid you not.

All that sounds dandy-ish. Underneath all that is the simple truth that the church has always been anti science. It accepts scientific views if and only if they are able to reconcile them with dogma. If not, they are rejected outright until such time as they have no choice. Galileo  and his heliocentric view of the solar system comes to mind, as well as the burning alive of Giordano Bruno. Today, the church still insists that a foetus is a person from the moment of conception,  and opposes stem cell research. I also remember Pope John Paul 11 railing against moral relativism.


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Giordano Bruno (/dʒɔːrˈdɑːnoʊ ˈbruːnoʊ/; Italian: [dʒorˈdaːno ˈbruːno]; Latin: Iordanus Brunus Nolanus; born Filippo Bruno, January or February 1548 – 17 February 1600) was an Italian Dominican friar, philosopher, mathematician, poet, cosmological theorist, and Hermetic occultist.[3] He is known for his cosmological theories, which conceptually extended the then-novel Copernican model. He proposed that the stars were distant suns surrounded by their own planets, and he raised the possibility that these planets might foster life of their own, a cosmological position known as cosmic pluralism. He also insisted that the universe is  and could have no "center".----------------------

-----During the seven years of his trial in Rome, Bruno was held in confinement, lastly in the Tower of Nona. Some important documents about the trial are lost, but others have been preserved, among them a summary of the proceedings that was rediscovered in 1940.[31] The numerous charges against Bruno, based on some of his books as well as on witness accounts, included blasphemy, immoral conduct, and heresy in matters of dogmatic theology, and involved some of the basic doctrines of his philosophy and cosmology. Luigi Firpo speculates the charges made against Bruno by the Roman Inquisition were:[32]

• holding opinions contrary to the Catholic faith and speaking against it and its ministers;
  
  
• holding opinions contrary to the Catholic faith about the Trinity, divinity of Christ, and Incarnation;
  
  
• holding opinions contrary to the Catholic faith pertaining to Jesus as the Christ;
  
  
• holding opinions contrary to the Catholic faith regarding the virginity of Mary, mother of Jesus;
  
  
• holding opinions contrary to the Catholic faith about both Transubstantiation and the Mass;
  
  
• claiming the existence of a plurality of worlds and their eternity;
  
  
• believing in metempsychosis and in the transmigration of the human soul into brutes;
  
  
• dealing in magics and divination.----------------
  

------------He was turned over to the secular authorities. On 17 February 1600, in the Campo de' Fiori (a central Roman market square), with his "tongue imprisoned because of his wicked words", he was hung upside down naked before finally being burned at the stake.[34][35] His ashes were thrown into the  river.--



Giordano Bruno - Wikipedia

[brewer]

Magic and science rarely occupy the same space.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

Here's a radical idea......what if the universe was created, but evolution is real? Mind blowing.

 Not really, it's a neat evasion.  Exactly what I was taught at the Catholic school I attended. Evolution was of course god's will. How could it be otherwise, since all of creation is god's will.

Was a time I was really confused about the problem of evil.  Turns out there's nothing to be confused about. God unapologetically created evil. Don't like it youse can lump it. 

The Bible actually has a lot to say about Evil. Below three quotes.

Isaiah 45:7 ESV / 53 helpful votes 

I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the Lord, who does all these things.

Micah 1:12 ESV / 12 helpful votes Helpful Not Helpful

For the inhabitants of Maroth wait anxiously for good, because disaster has come down from the Lord to the gate of Jerusalem.


 Numbers 21;5-6  And the people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this worthless food.” Then the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died.

Seems Epicurus was right; God can but chooses not to remove evil. That makes him malevolent . This pretty much how I've seen YHWH of the Torah. If I lived in biblical times and believed, I would be constantly fucking terrified.   YHWH was such a vindictive and capricious cunt. 

[Ferrocyanide]

A long time ago I watched a debunk video at a church that mentioned that dinosaurs are briefly mentioned three times in the bible. I cannot remember where, but they noted three examples of dinosaurs, which are probably seldom descriptions of random beasts they just believe are dinosaurs. But there are certain Christians that believe dinosaurs lived at the same time as man and were killed off by man after the Fall of Man in Eden.

A debunk video at a church? I think you mean bunk video.


The word leviathan appears 5 times in the Bible.

Job  41:1 KING JAMES VERSION
Canst thou draw out leviathan with an hook? or his tongue with a cord which thou lettest down? {41:2} Canst thou put an hook into his nose? or bore his jaw through with a thorn? {41:3} Will he make many supplications unto thee? will he speak soft words unto thee? {41:4} Will he make a covenant with thee? wilt thou take him for a servant for ever? {41:5} Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens? {41:6} Shall the companions make a banquet of him? shall they part him among the merchants? {41:7} Canst thou fill his skin with barbed irons? or his head with fish spears? {41:8} Lay thine hand upon him, remember the battle, do no more. {41:9} Behold, the hope of him is in vain: shall not one be cast down even at the sight of him? {41:10} None is so fierce that dare stir him up: who then is able to stand before me? {41:11} Who hath prevented me, that I should repay him? whatsoever is under the whole heaven is mine. {41:12} I will not conceal his parts, nor his power, nor his comely proportion. {41:13} Who can discover the face of his garment? or who can come to him with his double bridle? {41:14} Who can open the doors of his face? his teeth are terrible round about. {41:15} His scales are his pride, shut up together as with a close seal. {41:16} One is so near to another, that no air can come between them. {41:17} They are joined one to another, they stick together, that they cannot be sundered. {41:18} By his neesings a light doth shine, and his eyes are like the eyelids of the morning. {41:19} Out of his mouth go burning lamps, and sparks of fire leap out. {41:20} Out of his nostrils goeth smoke, as out of a seething pot or caldron. {41:21} His breath kindleth coals, and a flame goeth out of his mouth. {41:22} In his neck remaineth strength, and sorrow is turned into joy before him. {41:23} The flakes of his flesh are joined together: they are firm in themselves; they cannot be moved. {41:24} His heart is as firm as a stone; yea, as hard as a piece of the nether millstone. {41:25} When he raiseth up himself, the mighty are afraid: by reason of breakings they purify themselves. {41:26} The sword of him that layeth at him cannot hold: the spear, the dart, nor the habergeon. {41:27} He esteemeth iron as straw, and brass as rotten wood. {41:28} The arrow cannot make him flee: slingstones are turned with him into stubble. {41:29} Darts are counted as stubble: he laugheth at the shaking of a spear. {41:30} Sharp stones are under him: he spreadeth sharp pointed things upon the mire. {41:31} He maketh the deep to boil like a pot: he maketh the sea like a pot of ointment. {41:32} He maketh a path to shine after him; one would think the deep to be hoary. {41:33} Upon earth there is not his like, who is made without fear. {41:34} He beholdeth all high things: he is a king over all the children of pride. {42:1} Then Job answered the LORD, and said, {42:2} I know that thou canst do every thing, and that no thought can be withholden from thee. {42:3} Who is he that hideth counsel without knowledge? therefore have I uttered that I understood not; things too wonderful for me, which I knew not. {42:4} Hear, I beseech thee, and I will speak: I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto me. {42:5} I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee. {42:6} Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes. {42:7} And it was so, that after the LORD had spoken these words unto Job, the LORD said to Eliphaz the Temanite, My wrath is kindled against thee, and against thy two friends: for ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my

^^^^^Burning lamp? Smoke coming out of his nostrils?
It could be that they are describing a crocodile with some exagerations.

Or, it could be related to other religions. Something about the dragon of chaos that rules the waters.


Psalm 74:13 KING JAMES VERSION
Thou didst divide the sea by thy strength: thou brakest the heads of the dragons in the waters. {74:14} Thou brakest the heads of leviathan in pieces, and gavest him to be meat to the people inhabiting the wilderness. {74:15} Thou didst cleave the fountain and the flood: thou driedst up mighty rivers.

^^^^^They are talking about  the dragons in the waters.

Psalm 104:25 KING JAMES VERSION
So is this great and wide sea, wherein are things creeping innumerable, both small and great beasts. {104:26} There go the ships: there is that leviathan, whom thou hast made to play therein.

^^^^^The leviathan is a beast, he is a dragon, he is in the sea, he is the sea monster.

Isaiah 27:1 KING JAMES VERSION
In that day the LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent, even leviathan that crooked serpent; and he shall slay the dragon that [is] in the sea.

^^^^^Talking about the sea again. Talking about “leviathan the piercing serpent”.




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The word behemoth appears 1 times in the Bible.



Job 40:15 KING JAMES VERSION
Behold now behemoth, which I made with thee; he eateth grass as an ox. {40:16} Lo now, his strength is in his loins, and his force is in the navel of his belly. {40:17} He moveth his tail like a cedar: the sinews of his stones are wrapped together. {40:18} His bones are as strong pieces of brass; his bones are like bars of iron. {40:19} He is the chief of the ways of God: he that made him can make his sword to approach unto him. {40:20} Surely the mountains bring him forth food, where all the beasts of the field play. {40:21} He lieth under the shady trees, in the covert of the reed, and fens. {40:22} The shady trees cover him with their shadow; the willows of the brook compass him about. {40:23} Behold, he drinketh up a river, and hasteth not: he trusteth that he can draw up Jordan into his mouth. {40:24} He taketh it with his eyes: his nose pierceth through snares.

^^^^^Stones means testicles.
I have no idea what animal they are describing but perhaps it is an elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus.
The description is too vague. There are no measurements included.

There is also the mention of unicorns in the Bible. Perhaps they are talking about the rhinoceros.