Evolution (2)

In case of interest, one-page review of behavioral geneticist Kathryn Paige Harden's new book Original Sin; On the Genetics of Vice, the Problem of Blame, and the Future of Forgiveness (2026):
Michael A. Goldman 2026. Genes enter the garden of good and evil: A geneticist confronts how we think about free will, character, and wrongdoing. Science, 19 Mar 2026. Vol 391, Issue 6791, p. 1214. DOI: 10.1126/science.aef2245 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aef2245 .

While Harden apparently sees balance between genes and environment, the reviewer also mentions another book which argues that genes trump free will, Determined: A Science of Life without Free Will by Robert M. Sapolsky (2024). According to Amazon review, while Sapolsky doubts existence of free will, he concludes that acceptance of the concept makes for a much more humane world.
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Also, as adoptive parent I found informative The Nurture Assumption - Why Children Turn Out The Way They Do by Judith Rich Harris (1998), an examination of case histories from Holocaust survivors, to immigrants, to Swedish adoptees. My recollection is that while genes have a role, parental influence is most important until ~ age 5. After that, peer influence became most important.
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ETA: In addition to genes and social influences on behavior, there are other environmental influences of course. I remember timelapse photography of schoolkids under full spectrum lights v narrow: kids under the narrow spectrum of light were notably more hyperactive. A British prison had far fewer incidents in populations supplemented with vitamins and minerals. Things like that.

>4 brone: "catholics" are now free to begin from ground zero (Vat II)

No, that's not true. Vatican II is not "ground zero". As I've just responded to you in another thread, it is the culmination of two thousand years of Christian reflection on the deposit of faith, deepening our understanding of it, building on it in continuity with all that has gone before. In fact it could be argued that this weekend, Easter Sunday, celebrates "ground zero" for Christians

>6 brone:

Nobody has said the deposit of faith is a "reflection". But our understanding of it has deepened. I would have thought that to be an uncontroversial statement. The very fact that the early church had to define doctrines in response to heresies is part of the deepening of our understanding of the faith. They were "reading the signs of the times", as Vatican II put it nearly two thousand years later, and deepening their understanding of the faith in that light, just as we still are today.

Fair comment that "culmination" is probably the wrong word. God's mystery is infinite, and we'll never fully understand it this side of the parousia.

>12 brone: But to Roman Catholics it is mighty strange and heresy. WE believe...

Just for the record, Teilhard de Chardin, Rohr, Berry, Pope Francis, Pope Leo, US Cardinals Cupich, McElroy and Tobin, and many others whom you routinely denigrate (including my humble self) are also Roman Catholics in good standing with the Church, none of whom have been declared heretics, and what "WE believe" appears at times to be at odds with what YOU believe. But fortunately Roman Catholic doctrine is not defined by random individuals but by an ancient and well-established magisterium of the bishops speaking in concert with the pope, advised by pastors and theologians; that's where we differ from evangelical protestants. We are all free to follow our individual consciences, and there is no obligation on you to follow the doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church as interpreted through the magisterium, but to claim that your interpretation is the only correct one is rather bizarre. We are a broad Church, small-c catholic, and there is room for differences of opinion on many issues, one of which is evolution where the Church does not insist that we accept evidence-based scientific theories, and neither does she insist that we follow a literal and fundamentalist interpretation of the two Genesis creation stories. We're free. And as has frequently and patiently been explained in these threads on evolution, the roots of the non-literalist hermeneutical and exegetical tradition go back as far as Origen and Augustine in the 3rd to 5th centuries CE.

>14 brone:

Thanks for responding. I don't want to get into personal slanging matches which are neither charitable nor helpful, nor to stray too far from the thread topic of evolution, but let me respond to a couple of your comments.

I don't believe I have ever questioned your sincerity, as I assume that you truly believe what you write. But it does appear as if you are questioning the "Catholic sincerity" of Teilhard de Chardin, Rohr, Berry, myself and the others I named, and whom you also routinely name. My apologies if I have misunderstood you, but I was simply pointing out that they too are Roman Catholics as much as you are. There's no "us" and "youse guys"; we're all in this together. You're right of course that Jesus criticised the religious authorities of his time, particularly those who were legalistic, uncharitable, unmerciful, closed-minded, fundamentalist, literalist and I suppose one might say conservative and resistant to change. But he was Jesus, bringing new divine revelation, not a random individual Catholic, and the Christian Church didn't even exist yet. I was pointing out that the Catholic Church which you are so vigourously defending has a well-developed tradition for interpreting divine revelation through a Catholic lens, so although you are of course free to follow your own conscience, I do find it rather bizarre that you are so dismissive of the magisterium of the Catholic Church while at the same time purporting to defend Catholic doctrine.

I'm reluctant to comment too much on soundbite-type questions without seeing the context in which the statements were originally made, but I would say that I agree with the statement "Jesus and Christ give us a God who is both personal and universal". There have long been two strands in Catholic traditional theology regarding the immanence and transcendence of God, and the incarnation gives us a God who is very personal to each one of us, created as we are in the image and likeness of God; "The Word became flesh, he lived among us", or "pitched his tent amongst us" as many exegetes would consider to be a more literal translation of John 1:14. But at the same time our God remains an eternal universal God, a Mystery beyond human language and understanding. That's not controversial, is it? Are you trying to say that that statement about Jesus and the Christ is making them into two distinct persons? That's not how I would read it.

>17 brone: to bring the negative element of insincerity or sincerity for that matter

May I just point out that you are the one who introduced the issue of insincerity or sincerity to which I responded, but you have now deleted that post >14 brone: so it's difficult to track the conversation.

I believe in coherent explanations of the evidence rather than interpretations that assume a chronocological framework of a hundred million years or longer

So do I, which is why I accept the scientific consensus that the earth is around 4.5 billion years old, that the first recognisable life on earth emerged within a billion years or so of that event, that mammals appeared more than 200 million years ago, and that modern humans emerged around 300 thousand years ago here in Africa. The details of all of these are of course subject to modification as fresh evidence emerges - that's what scientific method is all about - but the broad picture is unikely to change much. The creation stories in the bible are not scientific evidence, but as Christians we know that they tell us important truths about who we are and why we are here - but not the detailed physical mechanism by which we got here. I see no conflict between the two.

Pope to Vatican Observatory: Church embraces science to find God in Creation (Vatican News)

In his address, the Pope recalled that Pope Leo XIII re-founded the Vatican Observatory in 1891, at a time when science was being presented as a rival source of truth to religion. The 19th-century Pope said he was re-founding the institution so that, “everyone might see clearly that the Church and her Pastors are not opposed to true and solid science, whether human or divine, but that they embrace it, encourage it, and promote it with the fullest possible devotion.” However, in our own times, both faith and science face a more insidious threat from those who deny the very existence of objective truth, said Pope Leo XIV. “Too many in our world refuse to acknowledge what both science and the Church plainly teach,” he said, “that we bear a solemn responsibility for the stewardship of our planet and for the welfare of those who dwell upon it, especially the most vulnerable, whose lives are imperilled by the reckless exploitation of both people and the natural world.” The Church’s desire to study the heavens through astronomy, he added, shows that she embraces “rigorous, honest science” as an essential aspect of her identity... In conclusion, Pope Leo XIV urged the faithful to never lose sight that the Christian religion is based on the Incarnation, since God made Himself known through His Creation and sent His only Son to redeem it. “The hunger to understand Creation more fully,” he said, “is nothing less than a reflection of that restless longing for God, which lies at the heart of every human soul.”

>19 John5918: Yes. If one chooses to open one's eyes, astronomy, embryology, evolution, and other facts and processes glimpsed by science are so mind-blowingly wondrous that they can easily lead one back to faith in the Creator.

>20 margd:

Thanks. One of my favourite writers on the spirituality of creation is Fr Thomas Berry who says we are called to "stand in awe" of God's creation. It truly is awesome (in the original meaning of the word "awesome", not the modern usage which has devalued it somewhat).

Open my eyes, that I may see wondrous things from Your law.
Nah?

>22 brone: dangerously close to pantheism

Are you familiar with the Canticle from Daniel 3:57-90, "Bless the Lord, all the Lord's creation: praise and glorify him for ever!"? Catholics recite it during morning prayer when praying the breviary on two Sundays out of four, and on almost all feast days. We stand in awe of God's creation, and all God's creation stands in awe of God.

Berry hated Catholicsm

That's an unfounded, and if I may say so, uninformed accusation against a respected Catholic theologian. I wrote my MA dissertation, "A Model for Personal Holiness in the Writings of Thomas Berry", at a prominent Catholic university in the USA more than thirty years ago. Having read everything he has written as well as commentaries on his work by other theologians, and having had personal conversations with this humble, holy and gentle man, I would beg to disagree with you. I think your single paragraph dismissal of his work is inaccurate in many ways, but since you'll probably delete it soon as you usually do, I won't bother dissecting it in detail. I would recommend anyone who is interested to read his The Dream of the Earth and The Universe Story, the latter co-authored with physicist Brian Swimme.

>25 brone: you and Berry and all heretics

As I have pointed out before, the tradition of the Catholic Church has processes for declaring someone a "heretic"; these involve the responsible ecclesial authorities, not random individual Catholics. Neither Fr Berry nor my humble self have been declared heretics by said responsible ecclesial authorities, ergo by definition we are not heretics, despite the fact that you, as a random individual Catholic, disagree with us. Mind you, I am flattered that you include me in the same sentence as Fr Berry, whom I admire greatly.

I won't bother responding to the rest of your post, except to say that I think you are uninformed and/or misinformed in much of what you write there.

>27 brone: your Synodal church

Just for the record, it is not "my" Synodal Church. It is our Synodal Church, as it applies to the entire Catholic Church, which includes ordinary Catholics like you and me. But that has little to do with the thread title, Evolution.

The Holy Ugandan Martyrs, we know recieved the pure seed of Faith from French missionaries untainted by modernism. What did these Holy Martyrs die for, it was the truth of sacred history of Genesis, especially the fundamental teachings of Marriage and sexual morality. The Martyrs did not believe that which is taught in most universities in the world and is believed by the popesplainer here. He will wisper in your ear the exact opposite of what most every African will tell you that their ancestors came from the North. Contrary to what evolutionary mythology teaches. There are songs still sung in Kenya with the choras "We don't ever want to go back to the land of Mizaim ever again!" Miziam was the founder of Egypt. The song reflects the fact that their ancestors moved Down into Africa after the Tower of Babel incident, NOT OUT OF AFRICA into the Near East. The subtle inverted relationship between Faith and Reason is highlighted by popesplainers like my friend John who continue to pave the way for the revolution that has ushered in the upside-down world which we now live. These naturalist agnostics have a systematized doubt of Mosaic authorship of the Pentatauch. All "Enlightened" will have a "lived experience," eyewitness and their historical reason is superior to a bible apologist even to revelation. As for Popes who disagree with modern popes and their splainers we have Leo XIII and St Pius X saying, the errors of the socalled 'higher Criticism' are "nothing but the commentaries of rationalism derived from a misuse of philogy and kindred studies.' Benedict XVI vindicated both pontiffs. Pray for the "Pearl of Africa" that it be a "light to all nations." That they will be able to survive the current global crisis of faith and morals and that Ugandans play a leading role in the re-evangelization of the whole world during the Era of Peace infallibly promised by Our Lady of Fatima where over 250,000 gathered just the other day may the Holy Uganda Martyrs guide us all into the Truth."AMDG" Free Jimmy Lai

>29 brone: The Holy Ugandan Martyrs, we know recieved the pure seed of Faith from French missionaries

Thanks for reminding us of the Ugandan martyrs - Catholics, Anglicans and oft-overlooked Muslims who all chose to die rather than submit to practices which their faith forbids. I was at the Martyrs' Shrine in Namugongo on the feast of the Uganda martyrs in 1976, 3rd June, less than a fortnight after Catholic Archbishop Emmanuel Nsubuga had been created cardinal, and I believe it was his first big public engagement after returning home to Uganda, so it was a huge double feast for Ugandan Catholics, celebrating martyrs and cardinal. I've also had the privilege of being the first headmaster of a Catholic senior (high) school in Sudan named after St Charles Lwanga, one of the best known of the Ugandan martyrs.

most every African will tell you that their ancestors came from the North

I think here you confuse history and pre-history. There were huge migrations within Africa, and many peoples have an oral tradition of where they came from over the last few thousand years or so. And incidentally, if you are claiming that Africans migrated southwards from Egypt, that's a bit of a tautology as Egypt is in Africa, as is Algeria which can also claim some of the most important collections of prehistoric rock art. But the fossil evidence is clear that pre-historic humans first appeared in sub-saharan Africa - South Africa, Kenya, Tanzania and Ethiopia can all lay claim to some of the earliest humans, who later migrated to other continents. Where I live on the escarpment of the Great Rift Valley I can see Olorgesailie, a site dating back between 1.2 million and 400 thousand years where stone tools have been found in abundance, along with skeletons of extinct giant elephants and hippopotami.

Fascinating how oral tradition, language, and genetics often hint at findings later confirmed by archeology and more detailed genetic analyses. Sometimes not, though -- at least not yet, and not with traditional explanations, e.g. Exodus, Noah's Ark, Shroud of Turin. (Hope no one's head explodes.)

My favourite is that Aryan, Apache, and West Coast BC peoples are related via Central Asian origins. Some went east and some went west to both eventually arrive in North America!

Completely off topic, but since the Uganda Martyrs were mentioned in >29 brone: and the annual feast in >30 John5918:, this might be of interest:

Uganda Postpones Martyrs’ Day Celebrations Over Ebola Fears, President Says “life must come first” (ACI Africa)

Uganda has postponed the 2026 Martyrs’ Day celebrations, traditionally held on June 3 at the Namugongo Martyrs Shrine in the country’s Catholic Archdiocese of Kampala, because of the Ebola outbreak in neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), from where thousands of pilgrims travel annually for one of the world’s largest Catholic gatherings... The postponement forms part of Uganda’s heightened surveillance measures aimed at preventing the spread of Ebola into the country amid regular movement of pilgrims and travellers across the border...

Father Alex Mugalassi my hero begins his fifth Rosary of the day with his gaze turned to Our Lady, in Kampala with the Ugandan wall of noise incessantly whinning. He is across the dirty pot-holed alley with dozens of orphan's a lullaby of crickets covers Uganda's capital city. It is 1030PM in eight short hours a teeming cauldron of nearly 5 million will make another go of it beneath the pounding African sun. Each night at this time the 41-year-old spiritual formator of 6 Ugandan seminaries turns in prayer to his Queen. Alongside the Ugandan Martyrs and the future American saint Archbishop Fulton Sheen. We know that through the intercession of Sheen many of whom will one day serve in parishes in the United States. Fr. Alex last week reports that three bishops from his homeland were murdered by poisoning. Saint Charles Lwanga and 21 of his friends were burned alive. Fr Alex manages over 1700 seminarians and what is living the Catholic faith in Africa in a word, a constellation of the global elites seeks to sever traditional Africa from its Catholic orthodoxy, Fr Alex says Uganda is a nation burdened by corruption, poverty, and treats as a threat anyone who preaches contrary to Moslem-dominated government. My friend will tell you none of this or why Charles Lwanga was murdered for resisting the King's homosexual demands. In 2024 on the western edge of Uganda the ADF a jihadist group linked to the Islamic State came over the mountains and slaughtered 42 setting fire while the girls were trapped inside their classrooms, those that escaped the flames were hacked to death by the Moslems nearby residents were also murdered. Six girls were abducted and languish in The Congo. We will welcome the 245 new orthodox priests to the US and know they will bring the heroism of the Ugandan Martyrs with them. AMDG

>33 brone:

Thanks for highlighting the role of the Church in Uganda, which is a very Christian country, but let me try to correct a few points where I believe you are mistaken or where there is need for deeper reflection. I don't know Father Alex Mugalassi, but while we're reflecting on prominent Ugandan priests, might I recommend current theologian Fr Emmanuel Katongole and the late Fr John Mary Waliggo, the latter a pioneering figure in African liberation theology. Cardinals Emmanuel Wamala (who was my parish priest fifty years ago) and Emmanuel Nsubuga (whom I've mentioned above) are worth looking at, as is Anglican Archbishop Janani Luwum, who was murdered by President Idi Amin just down the road from where I was living at the time. The Catholic monsignor who was in charge of education in our diocese was also murdered - his body was discovered in the forest where many of Amin's victims were dumped. A book well worth reading is J. J. Carney's For God and My Country: Catholic Leadership in Modern Uganda, which examines ten recent Christian leaders.

three bishops from his homeland were murdered by poisoning

Sadly poisoning is a traditional form of murder in some African cultures (just as guns are a traditional form of murder in the USA). I personally know of alleged cases in South Sudan and DRC, although as with Uganda it is often impossible to prove given that there are limited forensic facilities and in rural areas bodies are traditionally buried very quickly because they rapidly decompose in the heat in the absence of refrigerated mortuaries; any sudden and unexpected death is often rumoured to be by poisoning. As usual you don't cite any sources so it is difficult to really engage with this, but googling surfaces reports of three unnamed Anglican bishops, and some Catholic bishops where poisoning was rumoured but post mortems suggested otherwise.

Uganda is a nation burdened by corruption, poverty, and treats as a threat anyone who preaches contrary to Moslem-dominated government

The first part of this is true. Uganda is indeed burdened by corruption, nepotism and poverty and anyone who preaches contrary to the government is indeed treated as a threat by longstanding authoritarian President Yoweri Museveni. However your assertion that his government is "Muslim-dominated" surprises me, as Museveni is a practising Anglican who is a great supporter of his church.

will tell you none of this or why Charles Lwanga was murdered

I'm surprised to read this, as I thought the Uganda martyrs had been discussed in depth in many threads in this group, and I have provided quite a lot of information about them in some of my posts. Incidentally it wasn't just "Charles Lwanga and 21 of his {Catholic} friends", as there were also 23 Anglican martyrs. What is often overlooked is that there were also Muslims who were martyred "for resisting the King's homosexual demands", albeit not at the same time as the Christians. In case anyone is confused by the way you framed this, it's worth reiterating that the king was not a Muslim, and that much of this violence was not about religion nor homosexuality per se but was part of his resistance to colonial incursions with which missionaries were often associated at least in the minds of the local population.

the ADF a jihadist group linked to the Islamic State

Indeed, and I don't know of anyone (including most of the Muslims I know) who supports "jihadist groups" or "Islamic State". Their crimes against humanity are almost universally condemned. I've worked and travelled in the area of Uganda where ADF was active along with the "Christian" Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), and we were constantly on our guard against ambushes and landmines. However as with many insurgent groups the ADF is rooted in its own local agenda, and it's arguable whether it is primarily an Islamist group or whether it is simply drawing military, material and moral support for its own agenda from militant Islamists, in the same way that Israel's illegal settlers, for example, are drawing military, material and moral support from militant US Christians for their crimes against humanity in Gaza, or the LRA drew on a corrupted version of the Christian Ten Commandments for its own ideology.

Once again we have strayed far from the thread topic, evolution, but it's always interesting to explore other avenues.

Let us then turn to the subject and debate those of you who agree with Teilhardn, Rohr, Berry, Bergoglio, ect. All of you guys identify as Christian and all accept John are clerical. I say you are a community whose views are compatable with the mission of the foundation of Evolution. Unfortunately, your form of Chistianity has much more in common with Gnosticism than it does with traditional Christianity. Your CULT is recognized as a cult because of its characteristics simply put a confuence of different beliefs. Combining them all into something new. Your "unity" has taken what some call "the best qualities" of various viewpoints. A Characteristic you also display when speaking for yourself. The unity you have with the above named "heretics" is your although well guised but nevertheless denial of biblical doctrine of the salvation by faith in Christ's person and his finished work on the Cross. The occult practice you and above-mentioned clerics are really good at is the blending of various religions and belief systems into one unified thought this is nothing new the Church has ever battled this heresy. Your belief system was introduced and is commonplace in Eastern religions and occult practices. Your view of God is panthiestic as I have said many times. Jesus to this cult is a princile of love that brings oneness to all things. I will see if there is a response or a defense to it. I expect a denial because heretics always like to cover up their views with orthodoxy."AMDG"

Our Faith is reasonable, not unreasonable like Berry's. We Christians need to be able to present our beliefs in a logical way. Not the dreamers from Vatll. The securalism of the popesplainer makes it all the more urgent to show how the traditional understanding of morality and family life are simply not antiquated religious notions but are true to any person willing to employ their reason for living in nature. Now I'm not saying the popesplainer is always wrong but as we all do, he has his short comings and Catholics recognize this. So, I think he and his heroes are herectical I recognize the popesplainer anyways as a powerful cultural ally in explaining moral virtues."AMDG"

Off topic again, but since Saint Charles Lwanga and his martyred companions have cropped up several times in this thread recently it's perhaps worth noting that tomorrow, 3rd June, is the feast of the Uganda Martyrs. Sadly the big annual celebration at the Martyrs' Shrine has been cancelled this year due to the threat of ebola. Cuts to international aid by the USA, UK and other nations have severely impacted the region's ablity to contain this latest outbreak.

Edited to add: An Anglican friend has just informed me that in the Anglican church they also include Archbishop Janani Luwum (see >34 John5918:) as a Ugandan martyr and remember him today along with the others. If I recall correctly the government claimed that his death was a road traffic accident when his car was hit by a lorry, but photos published in the newspaper showed his car riddled with bullets. Some accident!

My friend the person who explains everything from Prevost has another hero who he mentions often. That would be the heretic Richard Rohr. The person who explains Prevost also is very happy to mention Rohr. Rohr and my friend the missionary continually teach that the bible especially the Old Testatment must be a transformational narrative, no scientific or historical record here. You know just like my friend does Rohr frames the Hebrew scripture as stories meant to shape the heart, awaken our conciousness and reveal patterns of grace good ole 1969 hippie stuff that boomers like the explainer of Prevost still sell. You ask the interpreter of Prevost if he sees Genesis especially the creation and fall narrative as mythic stories. There is no Adam, Eve, or the Fall as literal historical events. Instead, my friend and Rohr read them as stories about the human condition and that is the beginning of spiritual consciousness. This aligns with their panenthiestic theology, where God is present in all creation. For these guys, Exodus is an ongoing pattern of conversion. Rohr interprets the law as a school of desire a way of forming a people capable of relationship to him and my friend we are just in a stage of humanity's spiritual evolution. The person who helps us understand Prevost and his mentor Richard Rohr believe that revelation is progressive, culminating in the universal, cosmic Christ. In Rohr's and the African missionary's big picture the Pentateuch and the entire Old Testament as the slow awakening of humanity to the presence of God in all things. They do not see the Pentateuch as a system of doctrine but as a long symphony. Aquinas would agree part of the above as containing symbolic meanings, but he would surely reject the idea that Genesis is merely mythic, non-historical, or purely symbolic. He would insist that Genesis teaches real historical truths. Those truthes are divinely inspired and inerrant. The spiritual meanings are real and presuppose a literal foundation. He would insist that the fall of Adam and the creation of the world are real events not archetypes they would have you believe. So, these charlatans know that Aquinas teaches that Scripture has multiple senses, but the literal sense is foundational. "All the senses of Scripture are founded on the literal." He explicitly says Genesis uses figurative language (e.g., "God's hand," "God walking," but the events described are real. So, I'll show you where the heretics would disagree, they would disagree the world had a real beginning, they would disagree that God created the first humans directly and they all would agree that the Fall did not happen."AMDG"

Origins of the Universe 101 (5:49)
National Geographic | Mar 1, 2018

How old is the universe, and how did it begin? Throughout history, countless myths and scientific theories have tried to explain the universe's origins. The most widely accepted explanation is the big bang theory. Learn about the explosion that started it all and how the universe grew from the size of an atom to encompass everything in existence today.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdPzOWlLrbE&t=1s

Once again St Charles Lwangs and companions pop up in the news.

Heroic Witness of Ugandan Martyrs Hailed for Church’s Growth in Africa (ACI Africa)

The Representative of the Holy Father in Canada has attributed the growth of the Catholic Church in Africa to the heroic witness of the Ugandan Martyrs, noting that the sacrifice of the martyrs continues to inspire generations of Christians on the continent and beyond... Archbishop Ivan Jurkovič reflected on the significance of the young Christians who were killed for their faith in the late nineteenth century. “These martyrs are the first saints to be canonized in modern Africa and have thus been an encouragement and reason for the growth of the Church on the continent,” he said...

I'm not sure I properly understand it, but the endless and useless argument of the philosophers are which came first, the chicken or the egg? Then again me being the old motorman that I am think the inguiry might not be so futile after all. The deep theological differences of the chicken and agg debate to me is frivolous however the chicken and the egg are perfectly felicitous when discussing a subject with the evolutionary materialists in Librarything. Think how stupid it is to think of our great round world is represented by an egg which is brooded upon by some unbegotten bird which they have coveniently forgotton about. Some mystic dove of their educated beyond intelligent minds. I don't know if a bird is at the beginning of our existence, but it will be at the end of our chain. It seems common sense to me that the bird and the egg are equal and have been appearing equaly and alternatively forever. There is only one possiblity for the egg to exist and that is to produce the chicken, now the chicken may exist for any number of reasons. Our friends here are full of noisy forgetfulness; poison enters into the embryo of everthing producing rotten eggs. This type of thinking produces the old charge of fiddlin while Rome burns. The theological dogmas of the left here are as abstract as any but the new cloudy political cowardice here has rendered compromise useless. A half a loaf of bread to guys like me was better than no bread. To the aristocrats here it means that half a loaf is better than a whole loaf."AMDG"

So, my illustrious African Missionary will not say evolution is false, I suppose I can see that in some cases, but will he agree with me or Rohr and Tielhard My point is not aimed at biology as theirs is. My beef is the philosophical claims of the African's heroes that humans are merely advanced animals with no transcendent dimension. The materialist explanation my friend and his heroes hint that human beings display a sudden leap, as seen in art, reason, and religion. And ultimately to uniqueness. You see it here constantly people who disagree with the narrative of the post are but instinct driven creatures, they therefore diminish human dignity. I would challenge the idea that ideas emerged slowly from animal behavior. The sudden appearance of cave art is evidence of no continuity between animals and humans. Evolutionism is my real target the use of this foolishness to explain history, morality, religion, and culture. The abrupt showing of thought, art, worship, and reason show up in every archaeological record. What evolutionists go bongers over is our explanation of humanity's origin as being non-temporal and sacred what they snicker at is the uneducated who do believe human history and its beginning was a mysterious leap into rationality and spirituality. This then was the first intervention in history. The second was the Incarnation. So, evolution may describe biological change, but it cannot account for the full mystery of the human person."AMDG"