Who Believes in Evolution

The first books I read concerning atheism, evolution and such, were by a conservative. I think, today, and it's just my opinion, he would not be such a staunch conservative, if it meant rubbing elbows with the teabaggers. He might be in a no man's land, between the left and right, these days.

I attended Catholic school starting in Kindergarten, classes were held in the Church Community Center. At the time the were building the first Catholic School in AA county, so I was one of many of the children who began their education in the new school. The nuns responsible for our education belonged to the order of The Sisters of Notre Dame de Namour.. It was a French order of teachers, and they definitely taught evolution. It was a very open approach to science and scripture, and we learned how to think critically and independently.

We were taught that there was no conflict between science and scripture, scripture was guidance, but science allowed clarity. The belief system rejected the idea that science contradicted scripture. It was possible to learn from science while remaining faithful.

My guess is that those who reject evolution, do so because they believe it spits in God's face. I think I can sympathize with those who fear that anything not contained in the literal translation of the bible believe its sinful. I sympathize only because I understand how ridged they are in their thinking, not because I believe they truly understand.

Many of us here have tried to say that evolution makes no effort to keep people from believing in gods and religion, but the deists here want no part of it, in the main.

That's an interesting motive for why some people deny evolution, I hadn't thought of it before.

Viewing as "An insult to God"... They must see God as a very "human" entity.

I wonder whether there are still some Catholic orders that do not reject evolution. I was surprised to see your statement concerning a science-oriented order running your school.

I was shocked to find that a friend, who is a professor of astronomy, believes in a god and in religion. I would think that any study of the universe would cause one to to an atheist.

This will be an argument debated for all time. I'm not sure why you believe the way you do...but here's a short list ( there are too many for me to mention) of the most influential scientists of all time who could not disregard the possibility of the existence of God or a God:
Isaac Newton
Rene Descartes
Albert Einstein
Max Planck

Well education was age appropriate and of course there was religious training. But even in the early years we were taught that the Bible was a source of religious guidance, however, it would be difficult to ascertain times and dates because time may have been measured differently. In other words, Methuselah probably didn't reach 900 years of age, but in reality probably lived a very long time. Especially during a period when life span was much shorter than it is today. However science was not the only area, there was a heavy emphasis on the arts, math and everything else public schools were teaching at the time.

The Parish priests would visit every other week or so, and answer questions from the students. It was usually a free for all, but we got to ask anything we wanted to know and every question was answered without anger or scolding. We particularly liked Father Hebert, he was the youngest priest in our Parish and would do magic tricks.

Keep in mind when you allow 9 year olds to ask questions, it gets very inventive. Questions such as "Father, lets say it's Sunday and you are heading to your Grandmothers house before you go to Mass, but you're in a car accident and die, will God be mad because we missed Mass?"

I'm not sure if everyone understands that Church Law can be modified. Catholics would refrain from meat on Fridays (didn't make any sense but we did) until the Church decided it was not really something that mattered. I have friends who still go meatless on Fridays, but my parents were so happy to get rid of the fish sticks we dove right in to big meaty Fridays without any qualms.

I am not the authority on the Catholic Church and it's teachings, other Catholics may have had different guidance. But the Church in America is less ridged than in some places. I also understand that in some ethnic neighborhoods (in large cities) they maintain customs from the old country and may still be very conservative.

I haven't attended mass in a long time, and my reasons are based on sense of where the Church was at, at various times.

My quite conservative order of nuns, also notre dame nuns but not the french order, as I said before, taught evolution. I would be surprised if catholic orders now had changed their minds on that. I doubt every other christian type religion teaches creationism as a science model, but don't know about episcopalians, anglicans, methodists, et al. I have the impression it is just the fundamentalists and maybe not every one of them, who are going for it as a science.

you are correct that preaching creationism as a science is limited to several fundamentalist sects and many of the "Bible centerd" mini denominations. Southern Baptists are probably the biggest sect, followed by Adventists, Witnesses, Amish and"Full
BibleDenominations" , but many of these already have their own parochial schools so the issue of teaching it in violation of the First
Amendment doesn't even come up.

Catholics and Lutherans taught a concept of Special Creation until the 1950's or so.

I would be very surprised if you found any Roman Catholic order that rejects evolution. However, there are crack pot unauthorized groups like Opus Dei that are very fundamentalist, who hold beliefs close to those of the 13th century. The mainstream Catholic Church frowns on the activities of Opus Dei. That's about all I know of that, I was probably 30 years old before I even knew there was such an organization.

The FBI agent who sold classified information to the Russians was a member of Opus Dei.

I don't remember Special Creation as a phrase, but maybe it means the way we were taught, dunno. I entered first grade in '47 (crying my little head off). I do remember being taught about evolution in high school, not much but nothing against it, as other matters concern my nuns. In my first year of college in a catholic college, evolution was a key matter taught in my zoology class (I had no general religion class there, as such, but did take theology, which, tellingly, I got a D in, while also getting an A+ in logic). I must have been heretical in my exam bluebook, eh. I was too dumbfounded to question the teacher.

Naturally I continued to learn re evolution in my public university years - but I remember my first year in zoology at the university was essentially a repeat of my time in that catholic college zoo. course.

Ever had that, confused, feeling.

They are not straight thinkers like we are.

I don't know if I can agree with you. Because. I honestly don't know.