A young man I met recently declared, “I believe in evolution. I’m an atheist.” Unfortunately, I suspect he is one of many who think that faith in a Creator God is incompatible with the theory of evolution. Because science provides some evidence of evolution, it seems that faith in God must go. But is it a case of either evolution or faith in a Creator God, or can it be both/and?
This “either/or” choice is based on two fundamentalist positions that are pitted against each other. The first is creationism, which holds that God created human beings in their present form less than 10,000 years ago. The opposing theory is that of pure evolution, where natural processes take place without any divine intervention as one life form changes slowly into a higher life form over time.
These polarizing views are held by many. In a recent Gallup poll, 37 percent of American adults identify themselves as pure creationists, holding that God created humans less than 10 millennia ago. No doubt this is influenced by many Protestant and Pentecostal churches who interpret the Bible literally. This percentage, although still significant, has decreased since the beginning of the 2000s and reflects the lowest level in four decades. On the other hand, 24 percent of American adults support evolution without divine intervention, a notable increase that has almost tripled since 1999. Significantly, 34 percent of the population accepts both theories, believing that any changes in life forms are under the direction of the Spirit of the Creator.
What this survey reveals is that more than a third believe in some form of evolution that is unfolding under divine providence. This is the position of the Catholic Church and is based on two distinct and clear principles.
Theological, not scientific document
The first of these principles asserts that the Bible is not a scientific but a theological document. The creation accounts in the Bible are works of theology, not science – a fact pointed out by Pope Leo XIII as far back as 1893 in his encyclical “Providentissimus Deus.”
Even if the authors of Genesis wanted to write a scientific account of creation, they did not have the tools to do so. Rather, the authors of Genesis were expressing their faith in how creation relates to the Creator – how it originates from its Creator, is independent of the Creator and yet is radically dependent on the Creator.
These central truths are stated in the creation accounts in a literary, not scientific way.
The Creation account asserts that the universe was made in six days. The expression of time here is not in the chronological sense of six periods of 24 hours as we understand it today. Early Christian interpreters of the Bible, such as Origen and Augustine, were clear on this. It is crucially important, because a literal interpretation of six days to create the universe is widely ridiculed given evidence that it is at least 13.8 billion years old.
The second principle that allows Christians to accept both evolution and faith in a Creator God is stated clearly in another encyclical by Pope Pius XII, “Humani Generis,” published in 1950. This document accepts the evidence of evolution as seen in matter, but since the human soul is immaterial, it could not have arisen from a merely material process. As the giver of life, God infuses the soul or life principle directly into every human being.
Can universe create itself?
Having clarified these two principles, it is important to identify a difficulty with the argument that glibly supplants faith in a Creator God with acceptance of evolution. I think of scientists who are so enthusiastic for the evolutionary process that they suggest it gives rise to creation itself.
According to the late physicist Stephen Hawking, for instance, “Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist.” He concludes: “I think the universe was spontaneously created out of nothing, according to the laws of science.”
When scientists speak about “self-creation” and “spontaneous creation,” they move beyond the domain of science to make broad claims that apparently don’t need to appeal to a source of all there is.
But this position is impossible to accept. It is like explaining the Big Bang with the laws of physics only to discover that the laws of physics were created with the Big Bang, or trying to explain the existence of gravity without the interaction of objects (such as planets) that gives rise to gravity in the first place. This is ideological indoctrination masquerading as science that is determined not to let a divine foot in the door.
We must acknowledge what science tells us but also look beyond science to explore why there are processes to begin with and who is ultimately responsible for them all. We need both science and faith to answer the questions of how and why things exist.
Father Billy Swan is a priest of the Diocese of Ferns, Ireland. This commentary originally appeared on the Word on Fire blog at www.wordonfire.org.