[Abathar]

Don't shoot the messenger please.....

[Incorrigible]

So says the Guardian...

[RonF]

ID is a theory? Really? What hypothesis was tested to come up with it? How can it be further tested?

[pikachu]

Kinky Friedman said something like, "How can anyone believe in Intelligent Design after seeing the Texas legislature?"

[Mad Dawg]

In a startling display of the power of faith to overlook contradictory data, the Holy Father will in the same statement acknowledge the existence of Democrats and affirm his belief that the universe is not the work of malevolent spirits or of mere random occurrences, but of a being who means to do us good.

In anticipation, Vatican Theologians are preparing a statement denying the Democrats really exist.

Father Guido Parolaccio, Vatican Magister Rotationis (or spin meister), said, "Yes, I have seen something that looked like a Democrat, and it even appeared to be alive. But seriously, my children, when you consider how they act, what they do, what they say, would you call that LIVING?"

Check back at the top of the hour for further developments.

[lionheart 247365]

And next the Dah Vinci code , right ???

[demkicker]

Advocates of the theory argue that some features of the universe and nature are so complex that they must have been designed by a higher intelligence. Critics say it is a disguise for creationism.

I guess this is a typical 'duh factor' response for those that don't realize the intelligent designer is God.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Maybe someone will finally propose a definition of it.

[LouD]

I do not believe that evolution and creationism are mutually exclusive. The Bible is more about "why" than "how" - For all we know, the divine word of God may have included doctoral theses on genetics and string theory, explained at a level that a pre-scientific culture could grasp.

Even if you follow evolution all the way back to the beginning, you don't get to nothingness...

[RobbyS]

In his "Truth and Tolerance" the pope reminds us that the Kantian or neo-Kantian notion that we cannot know absolute truth holds sway in almost every discipline. although his Philosophy as a whole is rejected as inadequate, So Kant said a priori that we cannot "know" God or things about God. To put it another way, there can be no metaphysics. Yet men yearn for certainty, so a process like evolution, which has some similarities to Hegel's , is accepted without much examination, even though we have not fully delineated that process.

[wideawake]

The Roman Catholic Church never endorses any specific scientific theory - it only makes statements that point out specific scientific theories are untenable.

The most salient example of this was when Pope Pius XII condemned polygenism - the notion that human beings may have had different sets of ancestors. The Pope reaffirmed the truth that all human beings are descended from the same two common parents.

The Pope may condemn the notion that the universe originates in chaos and reject that sceintific theory as untenable - but he will endorse any particular scientific theory as being valid.

The Church alone has the deposit of faith - it does not outsource its magisterial authority.

[Aquinasfan]

Well, the Church has always taught that the existence of God can be inferred by all people from His works. So the Church can't deny that Creation demonstrates design by a great Intelligence.

Nevertheless, at least theoretically, the Church has left open the possibility for mankind originating through some kind of evolutionary process guided by God. This was Augustine's belief. And even Aquinas believed in a multi-stage Creation consonant with the Biblical days of Creation.

Genesis 1:19

Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air.

This verse could also be intended to express the difference between man and animal in that man has an eternal, rational, God-breathed soul, while animals do not.

[ALPAPilot]

Credo in unum Deum, Patrem omnipotentem, factorem caeli et terrae, visibilium omnium et invisibilium.

Doesn't this impy ID? Doesn't seem earth shattering to me.

[Remole]

I think the headline and the premise of the article are entirely misleading. This Pope, his predecessor, and the CAtholic Magisterium in general, simply do not reason in sound-bites and simplistic formulae, such as being "for" or "against" ID. Anyone with a search engine can find at least 10 major documents or statements from the Popes and Magisterium regarding Evolution, etc., and the matter is dealt with much more intelligently than in this news item.

[DungeonMaster]

TOID?

[taxesareforever]

Most Catholic intellectuals today are convinced that evolution is obviously true because most scientists say so

I'm sure that most Catholic common folk are convinced that God created man and woman.

[Tribune7]

Good.

[Chi-townChief]

Good for him!!!

[curiosity]

I amazed at how quickly reporters jump to conclusions on based on the shakiest evidence. Last week, the head of the Vatican observatory resigns without a reason given, and then on the basis of unnamed sources major papers were reporting that it was because of his opposition to intelligent design. Later, we find out the man is 73 years old and has cancer, has been planning to retire for many months, and the Vatican explicitly denied any connection with his views on evolution.

Now we have more of the same garbage reporting. This story is entirely based on the word of Dominique Tassot, an anti-science crackpot with zero influence or connections with the Vatican. It's junk journalism at its worst.