Content provided in partnership with

Non-overlapping magisteria - Special Issue: Science and Religion: Conflict or Conciliation? - religion and science have their own respective domains of teaching authority

Skeptical Inquirer, July-August, 1999 by Stephen Jay Gould

<< Page 1 Continued from page 4. Previous | Next

I had, up to here, found nothing surprising in Humani Generis, and nothing to relieve my puzzlement about the novelty of Pope John Paul's recent statement. But I read further and realized that Pius had said more about evolution, something I had never seen quoted, and something that made John Paul's statement most interesting indeed. In short, Pius forcefully proclaimed that while evolution may be legitimate in principle, the theory, in fact, had not been proven and might well be entirely wrong. One gets the strong impression, moreover, that Pius was rooting pretty hard for a verdict of falsity.

Most Popular Articles in Reference: The importance of understanding organizational culture; Credit card attitudes and behaviors of college students; What factors attract foreign direct investment?; Libraries Need Relationship Marketing - mutual interest marketing concept, ...; How to set performance goals: employee reviews are more than annual critiques; More »

Continuing directly from the last quotation, Pius advises us about the proper study of evolution: However, this must be done in such a way that the reasons for both opinions, that is, those favorable and those unfavorable to evolution, be weighed and judged with the necessary seriousness, moderation and measure. . . . Some however, rashly transgress this liberty of discussion, when they act as if the origin of the human body from preexisting and living matter were already completely certain and proved by the facts which have been discovered up to now and by reasoning on those facts, and as if there were nothing in the sources of divine revelation which demands the greatest moderation and caution in this question.

To summarize, Pius generally accepts the NOMA principle of nonoverlapping magisteria in permitting Catholics to entertain the hypothesis of evolution for the human body so long as they accept the divine infusion of the soul. But he then offers some (holy) fatherly advice to scientists about the status of evolution as a scientific concept: the idea is not yet proven, and you all need to be especially cautious because evolution raises many troubling issues right on the border of my magisterium. One may read this second theme in two rather different ways: either as a gratuitous incursion into a different magisterium, or as a helpful perspective from an intelligent and concerned outsider. As a man of goodwill, and in the interest of conciliation, I am content to embrace the latter reading.

In any case, this rarely quoted second claim (that evolution remains both unproven and a bit dangerous) - and not the familiar first argument for the NOMA principle (that Catholics may accept the evolution of the body so long as they embrace the creation of the soul) - defines the novelty and the interest of John Paul's recent statement.

John Paul begins by summarizing Pius's older encyclical of 1950, and particularly by reaffirming the NOMA principle - nothing new here, and no cause for extended publicity:

In his encyclical "Humani Generis" (1950) my predecessor Pius XII had already stated that there was no opposition between evolution and the doctrine of the faith about man and his vocation.

To emphasize the power of NOMA, John Paul poses a potential problem and a sound resolution: How can we possibly reconcile science's claim for physical continuity in human evolution with Catholicism's insistence that the soul must enter at a moment of divine infusion?

Non-overlapping magisteria - Special Issue: Science and Religion: Conflict or Conciliation? - religion and science have their own respective domains of teaching authority

Skeptical Inquirer, July-August, 1999 by Stephen Jay Gould

Find Research Guides for:

Find Featured Titles for: Health

Most Popular Articles in Reference

Most Popular Publications in Reference