The Vatican Stands Behind Charles Darwin

Posted on November 8, 2005

In a bit of a shocker, the Vatican has come out swinging in the evolution wars. The Vatican is defending Charles Darwin and evolution and has criticized the so-called "Intelligent Design" theory which is favored by Christian fundamentalists in the U.S. Many fundamentalist preachers lecture their flock that God created the Earth, the dinosaurs and Adam and Eve about 6,000 years ago, which the Vatican (and scientists) find to be ridiculous.

The Vatican's chief astronomer, Rev. George Coyne, has said that Intelligent Design is not science. The Register reports that Father Coyne told ANSA that Intelligent Design "isn't science, even though it pretends to be."

In another article, Coyne is quoted as saying at a Vatican press conference, "The fundamentalists want to give a scientific meaning to words that had no scientific aim." He also reportedly said that the real message from Genesis is that "the universe didn't make itself and had a creator".

Father Coyne also wrote in The Tablet earlier this year: "If they respect the results of modern science, and indeed the best of modern biblical research, religious believers must move away from the notion of a dictator God or a designer God, a Newtonian God who made the universe as a watch that ticks along regularly."

Kudos to the Vatican for issuing a smackdown to this absurd theory that has no scientific validity whatsoever.