Featuring Dr. Jay Richards
The confusion is pervasive. The consequences are catastrophic.
What is a Catholic supposed to believe when it comes to evolution? Is it okay or not? Can Darwinism be reconciled with Church teaching as many argue (or even assume)?
To answer these (and many other related questions), I brought in a man I consider to have one of the most remarkable minds in the Catholic Church.
His name is Dr. Jay Richards, a New York Times best-selling author and convert to Catholicism (from Calvinism).
Jay is an Assistant Research Professor in the Busch School of Business at The Catholic University of America, a Senior Fellow at the Discovery Institute, and the Executive Editor of The Stream.
He’s smart. Very smart. And he’s got a lot to say on the topic of evolution. In fact, he edited and contributed to a powerful book titled “God and Evolution” which I found very interesting.
You will, too.
Among other things, Jay and I discuss:
- The predominant views of how the world came to be
- How the Church views the famous “Origin of Species” by Charles Darwin
- The fundamental difference between a Darwinist and a theist
- The conundrum of “theistic evolution”
- Intelligent Design
- Why there is so much confusion in Catholicism about evolution
This is one of those episodes that’s going to challenge some of your fundamental presuppositions and make you say, “What? Really?” Enjoy!
God bless!
Matthew
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8 Responses
I’ve actually thought about this in an even more simple way — The argument that everything is just random and part of nature and there is no intelligent designer seems so incomprehensible that, for me, belief in God as our Creator is much more reasonable and believable. Even statistically speaking, it has been determined that even if random chance is the explanation the idea that everything randomly came together perfectly to support life on this planet, to provide us with incredibly efficient bodies, to put the sun exactly where it needs to be and the moon in harmony to keep our tides controlled, the air perfectly mixed for our lungs while providing CO2 for trees which then produce the oxygen we need to continue the cycle and so on and so forth…that, to me, is just astronomically impossible to fathom as created by random chance…seriously….we can just look around at nature’s chaos and unpredictability and see how unlikely that same natural process could suddenly become predictable enough to do all of this….I think I’ll continue to have faith in God as my Creator as it has been the only complete & logical explanation for existence and this creation we call our world. Random chance….sorry…too impossible to believe for me.
Exactly!
There is always an unintended musical sidebar/interlude in your podcasts which I enjoy. I have a difficult time keeping trash out of my head and Jay goes and mentions that fine song mammals.
Very timely subject because my daughter has a paper due on evolution. I will send this to her so that she can listen to it.
Thank you so much for everything you do.
God Bless!
LOL. Sorry to create an ear worm:). Glad you enjoyed, though!
What a great podcast! I never realized there was a difference between theistic evolution and intelligent design. This was most helpful!
Glad it was helpful, Veronica. God bless!
I’m following at slow pace your wonderful Next Level Academy, through which I got to know about this podcast and this specific interview. I enjoyed listening to Dr. Jay Richards. However, as this topic has always interested me, some years ago I watched a video of a presentation at Boston College, Boisi Center, of a Catholic Professor of Biology who provided sound arguments for the inexistence of contradiction between Catholic Faith and Evolution. His name is Kenneth Miller. I would love to listen to a conversation where he can explain his premises and hypothesis. He is not for Intelligent Design.
Very glad to hear you’re moving through Next Level Catholic Academy, Maria! It’s a life-changer. I wouldn’t be surprised if Dr. Richards is aware of Kenneth Miller. I’d check out the Discovery Institute and see if any of those guys have had any debates with guys like Miller. God bless!