In a recent address at the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, pope cuddles made comments that suggest evolution and big band theory are not in contradiction with the existence of a creator but requires it.
Pope cuddles said
“When we read about Creation in Genesis, we run the risk of imagining God was a magician, with a magic wand able to do everything. But that is not so,”
I don’t know where pope cuddles gets his information, but the Genesis story has a magician saying let there be and eventually getting tired on the sixth day. We agree the pope must believe the bible story true, but what happens to the other creation stories like that of my great grand fathers? Are they any less true?
He added,
He created human beings and let them develop according to the internal laws that he gave to each one so they would reach their fulfillment.
Cuddles must know something we don’t but as far as I can tell, the god of the bible’s only concern is to be worshiped on end. Whether that is what fulfills the puny humans we are I don’t know.
Cuddles also said
The Big Bang, which today we hold to be the origin of the world, does not contradict the intervention of the divine creator but, rather, requires it.
Evolution in nature is not inconsistent with the notion of creation, because evolution requires the creation of beings that evolve.
Yours truly doesn’t know how these fit in with the genesis story, but well, let’s hope there is some progress towards acceptance of naturalism.
Random thoughts 
According to RationalWiki the early church fathers had an allegorical rather than a literal understanding of genesis. Hence it might be that Mr Brogoglio simply continues this line, though such allegorical understanding is not without difficulties however. After all of a divinely inspired text who would suppose a straightforward interpretation.
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Looking at the bible allegorically as you say does not make matters any easier for the church and her followers.
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Indeed, it opens the way for diverse and mutually contradictory interpretations.
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And at the end makes the religious claims suspect
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The Pope wishes to gather all he can into his fold for it is in his interest.
He need not worry the Catholic system has a lot to offer and has stood the test of time.
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He need not worry. The church still has market
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Yes it offers a prop but a prop with dangers. It does not encourage us to stand on our own moral feet. It avocates oppressive doctrine such as no contraception.
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Cuddles 🙂
So, did Cuddles renounced Genesis, or just dance around it?
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Dance around it as you would expect
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Well, it’ll be interesting to at least hear the evangelicals scream bloody murder over it.
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Brother, I need your help.
Chris New quotes Nietzsche in his essay, but doesn’t hive a reference to where the words were issued. He says,
“Nietzsche has said in one of his less rhetorical, but therefore more telling, remarks: why should we expect the truth to be comfortable?
I can’t seem to find this listed anywhere. It might not, however, be a direct word-for-word quote. Do you know its origin/source?
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Trying checking Nietzcshe on truth, you may find his sentiments there. And this I think is either in beyond good and evil or genealogy of morals.
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I’ve found some like-minded quotes, but nothing directly matching. i think he was paraphrasing, which is fine. i’ll just cite New’s essay for reference.
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I think it is a paraphrase.
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Religion had a few thousand years head start on science and once science became more respected and credible after Galileo introduced a more robust scientific method that required control situations and repeated tests that produced the same results, then the church saw it as more of a threat because ultimately it is plain old simple beautiful logic which will time after time produce the same results and with reason.
The religious people have always had there ‘get out of jail free card’ which is that god being a god is infallible. God is ultimately far cleverer than us and we could never comprehend his reasoning. This ultimate dismissal of rational thought manifests itself in phrases like ‘god works in mysterious ways’, a phrase that I have heard used in the strangest of circumstances to answer the most unanswerable questions. A phrase which I can honestly say I detest as I heard it thousands of times as I was brought up Catholic.
I am shocked sometimes at religious peoples anger with science which they view as some kind of evil which is hell bent on trying to disprove the existence of god. Which is strange because even if science did fill in the final blanks that are missing from certain areas and come up with a grand unified theory, these same angry people could still claim that it was god who provided the initial conditions, who nudged the marble into existence and therefore their faith and beliefs could remain intact. There are Christian scientists who have done just this, they have accepted the big bang theory as well as accepting the heliocentric model over the geocentric model and still they have a belief in a god and have rationalised it in their own minds. But the majority of Christians are less than happy to do this because to them science is tearing the bible to shreds with its discoveries. Whether it is doing this intentionally or not is irrelevant to them and it seems that it is more important to save face and have some dignity rather than compromise yet again. They had no choice to accept the heliocentric model because it is provable. But for them that is enough, they don’t want to compromise any more of their sacred beliefs.
According to this article http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2609594/Half-Americans-dont-believe-Big-Bang-40-cent-doubt-climate-change-evolution.html that i read earlier in the year, only 1 in 5 Americans believe in the big bang, 27% believe that the Earth is 4.5 billion years old and 31% believe in evolution. Perhaps it comes as no surprise that those three topics contradict the bible and if it’s in the bible then it has to be the truth. I suspect that Christianity regrets having it’s head start over science as it has become more of a burden to them than an advantage, but their biggest burden although they would never admit it is the bible. If only they had waited a few hundred more years, in fact they could have just skipped that part and not mentioned anything about the creation at all, then perhaps they wouldn’t perceive science as a threat which ultimately isn’t it’s intention anyway.
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Ken Ham needs to debate Pope Pedophilious over this issue at his Creation Museum. It would be one helluva mind-numbing debate.
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And that would be a debate to watch
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I heard that Ken Ham actually protested against the Pope’s latest way of looking at the bible. Ha ha. I think that these characters are all bananas. Every single one of them.
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Let me get you a link on that shortly
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There is no greater satire than real life itself. Ham gets angry because the Pope is wrong about things. Simply amazing! The total stupidity of this is truly beyond words.
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I tell you, they need a new word for it is beyond stupid.
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Bananas is an apt description of the dimwits
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“I think that these characters are all bananas.” – Speaking of bananas, any word from Ray Comfort? Kirk Cameron?
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Not that I have seen.
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Through courageous acts such as the Pope’s – and face it, he will be criticized by Fundamentalists throughout the Christian world – slowly but surely, the Christian faith is being drug, kicking and screaming, into the twentieth century.
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Hopefully the next generation will have a better religion for the superstitious
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The pope tried science and failed. Even his explanation is gobbledygook.
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The pope is full of gobbledegook.
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“Even his explanation is gobbledygook.” – isn’t that the mother-tongue of the Abrahamic religions?
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I think you are right
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Is it just me or does it seem like this is simply a restating of another tired old argument? One thought begets another, only the language is slightly different. Thank you for this review, my Nairobi brother! 🙂
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Here we just report on news. We believe cuddles is not saying anything new.
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Pope Cuddles is only adding to the mythology. One day (soon I hope) these will just be stories told over a camp fire and his sayings will just be like spooky ghost stories.
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This one day should be very soon
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Everything is relative. To us non-believers, the Pope’s remarks don’t matter much. But in the world of religious fundamentalism, they are likely to be seen as heretical. The shock waves are particularly evident in the American evangelical community who consider Francis to be some sort of degenerate liberal devil-agent in league with communists.
Transitioning the world’s population away from mysticism and towards empiricism will not happen quickly. There is no rational argument that will suddenly alter the thinking of billions of poorly educated and indoctrinated people. Change will happen – and is happening – slowly, steadily, and incrementally.
The Pope’s acceptance of Evolution and the Big Bang, regardless of his motives, is certainly helping to facilitate that transition.
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You are right Bob, it will take a long time to free men of long held prejudices and hopefully the pope will be heard by many others
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An article well worth reading:
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Superb article. Thanks for posting the link.
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Thanks for sharing
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All credit goes to NeuroNotes, who turned me on to it. That lady is incredible when it comes to research – if it’s on the internet, she could find a black cat in a cellar, on a moonless night, at midnight.
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Agreed.
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That she could
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I am not a Catholic, but I know Catholicism hasn’t taught a “biblical literalism” for some time and has accepted evolution and the big bang. It is evangelical Protestantism that has opposed those sciences. These utterances from Pope Francis are not any kind of breaktrhough
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I agree Roman. Unfortunately most of the church people believe in the literal interpretation of genesis, at least, those I have interacted with. Maybe others don’t
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