How about teaching evolution at Sunday school?

Since this topic has suddenly popped back up and been brought to my attention I'm going to chime in with my two cents worth.It may be surprising to some but I don't think that those who support the scientific understanding of nature would want it taught in churches. As as been noted it wouldn't be done well anyway.However, it might be an idea for those who support the church and wish to retain their followers to conside it!Does this sound surprising? Probably.If the churchs allow their followers to be mislead by the fundamentalists ideas and misleading pronouncements they are left unprepared if they finally do get exposed to the truth about evolutionary theory. At that time if they have allowed thier faith to get to closly tied to a "literalist" (of course, not really literal though) interpreation of the bible then their faith is at risk. When someone finds they have been lied to about one thing they may let the suspicion unfairly carry over into other aspects of what they have been taught.Since only a minority of Christians agree with the fundamentalists they might want to consider "proofing" their members against the nonsense promulgated by them.

The Catholic Church already has a clear position on this. What I understand (but have only read news reports) is that they accept evolution as the method God used. There is no conflict for them or the majority of Christians or the large minority (40%) of scientists who are believers.

Now that is interesting since I've been told that the RCC does accept evolution as God's way of forming life on earth.I don't think there would be anything else that would matter. I couldn't, in a quick search, find the text of this, could you post the relavant parts?BTW, if it talks about soul or spirit I, for one, don't care. That has nothing to do with evolutionary science. It only has to do with individual beliefs and some biologists will believe that and others won't.

I think that if you dig a bit you will find that the Catholic Church does support "macro evolution". If you don't you could try the thread on that topic.
EvC Forum: Macro and Micro EvolutionHere is what I think is a Catholic source on this subject:
http://www.cin.org/visevol.htmlWhat I read them as saying is:
1)The entry of the human spirit is not a subject of the study of science. "'if the origin of the human body is sought in living matter which existed before it, the spiritual soul is directly created by God."2)In the last 50 years there has been a great deal more leaned which supports the ToE as understood by science.
"'Humani Generis'," he stated, "considered the doctrine of 'evolutionism' as a serious hypothesis, worthy of a more deeply studied investigation and reflection on a par with the opposite hypothesis. ... Today, more than a half century after this encyclical, new knowledge leads us to recognize in the theory of evolution more than a hypothesis. ... The convergence, neither soughtnor induced, of results of work done independently one from the other, constitutes in itself a significant argument in favor of this theory."3)Both aspects of the development of human kind must be considered.
"To tell the truth, more than the theory of evolution, one must speak of the theories of evolution. ... There are thus materialistic and reductionist readings and spiritual readings."And in what appears to be a pretty good summary:
"Consideration of the method used in diverse orders of knowledge allows for the concordance of two points of view which seem irreconcilable. The sciences of observation describe and measure with ever greater precision the multiple manifestations of life and place them on a timeline. The moment of passing over to the spiritual is not the object of an observation of this type, which can nevertheless reveal, on an experimental level, a series of very useful signs about the specificity of the human being. But the experience of metaphysical knowledge, of the awareness of self and of its reflexive nature, that of the moral conscience, that of liberty, or still yet the aesthetic and religious experience, are within the competence of philosophical analysis and reflection, while theology extracts from it the final meaning according to the Creator's designs."Sorry, Apostle, this is theistic evolution all the way through. If we disagree I guess I'm going to have to wander up the road to my Catholic friends and get him to check in at church. If there some other input you would need?[This message has been edited by NosyNed, 11-24-2003]

Yea, I noticed right after that you had tucked it in for a nap. It's ok, I agree with you. It was moving too fast for any of us to keep up with.

I suspect that you have no way of doing this, nor will you attempt to, but I have to ask you to support such a statement.

Good of you to notice that you might be heading off topic. If you want to see some thoughts on "no fossil transitionary forms" you might want to browse this thread (and perhaps add to it). fossil record

It is a bit scary since people often harden in their views as they age (not me of course, neither hardened or aged! ((mm that might not have come out as planned )) ). If KK starts where he is he'll not be able to learn anything new by the time he's 20.

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Common sense isn't