CHURCH AND EVOLUTION

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19781, 31 October 1927, Page 12

CHURCH AND EVOLUTION

NEED FOR UNDERSTANDING. VIEWS NOT AT VARIANCE. ADDRESS BY CANON ARCHDALL. Evolution and its relation to the teachings of the Church were dealt with by Canon H. K. Archdall, headmaster of King's College, in a sermon in St. Mary's Cathedral last evening. The preacher held that evolution in its spiritual sense was not adverse to theological doctrines, but that it was an essential part of Christian belief. Taking as bis text, "My father worketh even until now, and I work," from the fifth chapter of St. John, Canon xirchdall said Christ in using those words had Himself substituted the idea of continuous progress for the old conception of creation as an operation completed onco and for all. The words were taken from the exact translation of the Authorised Version of the Bible and were used in reply to certain Jews who objected to a work of mercy because it was performed on the Sabbath Day. There were other instances in which Christ boldly .challenged the story of Genesis, but this was one instance in which He fulfilled the law and the prophets by drawing out a better principle. He gave His hearers to understand definitely that the work of God in creation never ceased. With the advance of human thought, the words of the text had acquired in comparatively recent years a significance and value hidden from former genera tions. Those who fancied there was opposition between scientific research and Christian religion were creating for themselves an unnecessary difficulty. Scientific description of the development of the world was a glorious epic. A whole group of sciences had been extending their boundaries, until they had almost united into one vast empire of thought. They presented a splendid picture of creation, moro .stimulating to the imagination. Astronomy, physical geology, biology, anthropology and human history presented a pageant of description of a vast creative process that had made the world what it was. This pageant, how over, was only descriptive and in no sense explanatory. Genesis Story Discarded. Some people had taken a materialistic philosophy out of scientific description, but science proper asked no questions concerning the " whence' or the "whether"; it dealt only with the "how." This idea of evolution existed in the time of Aristotle, but many people believed the theory of evolution started with Darwin's "Origin of Species" in 1859. "It is a very serious matter that in the minds of so many half-educated Christians Christianity seems to cling to the out-worn views of the origin and relation of things," Canon Archdall said. "It is true that among the educated the Christian creed is no longer thought to. require the old interpretation of Genesis. It is not true that woman was made out of man's rib and it is very highly desirable that it should be understood that that is not a part of the Catholic faith. During the 19th centujy, when science was beginning to make advances, many Christians, filled with fear for Christian truth, tried to claim for Scriptural and Church authority things that were not in their ambit to control." Many people fancied the clergy still held the views of their early Victorian grandmothers and some liked to think that science was wicked and in opposition to religion. The scientific view of the evolution of the world was not an attempt to explain away theological teaching. It was certain that science came as a positive light, giving a newelement of promise to the philosophy of their faith. They should therefore approach the great scientific story of creation without hesitation and suspicion, but with frank appreciation. The Service of Science. It was possible for this attitude of the Church to be misunderstood. Natural science was not philosophy. It was entirely descriptive. If slime were taken from the bottom of the sea, it was obvious it could not bo made into something different. That was one of the laws of human thought. But placed in the hands of God, it could become some thing and progress. .They had ultimately to get behind the process for the caußfi. Some were inclined to the belief that the pictures science gave to life were derogatory and robbed human nature of the spiritual attitude which foraiod the basis of Christian religion. That not so. Science rendered great service because it showed that the spirit must be at tho back of all things, as it was the end. Darwin's theory of natural selection and the survival of the fittest */as not accented by a large body of eminent scientists of to-day, and the preacher said he had the names of 40 scientists of world repute who refused to believe that natural selection was the chief factor m evolution A loose understanding of the subject had wrought incalculable harm in the minds of many people. As a re suit, many had become fatalists; they used a few worn tags such as heredity and environment and believed could not control the destiny of the world. By this means they forgot they were part of the process of evolution, that evolution would continue, and that it was their duty to find out the laws of evolution in order to know how they might be recreated and redeemed. Those who thought evolution meant the world was becoming better and better each day and that they need not worry were hopelessly wrong. There was no necessary law of progress as far as human minds were concerned. None could sit back and let the world take care of itself and live a social lire founded purely on the plane of money and economics. It was a true realisation of the workings of evolution that alone would serve to impart the full spiritual life.