Catholicism's Crusade Against the Bible

Most non-Catholics were surprised when Pope John Paul II, in a formal statement sentto the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy of Science on October 23, 1996, announced thatevolution was a scientific theory acceptable to the Church. Evangelical leaders, in joiningforces with Rome, assured their critics that Catholicism accepts biblical inerrancy. Yet the Canons and Decrees of the Second Vatican Council (Roman Catholicism’s highest author-ity) declare: “Hence the Bible is free from error in what pertains to religious truth revealedfor our salvation. It is not necessarily free from error in other matters (e.g. natural science):[emphasis in original]. 14 Evolution is “scientific,” and the Bible is not infallible when it comes to science.

Edward Daschbach, a Catholic priest, without any apparent sense of betraying Peter and the Bible, explains the official Roman Catholic position:

"The Church, then, does not accept…the literal interpretation of the opening chapters of the Book of Genesis that would lead us to think that God, for example, actually made two grown adults suddenly from clay and rib….Catholics should beagainst creation-science for at least three serious reasons:

First: It effectively teaches a distrust of science and ultimately hurts religion as well. By defending a literal understanding of the opening chapters ofGenesis…creation-science sets itself squarely against the world of true scientificdiscovery…. The myths used by the Genesis authors are simply tools with which they communicate their religious beliefs.

Second: Creation-science is contrary to the method of interpreting Scripture favored universally by scholars and strongly approved by our Church. This favored approach…[allows us to] accept the divine revelation contained inScripture, while accepting at the same time human author’s errors in matters ofscience or history….

Third: Creation-science leads to deep prejudice and bigotry against the Catholic Church. The case in point is the Book of Revelation. When creation-science advocates ply their fundamentalist tools to this final scriptural book, the Church often becomes a target for vehement attack."