The Vatican sides with Darwin
Permalink | January 19th, 2006
In the on-going battle of good vs Intelligent Design, the side of good has struck yet another blow. The official Vatican newspaper recently printed an article saying that the decision by the Pennsylvania courts to not allow Intelligent Design to be taught as a scientific alternative to evolution was in fact the correct decision.
“If the model proposed by Darwin is not considered sufficient, one should search for another,” Fiorenzo Facchini, a professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Bologna, wrote in the Jan. 16-17 edition of the paper, L’Osservatore Romano.
“But it is not correct from a methodological point of view to stray from the field of science while pretending to do science,” he wrote, calling intelligent design unscientific. “It only creates confusion between the scientific plane and those that are philosophical or religious.”
The article was not presented as an official church position. But in the subtle and purposely ambiguous world of the Vatican, the comments seemed notable, given their strength on a delicate question much debated under the new pope, Benedict XVI.
While L’Osservatore is the official newspaper of the Vatican and represents the views of the Vatican, it does not, in its entirety, represent the official views of the Church. However, it stands to reason that at the same time, the newspaper does not print articles that stray far from the official views of the Church.
[via NY Times]
