Evolutionism vs Catholicism II

Published in Tradition in Action March 28, 2014


When I speak to fellow Catholics these days who believe in theistic evolution, I argue that the criteria for judging evolution has been plainly laid out by Our Lord, who said: "By their fruits you will know them... A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruits." (Mat 7:16, 18).

"So", I ask them: "what are the fruits of evolutionism?"

The first thing that springs to mind is the connection between evolutionism and the culture of death. In a fascinating book, Architects of the Culture of Death, authors de Marco and Wiker devote three chapters to evolutionists; one to Charles Darwin himself; one to his notorious cousin, Francis Galton; and one to Ernst Haekel, the most zealous darwinian "missionary" of continental Europe.

Darwin's supporters hide his racist stand, evident in the title of his original Origin of a Species.

Darwin's supporters hide his racist stand, evident in the title of his original Origin of a Species.

Now that he is a cultural icon, much is done to cover up the fact that Darwin was a racist, who believed that the white European race had reached a higher evolutionary plain, and was thus intrinsically superior to all others, and that the black race was barely a step above the gorilla. Evolutionists are also embarrassed by the politically incorrect full title of his famous book, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.

It is not hard to see how Darwin´s theory inspired Galton´s eugenics, the systematic selection for breeding of only the most "apt" individuals, and the sterilization or elimination of "undesirables". In the Origin of Species the diabolical mentality of eugenics can already be found. These are Darwin´s own words:

With savages, the weak in body or mind are soon eliminated; and those that survive commonly exhibit a vigorous state of health. We civilized men, on the other hand, do our utmost to check the process of elimination; we build asylums for the imbecile, the maimed, the sick; we institute poor-laws; and our medical men exert their utmost skill to save the life of every one to the last moment. Thus the weak members of civilized societies propagate their kind. No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man.

Darwin, however, was inconsistent with his ideas. If he had applied them to his family he probably would not have permitted any of his 10 children, all of weak health, to marry. However, his followers, with Galton and Haekel in the front line, were hell-bent on bringing down Christianity. They were so successful that by the end of the First World War, eugenics was government policy in Germany and several States in America.

Margaret Sanger based Planned Parenthood on the racist and eugenic principles of Darwinism

In 1921, Margaret Sanger, a fanatical evolutionist, founded what would become Planned Parenthood, now the world´s biggest abortion supplier, based on racist and eugenic principles derived from Darwinism.

It is hard to deny the ideological thread that connects the theory of evolution to the Action T-4 program, in which the Nazi regime forcibly sterilized some 400,000 people, as well as murdered thousands of physically and mentally disabled citizens, who were callously labelled "useless eaters." Twentieth century eugenics was funded by the Rockefeller Foundation (known for its great contributions to mankind…), and directly inspired by Darwinism.

Evolutionism denies Morals

If this is not enough to convince a Catholic of the rotten fruits of Evolutionism, I point out that Darwin´s ideas pull the carpet from under a Catholic´s feet, by denying any moral absolutes.

Evolution belongs to a secularist and atheist code of life

Its view of morality is absolutely contrary to the Catholic one. Instead of the Natural Law which is Divine Law inscribed by God on every man’s soul, Darwin proposed that morality evolved according to the needs of each tribe as they struggled to survive. This means that our moral values, no matter how deeply felt, are nothing more than an evolutionary inheritance that has been useful for the species.

This evolution of morality appealed very much to Karl Marx, who brought it to its logical conclusion: if there are no moral absolutes, anything goes in the fight for survival, or in the fight for supremacy of one social class over another. Communism, as well as Nazism, owes a great deal to Darwinism.

In addition to its bad fruits, I can also ask the believer in theistic evolution the following question: "What are the roots of Evolutionism?" I think it can be shown that evolution grew from a bad tree; therefore, according to Our Lord it cannot be a good philosophy.

Modern evolutionary philosophy has its roots in the 18th century, the misnamed "Enlightenment." In 1788, James Hutton formulated the principle of uniformitarianism, which now dominates geology. His famous rule - "the present is the key to the past" - defines uniformitarianism in a nutshell.

Despite archeological evidence, James Hutton denied Noah's flood

Hutton denied Noah´s flood and the prevailing biblical catastrophism of his day. According to his theory all geological formations arose from the same natural forces we observe today, operating over a huge amount of time. If uniformitarianism is true it means the Earth is much older than previously believed.

The problem is that Hutton was a deist; in other words, he ruled out a priori any possibility of divine intervention in the world. Therefore, his conclusions are rather the result of his naturalistic philosophy than of scientific investigation. This is made clear by his own words of 1785, before he had even examined the evidence:

“The past history of our globe must be explained by what can be seen to be happening now. ... No powers are to be employed that are not natural to the globe, no action to be admitted except those of which we know the principle.”

Hutton´s theories exerted a huge influence on Charles Lyell, the inventor (I use the word intentionally) of the geological column, the diagram of rock layers with their respective ages we have all seen, but which exists nowhere on Earth except in science text books.

It is worth remembering that Lyell had no scientific method for dating rocks, so the ages he ascribed to them could only be the product of his imagination. Evolutionists champion his geological column as if it were divinely inspired, despite all the problems it causes in the real world, because they need millions of years in order to make their theory even seemingly plausible.

Lyell's geological column was based on no scientific evidence whatsoever

Lyell´s ideological starting point was the desire to debunk the biblical age of the Earth. Like Hutton, he was a deist, whose avowed wish was to "rid the world of Moses". He realized that if he managed to "prove" the Earth was far more than 6,000 years old, the reliability of the Bible would be brought into question, and thus the entire Christian Faith would be undermined.

His work had devastating consequences; his three-volume Principles of Geology was amongst the books Darwin chose to bring with him on his famous voyage to the Galapagos Islands on board H.M.S Beagle. Darwin admitted that after reading this book he felt his faith crumble, never to be recovered; from that moment he viewed the world through the lens of Naturalism

My hope is that by telling my story in these articles Catholics will wake up to the truth that belief in Special Creation is far from an anachronistic Protestant quirk, which is sadly how most of the members of Church Hierarchy view it these days, but rather an integral part of the authentic Catholic Faith of the Ages.

I believe that an honest look at the rotten fruits and the highly suspicious origins of evolutionary philosophy is enough to convince a Catholic of its incompatibility with the One True Faith. And this is without even a glance at the scientific evidence against evolution, which is mounting day by day.