In and Out of God - God and Evolution

Just a theory

The only encounter that I had in my religious past with the theory of evolution was in Biology class. The teacher stood in front of the class and monotonously droned about black butterflies eventually outnumbering the white butterflies because they were the same colour of tree trunks and that natural selection was the vehicle for this occurrence and that this is what we meant by evolution. Did you feel as bored reading the last sentence as I felt writing it?

I did have a secondary encounter with the theory though, and surely enough it was in a Religious Knowledge class. I usually had docile, risk averse,  Religious Knowledge teachers as far as I can remember, but in Form 5, our teacher was very much involved in his faith. I remember him telling us that evolution was 'just a theory' and that it had recently been disproved. And just like that I was convinced. After all, he was a teacher, and I had much better things to worry about - like getting all 1's in 'CXC' (CSEC). How I got a 1 in Biology baffles me to this day.

It's not until I was 20 years old that the theory reared its head again like an atavism. What better a place to do this than in a group of young Catholic males, motivated from within and burning with passion for intellectual evangelisation. We wanted to save Catholicism from immature theology among the laity and defend Catholicism from creeping atheism. One in our bunch was fond of evolution and I would bounce my skepticism off of him. He dealt with them like a professional. Thanks to his responses, and that wonderful book by Jerry Coyne that he lent me, I now see that evolution is the best explanation for the diversity of life we see on earth.

Get this book.

My acknowledging the truth of evolution did have its accompanying problems, unfortunately. But first, let me give a simple explanation of evolution for those who misunderstand it. Then I will refocus on my struggle with accepting it alongside my faith.

"Life on earth evolved gradually beginning with one primitive species - perhaps a self-replicating molecule - that lived more than 3.5 billion years ago; it then branched out over time, throwing off many new and diverse species; and the mechanism for most (but not all) of evolutionary change is natural selection". 


Take a deep breath. First of all, the theory of evolution does not say anything about the origin of life on earth. That's an entirely different question. Hopefully the following example would help to understand the theory better -

In and Out of God - God and prayer

One Unanswered Prayer

Even though I wasn’t as close to him as everyone else was, his passion for life impacted me enough to suck tears from my eyes when I heard about his passing. He was the first and only person I have ever cried for at a funeral. That probably says something.

I was sitting on a chair in my room one night. The memory is a bit hazy so I can’t say exactly what I was doing, unfortunately. What I do remember, was fearfully answering the phone at 3am in the morning only to have my fear hyperbolically realised. He was in a car accident and was now in the Intensive Care Unit of San Fernando General Hospital. The sleepy voice on the phone advised me, “Pray boy, pray. Jus’ pray.”

The next day, a large group of us were gathered in the prayer room, on our knees, wailing before the Blessed Sacrament. We sang, we danced, and we beat the life out of the goat skin drums in some infantile, ironic hope that it would be transferred to him. We literally begged God, with tears in our eyes and bruised knees as the modern replacements for sackcloth and ashes, to save him. He died that day. Quicker than a thought.