Lesson 43 –
Evolution and the Creation of Man

This is why the Catholic faith holds that, even if bodily and animal life emerged and developed through a long process of evolution, God intervened in history and did something new to bring about a new kind of creature, which we call the human being – a higher animal than had ever before existed, endowed with a spiritual and therefore rational soul.

Course Reading

Summa Theologiae I q. 76 | St. Thomas Aquinas

How Did God Create Homo Sapiens Through Evolution? | Fr. Nicanor Austriaco, O.P.

Modern Biblical Exegesis of the Creation Accounts | Fr. John Baptist Ku, O.P.

Excerpt from Modern Biblical Exegesis of the Creation Accounts:

[W]hile Israel shares similar themes in its religious poetry with its pagan neighbors—a fact we need not fear—there is a definitive new revelation that works as a cor- rective in all these narratives. Through some of these same ancient images, the sacred Scriptures teach anew that there is only one God, uncreated and omnipotent, the only source of all things, who has bestowed on man the great dignity of being made in the image of the Almighty.

Course Listening

Does Evolution Undermine Christianity? | Prof. James Madden

On Creationism and Evolution | Fr. Mariusz Tabaczek, O.P.