Vatican City, 27 October 2014 (VIS) –
This morning the Holy Father attended the plenary session of the
Pontifical Academy of Sciences held in the Casina Pio IV, during
which he inaugurated a bust of Pope emeritus Benedict XVI, whom he
described as “a great Pope. Great for the strength and penetration
of his intelligence, great for his important contribution to
theology, great for his love of the Church and of human beings, great
for his virtue and religiosity”. He recalled that Benedict XVI was
the first to invite a president of this Academy to participate in the
Synod on new evangelisation, “aware of the importance of science in
modern culture”.
Pope Francis chose not to focus on the
complex issue of the evolution of nature, the theme the Academy will
consider during this session, emphasising however that “God and
Christ walk with us and are also present in nature”. “When we
read in Genesis the account of Creation, we risk imagining God as a
magus, with a magic wand able to make everything. But it is not so.
He created beings and allowed them to develop according to the
internal laws that He gave to each one, so that they were able to
develop and to arrive and their fullness of being. He gave autonomy
to the beings of the Universe at the same time at which he assured
them of his continuous presence, giving being to every reality. And
so creation continued for centuries and centuries, millennia and
millennia, until it became which we know today, precisely because God
is not a demiurge or a conjurer, but the Creator who gives being to
all things. The beginning of the world is not the work of chaos that
owes its origin to another, but derives directly from a supreme
Origin that creates out of love. The Big Bang, which nowadays is
posited as the origin of the world, does not contradict the divine
act of creating, but rather requires it. The evolution of nature does
not contrast with the notion of Creation, as evolution presupposes
the creation of beings that evolve”.
He continued, “With regard to man,
instead, there is a change and something new. When, on the sixth day
of the account in Genesis, man is created, God gives the human being
another autonomy, an autonomy that is different to that of nature,
which is freedom. And he tells man to name everything and to go ahead
through history. This makes him responsible for creation, so that he
might dominate it in order to develop it until the end of time.
Therefore the scientist, and above all the Christian scientist, must
adopt the approach of posing questions regarding the future of
humanity and of the earth, and, of being free and responsible,
helping to prepare it and preserve it, to eliminate risks to the
environment of both a natural and human nature. But, at the same
time, the scientist must be motivated by the confidence that nature
hides, in her evolutionary mechanisms, potentialities for
intelligence and freedom to discover and realise, to achieve the
development that is in the plan of the Creator. So, while limited,
the action of humanity is part of God's power and is able to build a
world suited to his dual corporal and spiritual life; to build a
human world for all human beings and not for a group or a class of
privileged persons. This hope and trust in God, the Creator of
nature, and in the capacity of the human spirit can offer the
researcher a new energy and profound serenity. But it is also true
that the action of humanity – when freedom becomes autonomy –
which is not freedom, but autonomy – destroys creation and man
takes the place of the Creator. And this is the grave sin against God
the Creator”, he concluded.
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