Vatican-backed conference snubs creationism

[rpannier]

ROME - A Vatican-backed conference on evolution is under attack from people who weren't invited to participate: those espousing creationism and intelligent design.

The Discovery Institute, the main organization supporting intelligent design research, says it was shut out from presenting its views because the meeting was funded in part by the John Templeton Foundation, a major U.S. nonprofit that has criticized the intelligent design movement.

snip

Organizers of the five-day conference at the Pontifical Gregorian University said Thursday that they barred intelligent design proponents because they wanted an intellectually rigorous conference on science, theology and philosophy to mark the 150th anniversary of Charles Darwin's "The Origin of Species."

snip

The foundation has criticized intelligent design in the past and says on its Web site that it doesn't support any research or programs that "deny large areas of well-documented scientific knowledge."

snip

In addition to intelligent design, creationism has come under disdain at the conference. In his opening address, Cardinal William Levada, head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, spoke dismissively of fundamentalist Christians in the U.S. who want schools to teach biblical creationism alongside, or instead of, evolution.


link:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29535870

[ACTION BASTARD]

1. As a recovering Catholic this amuses me...slightly.

[Ian David]

2. Pope Ratso believes there's an invisible man in the sky and that demons can take over your body...

... but believing that The Earth is just six thousand years old... well, that's just crazy-talk.

What does THAT tell you about Creationists?

[rpannier]

4. Well you know they say There's Crazy

and then there's Totally Bat-sh*t crazy

[Tommy_Carcetti]

7. Sigh.

:eyes:

[anonymous171]

3. This is one thing the Vatican does right. nt

[chollybocker]

5. The Discovery Institute is a joke.

It's a conference on EVOLUTION. Why should they be there? They were never invited in the first place; now they're just riding its coat-tails.

The ID/Creationistas are always holding their own conferences, only they call them Mass.

[KatyMan]

8. Mass?

Mass is Catholic. The conference is a conference sponsored by the Catholic Church, the subject is evolution, which the Catholic Church espouses. What is the point of your comment?

[underpants]

6. FOX NEWS-Creationists Blast Vatican for Not Inviting Them to Evolution Conference

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,505385,00.html

[bottomtheweaver]

9. Darwin's grandson said as much a few weeks ago.

He was interviewed on the NPR science show and said that a lot of the biologists he'd met who supported his grandfather's theories were devout Catholics.

[malaise]

10. When you're beneath the Vatican's

intelligence, you should live in a cave with the dinosaurs, like Fred Flintstone.