Over at Life's Paradox, Eric Lee has written about the problem with "creationism". I wholly concur with him and the fundamentalist obsession with the literal interpretation of Genesis is both a modern phenomenon and completely lacking an awareness of what precisely is essential to Christianity. The frequent wrangling over this issue does not serve the best interests of the Christian faith and can only lead to further rancour and also ridiculing of Christianity, given that many (even intelligent) people's knowledge of the Christian faith consists almost exclusively in the "creationist creed", which Eric helpfully sums up in the following pithy manner:
Jesus Christ — the Word made flesh — came into this world, was crucified under Pontius Pilate, rose again after three days so that we could all know that the world was created in six ‘literal’ days.
That said, I believe there is a conflict between evolutionary theory and Christianity and I'm not really sure that this conflict ought only to be attributed to the ultra-darwinistic versions. Of course, the interpretation of Genesis in literal terms misses the point and one can refer to St. Augustine ad nauseum to show that such literal interpretations were not even the standard back in his day.
Nevertheless, Christian critics of evolution have had more concerns with it than simply the damage it does to the idea of "special creation". The principle problem it presents is the challenge to the Christian idea of a God who is Love. Whilst "the problem of evil" is typically dealt with through recourse to the "free will" defence, the 'evil' which evolution seems to entail cannot be dealt with in a similar fashion. In presenting man as the product of a long line of evolution from lower to higher Darwin's work undermines the entire Christian drama of Creation, Fall and the need for Redemption. How does the Pauline notion of the entry of death into the world through sin fit into all this?
Given the evil that appears inherent when one considers "nature red in tooth and claw", how are we to explain that the Triune God chose such a route to arrive at mankind? It is of course good theology to hold that God providentially causes good to arise from evil, but it is absolutely prohibited to say that God brings about good explicitly through evil. I suppose it may be answered that attributing 'evil' to a 'natural' process such as evolution is simply to anthropomorphise the issue but I cannot view such a world with equanimity and declare that it is "very good". David B. Hart also points out in The Doors of the Sea that the New Testament does not really make any fine distinctions between 'moral' evil and 'natural' evil. The Fall cannot, however, be brought in as a way to explain this evil if the scientific consensus regarding evolution is accepted. I am thus becoming less and less inclined to accept any glib reconciliations between science and faith regarding evolution. But where does one go from here? Is the only possible route to become a fundamentalist creationist? They make be wrong over the question of Genesis, but they are surely right regarding the question of the intrustion of death into creation, it cannot have been providentially assigned by God and if it was, what kind of God are we dealing with here?
Interestingly, John Milbank remarks in a interview that:
I think one thing that I don’t say in Theology and Social Theory very clearly is that I definitely line up with the die-hards who think that death comes into the world after the fall. And I agree with the nut cases who say, “If you abandon that, you abandon Christianity.” In fact, if you abandon that, then Christianity becomes really a rather nasty sort of doctrine in some ways that is going to get into all sorts of peculiar theodicies and so forth.
But just how do sophisticated theologians like Hart and Milbank reconcile the notion that death is inextricably linked to sin with the idea of evolution? I suppose one way would be to adopt Karl Rahner's position that 'death' as understood in the New Testament and 'natural death' should be differentiated. That is to say, whilst before the fall death would have existed in any case but presumably as a peaceful transition into eternity, what we know associate with death - fear, anxiety, despair, meaninglessness - are consequences of sin. In fact, Milbank intimates this in his forewood to James K. A. Smith's Introduction to Radical Orthodoxy. But that still leaves us with the problem of evolution as a whole before the advent of man. I read somewhere that Conor Cunningham was writing a book on Evolution but I've not seen any sign of it and I'm not sure it would address these issues in any case.
To sum up, I think all-to-easy concilations between evolution and Christianity need to be scrutinized. Is it possible to reconcile the idea of an originally good creation with the waste and downright cruelty that forms an intrinsic part of the evolutionary process?
Sunday, September 2, 2007
The Problem with Evolution
Over at Life's Paradox, Eric Lee has written about the problem with "creationism". I wholly concur with him and the fundamentalist obsession with the literal interpretation of Genesis is both a modern phenomenon and completely lacking an awareness of what precisely is essential to Christianity. The frequent wrangling over this issue does not serve the best interests of the Christian faith and can only lead to further rancour and also ridiculing of Christianity, given that many (even intelligent) people's knowledge of the Christian faith consists almost exclusively in the "creationist creed", which Eric helpfully sums up in the following pithy manner:
Jesus Christ — the Word made flesh — came into this world, was crucified under Pontius Pilate, rose again after three days so that we could all know that the world was created in six ‘literal’ days.
That said, I believe there is a conflict between evolutionary theory and Christianity and I'm not really sure that this conflict ought only to be attributed to the ultra-darwinistic versions. Of course, the interpretation of Genesis in literal terms misses the point and one can refer to St. Augustine ad nauseum to show that such literal interpretations were not even the standard back in his day.
Nevertheless, Christian critics of evolution have had more concerns with it than simply the damage it does to the idea of "special creation". The principle problem it presents is the challenge to the Christian idea of a God who is Love. Whilst "the problem of evil" is typically dealt with through recourse to the "free will" defence, the 'evil' which evolution seems to entail cannot be dealt with in a similar fashion. In presenting man as the product of a long line of evolution from lower to higher Darwin's work undermines the entire Christian drama of Creation, Fall and the need for Redemption. How does the Pauline notion of the entry of death into the world through sin fit into all this?
Given the evil that appears inherent when one considers "nature red in tooth and claw", how are we to explain that the Triune God chose such a route to arrive at mankind? It is of course good theology to hold that God providentially causes good to arise from evil, but it is absolutely prohibited to say that God brings about good explicitly through evil. I suppose it may be answered that attributing 'evil' to a 'natural' process such as evolution is simply to anthropomorphise the issue but I cannot view such a world with equanimity and declare that it is "very good". David B. Hart also points out in The Doors of the Sea that the New Testament does not really make any fine distinctions between 'moral' evil and 'natural' evil. The Fall cannot, however, be brought in as a way to explain this evil if the scientific consensus regarding evolution is accepted. I am thus becoming less and less inclined to accept any glib reconciliations between science and faith regarding evolution. But where does one go from here? Is the only possible route to become a fundamentalist creationist? They make be wrong over the question of Genesis, but they are surely right regarding the question of the intrustion of death into creation, it cannot have been providentially assigned by God and if it was, what kind of God are we dealing with here?
Interestingly, John Milbank remarks in a interview that:
I think one thing that I don’t say in Theology and Social Theory very clearly is that I definitely line up with the die-hards who think that death comes into the world after the fall. And I agree with the nut cases who say, “If you abandon that, you abandon Christianity.” In fact, if you abandon that, then Christianity becomes really a rather nasty sort of doctrine in some ways that is going to get into all sorts of peculiar theodicies and so forth.
But just how do sophisticated theologians like Hart and Milbank reconcile the notion that death is inextricably linked to sin with the idea of evolution? I suppose one way would be to adopt Karl Rahner's position that 'death' as understood in the New Testament and 'natural death' should be differentiated. That is to say, whilst before the fall death would have existed in any case but presumably as a peaceful transition into eternity, what we know associate with death - fear, anxiety, despair, meaninglessness - are consequences of sin. In fact, Milbank intimates this in his forewood to James K. A. Smith's Introduction to Radical Orthodoxy. But that still leaves us with the problem of evolution as a whole before the advent of man. I read somewhere that Conor Cunningham was writing a book on Evolution but I've not seen any sign of it and I'm not sure it would address these issues in any case.
To sum up, I think all-to-easy concilations between evolution and Christianity need to be scrutinized. Is it possible to reconcile the idea of an originally good creation with the waste and downright cruelty that forms an intrinsic part of the evolutionary process?
Jesus Christ — the Word made flesh — came into this world, was crucified under Pontius Pilate, rose again after three days so that we could all know that the world was created in six ‘literal’ days.
That said, I believe there is a conflict between evolutionary theory and Christianity and I'm not really sure that this conflict ought only to be attributed to the ultra-darwinistic versions. Of course, the interpretation of Genesis in literal terms misses the point and one can refer to St. Augustine ad nauseum to show that such literal interpretations were not even the standard back in his day.
Nevertheless, Christian critics of evolution have had more concerns with it than simply the damage it does to the idea of "special creation". The principle problem it presents is the challenge to the Christian idea of a God who is Love. Whilst "the problem of evil" is typically dealt with through recourse to the "free will" defence, the 'evil' which evolution seems to entail cannot be dealt with in a similar fashion. In presenting man as the product of a long line of evolution from lower to higher Darwin's work undermines the entire Christian drama of Creation, Fall and the need for Redemption. How does the Pauline notion of the entry of death into the world through sin fit into all this?
Given the evil that appears inherent when one considers "nature red in tooth and claw", how are we to explain that the Triune God chose such a route to arrive at mankind? It is of course good theology to hold that God providentially causes good to arise from evil, but it is absolutely prohibited to say that God brings about good explicitly through evil. I suppose it may be answered that attributing 'evil' to a 'natural' process such as evolution is simply to anthropomorphise the issue but I cannot view such a world with equanimity and declare that it is "very good". David B. Hart also points out in The Doors of the Sea that the New Testament does not really make any fine distinctions between 'moral' evil and 'natural' evil. The Fall cannot, however, be brought in as a way to explain this evil if the scientific consensus regarding evolution is accepted. I am thus becoming less and less inclined to accept any glib reconciliations between science and faith regarding evolution. But where does one go from here? Is the only possible route to become a fundamentalist creationist? They make be wrong over the question of Genesis, but they are surely right regarding the question of the intrustion of death into creation, it cannot have been providentially assigned by God and if it was, what kind of God are we dealing with here?
Interestingly, John Milbank remarks in a interview that:
I think one thing that I don’t say in Theology and Social Theory very clearly is that I definitely line up with the die-hards who think that death comes into the world after the fall. And I agree with the nut cases who say, “If you abandon that, you abandon Christianity.” In fact, if you abandon that, then Christianity becomes really a rather nasty sort of doctrine in some ways that is going to get into all sorts of peculiar theodicies and so forth.
But just how do sophisticated theologians like Hart and Milbank reconcile the notion that death is inextricably linked to sin with the idea of evolution? I suppose one way would be to adopt Karl Rahner's position that 'death' as understood in the New Testament and 'natural death' should be differentiated. That is to say, whilst before the fall death would have existed in any case but presumably as a peaceful transition into eternity, what we know associate with death - fear, anxiety, despair, meaninglessness - are consequences of sin. In fact, Milbank intimates this in his forewood to James K. A. Smith's Introduction to Radical Orthodoxy. But that still leaves us with the problem of evolution as a whole before the advent of man. I read somewhere that Conor Cunningham was writing a book on Evolution but I've not seen any sign of it and I'm not sure it would address these issues in any case.
To sum up, I think all-to-easy concilations between evolution and Christianity need to be scrutinized. Is it possible to reconcile the idea of an originally good creation with the waste and downright cruelty that forms an intrinsic part of the evolutionary process?
20 comments:
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Eric Lee said...
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David,
I whole-heartedly agree that that all-too-easy conciliations between evolution and Christianity need to be scrutinized. I can see how I might have "left that door open" quite easily in my post, but that is not something that I intended to do in any way. Specifically, I was just curious as to the actual science part of evolutionary biology.
And that is exactly where the distinction--between biology as a science and evolution as cosmology--comes in to play. Seeing as you mentioned Conor Cunningham, this is precisely the distinction he makes in his forthcoming essay called "Trying My Very Best to Believe Darwin, or, The Supernaturalistic Fallacy: From Is to Nought" found in the upcoming Belief and Metaphysics collection (and presumably in his upcoming Evolution: Darwin's Pious Idea, although I haven't read the first few chapters that he has completed yet). What Cunningham does in this essay is to show that it is perfectly fine to to "believe Darwin" in so far as we allow Darwin's observations to stay within biology.
Yet, what seems to happen, all too easily, is a conflation of evolution as a cosmology/ontology for all of life. Today we call this view some variant of materialism, naturalism, or physicalism.
Cunningham expounds upon the 'Supernaturalistic fallacy' which is the 'is to nought': for example, taking humans or even objects such as a tea kettle and saying that they are not really 'things' but rather the make up of tissues, cells, and ultimately DNA; in other words, genetic and atomic material to be passed on and transmitted by way of breeding. In a footnote in the introduction to his book on Evolution, Cunningham calls this a species of the logic of nihilism as the "nothing as something" (see his Genealogy of Nihilism for a long exposition of this).
So, again to make his point in another way, Cunningham quotes Vittorio Hösle along these lines: "We honor (Darwinism) better if we recognize its limited ontological relevance and do not make a first philosophy out of it."[1]
What we have, then, is a kind of universal 'acid' which creeps out of the science lab and consumes all other disciplines (Cunningham follows Daniel Dennet's imagery here).
Instead, Cunningham points the way forward a bit like this (I hope he doesn't mind the direct quotation):
"Man shares a common ancestry with all life, yes, and this, rather than being an ontological slight, is instead all the more amazing, central to the mystery of man. But there is no doubt an important lesson to be learned from this discovery. And that is to accept creation as a gift. As St. Paul writes in his epistle to the Philippians: “Though he was in the form of God, he did not deem equality with God something to be grasped at; rather, he emptied himself and took the form of a slave, being born in the likeness of man” (2:6-7). And in light of the Incarnation, man, in terms of the Darwinian notion of common ancestry, reflects this divine truth. And it is those who endeavour to grasp man’s importance, in terms of an essence, pure and simple who display their Luciferian link with Gnosticism. This then is our ontological temptation."
Like David Bentley Hart in his rebuttal to Daniel Dennett's recent Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon, Cunningham thus argues that any scientific observations can only be extrapolated to other disciplines analogously, and not directly. To quote DB Hart from that review in First Things:
"The moment its principles are extended into areas to which they are not properly applicable, it begins to cross the line from the scientific to the speculative. This is fine, perhaps, so long as one is conscious from the first that one is proceeding in stochastic fashion and by analogy, and that one’s conclusions will always be unable to command anyone’s assent. When, though, those principles are translated into a universal account of things that are not in any definable way biological or physically causal, they have been absorbed into a kind of impressionistic mythology, or perhaps into a kind of metaphysics, one whose guiding premises are entirely unverifiable."
To get back to Cunningham, this is the good he finds in Darwinism, and I think he leaves it at that, as a kind of (to hearken to our discussion on Milbank!!) natural theology that finds its way, by analogy, to our giftedness by the Triune God.
Now, I do not yet know (I should ask him) if Conor is going to address the death-before-humanity issue in his book on Evolution, but I imagine that he would agree with you on this score, viz., that we deny that such a thing could occur, as the process theologians argue (e.g. see Marjorie Suchocki's The Fall to Violence).
So yes, I don't think that there would have been death before the creation of humans either, but I also think that any venture into this realm is soon entering into cosmology and ontology, which is something I want to explicitly deny to biology.
I'll shoot Conor an e-mail and ask him what the trajectory of his book looks like to see if it includes your question above concerning death-before-humanity.
Peace,
Eric
[1] Vittorio Hösle, ‘Objective Idealism and Darwinism’, in Vitorrio Hösle and Christian Illies, eds., Darwinism and Philosophy (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2005), p. 218. -
September 4, 2007 at 6:31 AM
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DJW said...
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Hi,
Thanks for your detailed reply.
Ultimately though, isn't saying that evolutionary science cannot tell us anything concerning death before the creation of the first humans (because this is not a strictly biological point of view) pretty much the same as rejecting evolutionary theory? I mean, the whole evolutionary ascent (from what I understand) is predicated on a great deal of waste and death occurring. Or are you talking about death in a different sense to 'mere' biological death? (what I referred to as Rahner's understanding in my post).
And if it is biological death that you say cannot be predicated before the fall (and thus bringing into question the whole of the story of evolution) is it a case of natural science only being able to study a sort of scientific phenomenology of the fall? (and when put like that I suppose, from a Christian p.o.v, it makes sense). And this would also tie into Radical Orthodoxy's reluctance to grant the 'secular' sciences too much autonomy!
That said, this perspective is hardly going to be any more to the liking of evolutionary biologists. Although it also brings up the question of what a Radical Orthodox perspective means for the natural sciences (as it's typically been applied to the social sciences): would RO advocate constructionist readings of natural science for example? Would it berate them for not taking into account the Christian narrative?
Anyway, it's definitely food for thought.
Regards,
David -
September 4, 2007 at 2:32 PM
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Lee said...
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Hey David,
Thanks for a good discussion (I found your blog via Eric). This is a topic I'm very interested in.
It seems to me that you're correct about the problem that an evolutionary understanding of animal and human development poses for certain traditional theological accounts of how death entered the world.
But it needs to be emphasized, I think, how minimal the assumptions are that are necessary to create the problem though. You can be a skeptic about certain details of evolutionary theory, or even be a proponent of "intelligent design," but everyone who's not a young earth creationist agrees that 1. non-human animals existed prior to human beings and 2. non-human animals died (and presumably suffered). You don't even have to be an evolutionist to accept this - it's more a matter of natural history than biology per se. Of course, the problem is compounded by evolution since it seems, based on what we know about the development of life, that death is an necessary condition of new forms of life coming to be.
I think the only way out for a defender of the no-death-prior-to-the-fall view is to posit some sort of supra-human "fall" that resulted (somehow) in death entering the physical world. This is essential the route Hart seems to take in The Doors of the Sea where he says we live in the "aftermath of a cosmic cataclysm" (I'm paraphrasing from memory) brought on by the "fall" of some kind of supernatural agents. In theory this gets you out of having to deny that there was death prior to the fall of man without positing death as a necessary part of organic life. However, I think there are some serious problems with this view and wrote about it a bit here (pardon the self-plug): http://thinkingreed.wordpress.com/2006/08/16/hart-on-natural-evil-and-the-broken-cosmos/ -
September 6, 2007 at 5:23 PM
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Eric Lee said...
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To tie what Lee said in regards to all-who-are-not-creations to what Conor's point in his essay is trying to say, is that Conor wants to, in a sense 'retrive' Darwin for at least a couple reasons:
1. Darwin was not an 'Evolutionary Theorist' in the same sense as Dawkins, Dennett, et. al. are. That is, he did not know what 'genes' were and so there is nothing as primary as genetic material. What was primary for Darwin was 'Natural Selection' and the 'preservation', unfortunately, of 'favored races' (the second half of his title that smacks of racism is almost always left out). Conor argues that these ultra-Darwinians are not being Darwinian enough when they ahistorically posit that genes are the primal stuff when a.) Darwin didn't know about them and b.) not everything actually has genes.
2. Therefore, what is actually emphasized is not the survival of the 'fittest' (not a term put in until the 5th edition of On the Origin of the Species, I think), but rather, as Conor argues, the survival of the fitter.
3. Thus, what Conor is arguing is that while death may be somewhat 'original', is it not originary.
4. Furthermore, what this all says is that we do not even begin to know what it is to speak of death outside of the death and resurrection of Christ and thus the resurrection of all humans in the eschaton (Conor puts it something along the lines of "death is nonsensical without theology" but "the very sense that theology gives it, immediately makes it derivative, and ultimately overcome").
So yes, David, you can be generally right in your broad assumption that the RO folk do not want other disciplines such as the natural sciences, in their supposed 'autonomy', to somehow set the stage for theology.
To try to answer your earlier question:
"would RO advocate constructionist readings of natural science for example? Would it berate them for not taking into account the Christian narrative?"
To the first: Yes, with qualifications (i.e. Conor is "trying his very best to believe Darwin," after all, who doesn't seem to want to usually make Christian or even metaphysical claims, although I think he cites one odd example).
To the second: no, Conor does not 'berate' accounts for failing to take into account the Christian narrative. No, what Conor does, like a good metaphysician, is show how the logic of Naturalism and Evolutionary Theory undercuts itself as soon as it tries to be metaphysical (which these days it almost always does), as it borrows terms from other sciences that do not make sense to its own account (Conor's example is Dawkins borrowing the term 'individual' which does not make much sense when organisms are but mere clouds anyway), which could only be predicated univocally anyway if it remained purely 'constructionist'. Conor also draws on such works as Michael C. Rea's The Word By Design for much of this analytic, and for the above mentions about theology reconfiguring death, he draws on the work of the recently departed Michel Henry, whose work I am quite ignorant of so far... although Conor also has an essay on Henry and Thomas Aquinas in the Transcendence and Phenomenology volume that he has referred me to a couple times in e-mail discussions about this stuff (mainly I am the Truth).
Now, of course, Conor is coming at the whole debate from a Christian perspective, so he is quite self-aware of his own bias, but considering that he digs Darwin insofar as Darwin, he doesn't berate him. He's mainly going after Dawkins, Dennett, and the other extreme naturalists, as well as even (later in his book on Evolution) the 'Intelligent Design' people, et. al.
I don't mean to be the 'voice' for Dr. Cunningham, nor do I claim to accurately represent him (I'm trying my best), so these conversations might be easier concerning "What does RO say about this?" once the Belief and Metaphysics book comes out in a month or two and when Conor's full book comes out sometime next year I am hardly an expert on these matters, but am very willing to continue to learn! Thanks for the conversation.
Peace,
Eric -
September 6, 2007 at 7:43 PM
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Eric Lee said...
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My bad: I almost completely flubbed on citing the name of the Michael Rea book. It is, rather:
World without Design: The Ontological Consequences of Naturalism.
Anecdotal fun: At a conference, Conor called Rea in this book "a sexier [Alvin] Plantinga"!
Peace,
Eric -
September 6, 2007 at 8:20 PM
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DJW said...
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Lee and Eric,
I have to say I feel a little silly as the fall of the angels completely escaped me. I hadn't thought of it at all. A couple of points on that (referring to your post on your blog) - I personally wouldn't regard the idea as particularly 'gnostic', I mean it's a traditionally attested doctrine and one that coming from my perspective could not be jettisoned. I presume that it is this Hart is talking about.
That said, I agree with you on the problems that follow from this: namely that mankind (and other creatures) appear to be the bastard offspring of a creation which has been disfigured to the core. Humanity would have arrived on the scene as an already wounded creation which again poses problems for the idea of the fall (of man).
Perhaps the only possible route to take is that of acknowledging death before the fall but not in the 'violent' manner in which it occurs now - quite what form it would have taken is not really information we are privy to.
The two books coming from those conferences look very interesting although having taken a look on Amazon a tad bit expensive as well!
On a personal note: Eric, are you pursuing a Masters at the University of Nottingham? Or thinking of doing one (or maybe a PhD)as I see you're also in charge of the theology and philosophy centre website.
Regards,
David -
September 7, 2007 at 9:47 AM
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Eric Lee said...
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David,
Sorry about the price of the books. That always annoys me too. I've seen much worse out there: I saw that you link to Ben's Faith and Theology blog -- remember when he linked to Francesca Murphy's 'God is not a story' book? It started at over $100 (US), and their rationale for it was a bit weird. Oh well.
As for my education, I have a year left of my MA at Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego, California. And I hope to attend the U. of Nottingham for my PhD, yes... I would very much like to study under Conor Cunningham. I will be applying to other schools in the US, but there's a chance that my GRE scores will be slightly prohibitive in the states, unless I retake it. I just do not do well on standardized tests.
That's probably more than you asked for, but yeah. I have some other connections at Nottingham, student-wise, that I met at the Belief & Metaphysics conference last year, so that's fun. We'll see what happens!
Are you in a MA or PhD program somewhere? I see that you put "Graduated in Theology and Politics from The University of Bristol, UK" in your profile...
Peace,
Eric -
September 7, 2007 at 6:18 PM
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DJW said...
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Hey,
Yeah, I remember that. Shame too as it looks like an incredibly interesting read too.
Nottingham looks like a very exciting place to be for studying theology. The faculty is very strong and, of course, there's the theology and philosophy centre there.
I'm afraid I graduated and haven't done much since from an academic point of view. I seriously considered doing a Masters and Nottingham would have been one of my top choices but I couldn't really justify the expense when I knew I probably wasn't going to go into full time academia (again, money and no sure job prospects at the end of 4 years of extra study sort of put me off). My study of theology will have to remain limited to what I can manage privately.
Anyway, good luck with completing your MA!
David -
September 7, 2007 at 6:40 PM
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Anonymous said...
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I just wanted to note that, while it might be true (though I am not certain it is) that the NT does not make any "fine" distinctions between moral and natural evil, it is just that distinction that makes possible the affirmation of creation's goodness over against Manichaeism. To deny it is to be, quite literally, Manichaeian.
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September 7, 2007 at 8:35 PM
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Anonymous said...
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That is, the rejection of Manichaeism is not primarily a denial of ontological dualism, it is specifically an affirmation of creation's goodness because it is both created and controlled by God -- and this with regard to the ordering of the whole. The fact that the ordering of the whole includes violence is only "evil" for the individual, not the race or the species.
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September 7, 2007 at 8:41 PM
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DJW said...
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JD,
Asserting that creation is wounded is not Manichaeism. One can affirm creation's goodness whilst also recognising that it has been damaged through sin and that it too waits to be delivered from the bondage of corruption.
Frankly, I don't know what sort of moral creed can assert the importance of "the race or the species" above individuals but it isn't a Christian one. And ascribing violence to God's specific design and "ordering of the whole" is even more problematic as it renders Him the author of evil. As I said in my post, one can state that God providentially brings good out of evil but not that he brings about good specifically through evil as part of His original design.
David -
September 8, 2007 at 11:01 AM
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Anonymous said...
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David,
Its the content of the argument against Manichaeism. It is the way both Augustine and Aquinas deal with the matter. Cf. Augustine, On Free Choice of the Will Bk. 3, 23 as an example. -
September 8, 2007 at 10:46 PM
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DJW said...
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JD,
I'm afraid I don't know which part of my post you're directing your comment at. And I don't own that book so you'll have to enlighten me.
In any case, as I've already said, asserting that creation is fallen is christian doctrine, not Manichaeism -
September 8, 2007 at 11:44 PM
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Anonymous said...
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I am referring, as I noted above, to the way in which your reflections pivot around the claim -- one that you take up from DB Hart -- that Christian theology cannot and should not make too "sharp" a distinction drawn between moral and natural evil. I am not disputing the sentiment behind this claim; I agree with it. I am disputing its association with "traditional" Christian theology. What I am trying to point out is the sense in which both the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo and the orthodox rejection of Manichaeism is unthinkable without just this distinction. The passage from Augustine makes this clear, precisely as a point about the nature of evil as a moral act of the will, noting specifically how people who elide moral and natural evil are, he says, "ignorant" and even suggesting they are impious.
To see that this is not anomalous look at Summa I.47.2, and this passage in particular:
"God and nature and any other agent make what is best in the whole, but not what is best in every single part, except in order to the whole, as was said above (47, 2). And the whole itself, which is the universe of creatures, is all the better and more perfect if some things in it can fail in goodness, and do sometimes fail, God not preventing this. This happens, firstly, because "it belongs to Providence not to destroy, but to save nature," as Dionysius says (Div. Nom. iv); but it belongs to nature that what may fail should sometimes fail; secondly, because, as Augustine says (Enchir. 11), "God is so powerful that He can even make good out of evil." Hence many good things would be taken away if God permitted no evil to exist; for fire would not be generated if air was not corrupted, nor would the life of a lion be preserved unless the ass were killed. Neither would avenging justice nor the patience of a sufferer be praised if there were no injustice." (I.48.2 rep. obj. 3.)
If you want to quibble over what he means by "fail" in the good, suggesting that this has to do with the fall and not simply the "natural" good order of creation as such, then you should note that Aquinas considers the production of females in procreation to be an example of just such a "necessary" failure in the good (cf. I.92.1 rep. obj. 1.)
Once again, I am not disputing the sentiment of the post; I am only trying to underscore a mistake in its reasoning. There may be better ways to go about making the case you are trying to make. This one, however, won't hold water as "traditional" orthodox doctrine. There might even be a way to make the case from the perspective of the East, rather than the West; and, I suspect that is what DBH is really up to here. However, I suspect that on close inspection that case would not pan out too well either. -
September 9, 2007 at 5:40 AM
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Anonymous said...
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Just to clarify further (so as to cut off further misunderstanding):
You said, "...one can state that God providentially brings good out of evil but not that he brings about good specifically through evil as part of His original design."
I am disputing that the understanding of evil at work in that statement is traditional and orthodox, and suggesting that has more in common with Gnostic and Manichaeian arguments than it does the traditional formulation of creatio ex nihilo as it is inherited from Augustine. -
September 9, 2007 at 5:51 AM
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DJW said...
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As I have already stated, I am not saying that creation is evil but that it is fallen.I am well aware of what the distinction between natural and moral evil consists of. My principle contention is that such a distinction does not erase the fact that 'natural evil' remains 'evil' and that Christian theology has traditionally attributed such evil to the fall (both angelic and that of mankind).
Such an understanding is certainly biblical. Isaiah and Revelation both tell us of the eschatological hope for the redemption of creation - where the wolf will lie with the lamb, where death will cease to be, where creation groaning in its bondage to decay will be released from its fetters. Such a view naturally precludes any 'Manichaean' tendencies as if creation were inherently evil there would be nothing to 'redeem'. As Aquinas quotes: "it belongs to Providence not to destroy, but to save nature". To say the 'distinction' is not held so firmly in the Bible is simply to recognise that scripture speaks to us of a creation which has been wounded due to the cataclysmic effects of sin, first of the angels and then of mankind. To say this is some sort of 'alien' idea to Christian orthodoxy is incomprehensible to me and both Augustine and Aquinas held it.
One can see this, for example, in Aquinas' positing of a state of 'original justice' wherein man would have been free from the subjection to death that his materiality entailed. This would have been due to God's grace alone but the loss of grace by the creature does not render it simply a 'natural' being once again as if the supernatural were exstrinsically added to it. As Emile Mersch points out: the loss of grace wounds the creature to the core. Thus, although it may have been 'natural' for human beings to die before the fall without thereby calling into question the goodness of creation, once man was called to a supernatural destiny (and as Henri de Lubac argues, there never was a state of 'pure nature', man has always de facto existed with a supernatural orientation), the loss of this did not mean a mere return to man's 'natural' being. -
September 9, 2007 at 11:19 PM
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Anonymous said...
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David,
It was not my intention to be contrarian. I understand that you are not intending to say that creation is evil; and, the way I phrased my initial comment regarding Manichaeism in the first post, most likely, set us off on the wrong foot. I do, however, think that clarifying this, at this point, is beyond the scope of this forum. Suffice it to say that I think there is something in the relationship between moral evil, God's ordering of the whole, and the nature of the argument for creatio ex nihilo that is being overlooked here - something of deep importance. Particularly, this is related to your above claim that "natural evil is still evil." I just don't think this is right, from the perspectives of Augustine and Aquinas. I think you can say it is 'not perfected,' that it awaits for, longs for a perfection that is not-yet; but, the way your are positioning this argument vis-a-vis evolution, I simply think you are tracking pretty close to a line of reasoning that is de facto, even if not de jure, Manichaeian in perspective.
Nonetheless, despite our mutual misunderstanding, thank your for your engagment.
Peace. -
September 10, 2007 at 1:10 AM
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December 4, 2012 at 12:00 PM
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David,
I whole-heartedly agree that that all-too-easy conciliations between evolution and Christianity need to be scrutinized. I can see how I might have "left that door open" quite easily in my post, but that is not something that I intended to do in any way. Specifically, I was just curious as to the actual science part of evolutionary biology.
And that is exactly where the distinction--between biology as a science and evolution as cosmology--comes in to play. Seeing as you mentioned Conor Cunningham, this is precisely the distinction he makes in his forthcoming essay called "Trying My Very Best to Believe Darwin, or, The Supernaturalistic Fallacy: From Is to Nought" found in the upcoming Belief and Metaphysics collection (and presumably in his upcoming Evolution: Darwin's Pious Idea, although I haven't read the first few chapters that he has completed yet). What Cunningham does in this essay is to show that it is perfectly fine to to "believe Darwin" in so far as we allow Darwin's observations to stay within biology.
Yet, what seems to happen, all too easily, is a conflation of evolution as a cosmology/ontology for all of life. Today we call this view some variant of materialism, naturalism, or physicalism.
Cunningham expounds upon the 'Supernaturalistic fallacy' which is the 'is to nought': for example, taking humans or even objects such as a tea kettle and saying that they are not really 'things' but rather the make up of tissues, cells, and ultimately DNA; in other words, genetic and atomic material to be passed on and transmitted by way of breeding. In a footnote in the introduction to his book on Evolution, Cunningham calls this a species of the logic of nihilism as the "nothing as something" (see his Genealogy of Nihilism for a long exposition of this).
So, again to make his point in another way, Cunningham quotes Vittorio Hösle along these lines: "We honor (Darwinism) better if we recognize its limited ontological relevance and do not make a first philosophy out of it."[1]
What we have, then, is a kind of universal 'acid' which creeps out of the science lab and consumes all other disciplines (Cunningham follows Daniel Dennet's imagery here).
Instead, Cunningham points the way forward a bit like this (I hope he doesn't mind the direct quotation):
"Man shares a common ancestry with all life, yes, and this, rather than being an ontological slight, is instead all the more amazing, central to the mystery of man. But there is no doubt an important lesson to be learned from this discovery. And that is to accept creation as a gift. As St. Paul writes in his epistle to the Philippians: “Though he was in the form of God, he did not deem equality with God something to be grasped at; rather, he emptied himself and took the form of a slave, being born in the likeness of man” (2:6-7). And in light of the Incarnation, man, in terms of the Darwinian notion of common ancestry, reflects this divine truth. And it is those who endeavour to grasp man’s importance, in terms of an essence, pure and simple who display their Luciferian link with Gnosticism. This then is our ontological temptation."
Like David Bentley Hart in his rebuttal to Daniel Dennett's recent Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon, Cunningham thus argues that any scientific observations can only be extrapolated to other disciplines analogously, and not directly. To quote DB Hart from that review in First Things:
"The moment its principles are extended into areas to which they are not properly applicable, it begins to cross the line from the scientific to the speculative. This is fine, perhaps, so long as one is conscious from the first that one is proceeding in stochastic fashion and by analogy, and that one’s conclusions will always be unable to command anyone’s assent. When, though, those principles are translated into a universal account of things that are not in any definable way biological or physically causal, they have been absorbed into a kind of impressionistic mythology, or perhaps into a kind of metaphysics, one whose guiding premises are entirely unverifiable."
To get back to Cunningham, this is the good he finds in Darwinism, and I think he leaves it at that, as a kind of (to hearken to our discussion on Milbank!!) natural theology that finds its way, by analogy, to our giftedness by the Triune God.
Now, I do not yet know (I should ask him) if Conor is going to address the death-before-humanity issue in his book on Evolution, but I imagine that he would agree with you on this score, viz., that we deny that such a thing could occur, as the process theologians argue (e.g. see Marjorie Suchocki's The Fall to Violence).
So yes, I don't think that there would have been death before the creation of humans either, but I also think that any venture into this realm is soon entering into cosmology and ontology, which is something I want to explicitly deny to biology.
I'll shoot Conor an e-mail and ask him what the trajectory of his book looks like to see if it includes your question above concerning death-before-humanity.
Peace,
Eric
[1] Vittorio Hösle, ‘Objective Idealism and Darwinism’, in Vitorrio Hösle and Christian Illies, eds., Darwinism and Philosophy (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2005), p. 218.
Hi,
Thanks for your detailed reply.
Ultimately though, isn't saying that evolutionary science cannot tell us anything concerning death before the creation of the first humans (because this is not a strictly biological point of view) pretty much the same as rejecting evolutionary theory? I mean, the whole evolutionary ascent (from what I understand) is predicated on a great deal of waste and death occurring. Or are you talking about death in a different sense to 'mere' biological death? (what I referred to as Rahner's understanding in my post).
And if it is biological death that you say cannot be predicated before the fall (and thus bringing into question the whole of the story of evolution) is it a case of natural science only being able to study a sort of scientific phenomenology of the fall? (and when put like that I suppose, from a Christian p.o.v, it makes sense). And this would also tie into Radical Orthodoxy's reluctance to grant the 'secular' sciences too much autonomy!
That said, this perspective is hardly going to be any more to the liking of evolutionary biologists. Although it also brings up the question of what a Radical Orthodox perspective means for the natural sciences (as it's typically been applied to the social sciences): would RO advocate constructionist readings of natural science for example? Would it berate them for not taking into account the Christian narrative?
Anyway, it's definitely food for thought.
Regards,
David
Hey David,
Thanks for a good discussion (I found your blog via Eric). This is a topic I'm very interested in.
It seems to me that you're correct about the problem that an evolutionary understanding of animal and human development poses for certain traditional theological accounts of how death entered the world.
But it needs to be emphasized, I think, how minimal the assumptions are that are necessary to create the problem though. You can be a skeptic about certain details of evolutionary theory, or even be a proponent of "intelligent design," but everyone who's not a young earth creationist agrees that 1. non-human animals existed prior to human beings and 2. non-human animals died (and presumably suffered). You don't even have to be an evolutionist to accept this - it's more a matter of natural history than biology per se. Of course, the problem is compounded by evolution since it seems, based on what we know about the development of life, that death is an necessary condition of new forms of life coming to be.
I think the only way out for a defender of the no-death-prior-to-the-fall view is to posit some sort of supra-human "fall" that resulted (somehow) in death entering the physical world. This is essential the route Hart seems to take in The Doors of the Sea where he says we live in the "aftermath of a cosmic cataclysm" (I'm paraphrasing from memory) brought on by the "fall" of some kind of supernatural agents. In theory this gets you out of having to deny that there was death prior to the fall of man without positing death as a necessary part of organic life. However, I think there are some serious problems with this view and wrote about it a bit here (pardon the self-plug): http://thinkingreed.wordpress.com/2006/08/16/hart-on-natural-evil-and-the-broken-cosmos/
To tie what Lee said in regards to all-who-are-not-creations to what Conor's point in his essay is trying to say, is that Conor wants to, in a sense 'retrive' Darwin for at least a couple reasons:
1. Darwin was not an 'Evolutionary Theorist' in the same sense as Dawkins, Dennett, et. al. are. That is, he did not know what 'genes' were and so there is nothing as primary as genetic material. What was primary for Darwin was 'Natural Selection' and the 'preservation', unfortunately, of 'favored races' (the second half of his title that smacks of racism is almost always left out). Conor argues that these ultra-Darwinians are not being Darwinian enough when they ahistorically posit that genes are the primal stuff when a.) Darwin didn't know about them and b.) not everything actually has genes.
2. Therefore, what is actually emphasized is not the survival of the 'fittest' (not a term put in until the 5th edition of On the Origin of the Species, I think), but rather, as Conor argues, the survival of the fitter.
3. Thus, what Conor is arguing is that while death may be somewhat 'original', is it not originary.
4. Furthermore, what this all says is that we do not even begin to know what it is to speak of death outside of the death and resurrection of Christ and thus the resurrection of all humans in the eschaton (Conor puts it something along the lines of "death is nonsensical without theology" but "the very sense that theology gives it, immediately makes it derivative, and ultimately overcome").
So yes, David, you can be generally right in your broad assumption that the RO folk do not want other disciplines such as the natural sciences, in their supposed 'autonomy', to somehow set the stage for theology.
To try to answer your earlier question:
"would RO advocate constructionist readings of natural science for example? Would it berate them for not taking into account the Christian narrative?"
To the first: Yes, with qualifications (i.e. Conor is "trying his very best to believe Darwin," after all, who doesn't seem to want to usually make Christian or even metaphysical claims, although I think he cites one odd example).
To the second: no, Conor does not 'berate' accounts for failing to take into account the Christian narrative. No, what Conor does, like a good metaphysician, is show how the logic of Naturalism and Evolutionary Theory undercuts itself as soon as it tries to be metaphysical (which these days it almost always does), as it borrows terms from other sciences that do not make sense to its own account (Conor's example is Dawkins borrowing the term 'individual' which does not make much sense when organisms are but mere clouds anyway), which could only be predicated univocally anyway if it remained purely 'constructionist'. Conor also draws on such works as Michael C. Rea's The Word By Design for much of this analytic, and for the above mentions about theology reconfiguring death, he draws on the work of the recently departed Michel Henry, whose work I am quite ignorant of so far... although Conor also has an essay on Henry and Thomas Aquinas in the Transcendence and Phenomenology volume that he has referred me to a couple times in e-mail discussions about this stuff (mainly I am the Truth).
Now, of course, Conor is coming at the whole debate from a Christian perspective, so he is quite self-aware of his own bias, but considering that he digs Darwin insofar as Darwin, he doesn't berate him. He's mainly going after Dawkins, Dennett, and the other extreme naturalists, as well as even (later in his book on Evolution) the 'Intelligent Design' people, et. al.
I don't mean to be the 'voice' for Dr. Cunningham, nor do I claim to accurately represent him (I'm trying my best), so these conversations might be easier concerning "What does RO say about this?" once the Belief and Metaphysics book comes out in a month or two and when Conor's full book comes out sometime next year I am hardly an expert on these matters, but am very willing to continue to learn! Thanks for the conversation.
Peace,
Eric
My bad: I almost completely flubbed on citing the name of the Michael Rea book. It is, rather:
World without Design: The Ontological Consequences of Naturalism.
Anecdotal fun: At a conference, Conor called Rea in this book "a sexier [Alvin] Plantinga"!
Peace,
Eric
Lee and Eric,
I have to say I feel a little silly as the fall of the angels completely escaped me. I hadn't thought of it at all. A couple of points on that (referring to your post on your blog) - I personally wouldn't regard the idea as particularly 'gnostic', I mean it's a traditionally attested doctrine and one that coming from my perspective could not be jettisoned. I presume that it is this Hart is talking about.
That said, I agree with you on the problems that follow from this: namely that mankind (and other creatures) appear to be the bastard offspring of a creation which has been disfigured to the core. Humanity would have arrived on the scene as an already wounded creation which again poses problems for the idea of the fall (of man).
Perhaps the only possible route to take is that of acknowledging death before the fall but not in the 'violent' manner in which it occurs now - quite what form it would have taken is not really information we are privy to.
The two books coming from those conferences look very interesting although having taken a look on Amazon a tad bit expensive as well!
On a personal note: Eric, are you pursuing a Masters at the University of Nottingham? Or thinking of doing one (or maybe a PhD)as I see you're also in charge of the theology and philosophy centre website.
Regards,
David
David,
Sorry about the price of the books. That always annoys me too. I've seen much worse out there: I saw that you link to Ben's Faith and Theology blog -- remember when he linked to Francesca Murphy's 'God is not a story' book? It started at over $100 (US), and their rationale for it was a bit weird. Oh well.
As for my education, I have a year left of my MA at Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego, California. And I hope to attend the U. of Nottingham for my PhD, yes... I would very much like to study under Conor Cunningham. I will be applying to other schools in the US, but there's a chance that my GRE scores will be slightly prohibitive in the states, unless I retake it. I just do not do well on standardized tests.
That's probably more than you asked for, but yeah. I have some other connections at Nottingham, student-wise, that I met at the Belief & Metaphysics conference last year, so that's fun. We'll see what happens!
Are you in a MA or PhD program somewhere? I see that you put "Graduated in Theology and Politics from The University of Bristol, UK" in your profile...
Peace,
Eric
Hey,
Yeah, I remember that. Shame too as it looks like an incredibly interesting read too.
Nottingham looks like a very exciting place to be for studying theology. The faculty is very strong and, of course, there's the theology and philosophy centre there.
I'm afraid I graduated and haven't done much since from an academic point of view. I seriously considered doing a Masters and Nottingham would have been one of my top choices but I couldn't really justify the expense when I knew I probably wasn't going to go into full time academia (again, money and no sure job prospects at the end of 4 years of extra study sort of put me off). My study of theology will have to remain limited to what I can manage privately.
Anyway, good luck with completing your MA!
David
I just wanted to note that, while it might be true (though I am not certain it is) that the NT does not make any "fine" distinctions between moral and natural evil, it is just that distinction that makes possible the affirmation of creation's goodness over against Manichaeism. To deny it is to be, quite literally, Manichaeian.
That is, the rejection of Manichaeism is not primarily a denial of ontological dualism, it is specifically an affirmation of creation's goodness because it is both created and controlled by God -- and this with regard to the ordering of the whole. The fact that the ordering of the whole includes violence is only "evil" for the individual, not the race or the species.
JD,
Asserting that creation is wounded is not Manichaeism. One can affirm creation's goodness whilst also recognising that it has been damaged through sin and that it too waits to be delivered from the bondage of corruption.
Frankly, I don't know what sort of moral creed can assert the importance of "the race or the species" above individuals but it isn't a Christian one. And ascribing violence to God's specific design and "ordering of the whole" is even more problematic as it renders Him the author of evil. As I said in my post, one can state that God providentially brings good out of evil but not that he brings about good specifically through evil as part of His original design.
David
David,
Its the content of the argument against Manichaeism. It is the way both Augustine and Aquinas deal with the matter. Cf. Augustine, On Free Choice of the Will Bk. 3, 23 as an example.
JD,
I'm afraid I don't know which part of my post you're directing your comment at. And I don't own that book so you'll have to enlighten me.
In any case, as I've already said, asserting that creation is fallen is christian doctrine, not Manichaeism
I am referring, as I noted above, to the way in which your reflections pivot around the claim -- one that you take up from DB Hart -- that Christian theology cannot and should not make too "sharp" a distinction drawn between moral and natural evil. I am not disputing the sentiment behind this claim; I agree with it. I am disputing its association with "traditional" Christian theology. What I am trying to point out is the sense in which both the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo and the orthodox rejection of Manichaeism is unthinkable without just this distinction. The passage from Augustine makes this clear, precisely as a point about the nature of evil as a moral act of the will, noting specifically how people who elide moral and natural evil are, he says, "ignorant" and even suggesting they are impious.
To see that this is not anomalous look at Summa I.47.2, and this passage in particular:
"God and nature and any other agent make what is best in the whole, but not what is best in every single part, except in order to the whole, as was said above (47, 2). And the whole itself, which is the universe of creatures, is all the better and more perfect if some things in it can fail in goodness, and do sometimes fail, God not preventing this. This happens, firstly, because "it belongs to Providence not to destroy, but to save nature," as Dionysius says (Div. Nom. iv); but it belongs to nature that what may fail should sometimes fail; secondly, because, as Augustine says (Enchir. 11), "God is so powerful that He can even make good out of evil." Hence many good things would be taken away if God permitted no evil to exist; for fire would not be generated if air was not corrupted, nor would the life of a lion be preserved unless the ass were killed. Neither would avenging justice nor the patience of a sufferer be praised if there were no injustice." (I.48.2 rep. obj. 3.)
If you want to quibble over what he means by "fail" in the good, suggesting that this has to do with the fall and not simply the "natural" good order of creation as such, then you should note that Aquinas considers the production of females in procreation to be an example of just such a "necessary" failure in the good (cf. I.92.1 rep. obj. 1.)
Once again, I am not disputing the sentiment of the post; I am only trying to underscore a mistake in its reasoning. There may be better ways to go about making the case you are trying to make. This one, however, won't hold water as "traditional" orthodox doctrine. There might even be a way to make the case from the perspective of the East, rather than the West; and, I suspect that is what DBH is really up to here. However, I suspect that on close inspection that case would not pan out too well either.
Just to clarify further (so as to cut off further misunderstanding):
You said, "...one can state that God providentially brings good out of evil but not that he brings about good specifically through evil as part of His original design."
I am disputing that the understanding of evil at work in that statement is traditional and orthodox, and suggesting that has more in common with Gnostic and Manichaeian arguments than it does the traditional formulation of creatio ex nihilo as it is inherited from Augustine.
As I have already stated, I am not saying that creation is evil but that it is fallen.I am well aware of what the distinction between natural and moral evil consists of. My principle contention is that such a distinction does not erase the fact that 'natural evil' remains 'evil' and that Christian theology has traditionally attributed such evil to the fall (both angelic and that of mankind).
Such an understanding is certainly biblical. Isaiah and Revelation both tell us of the eschatological hope for the redemption of creation - where the wolf will lie with the lamb, where death will cease to be, where creation groaning in its bondage to decay will be released from its fetters. Such a view naturally precludes any 'Manichaean' tendencies as if creation were inherently evil there would be nothing to 'redeem'. As Aquinas quotes: "it belongs to Providence not to destroy, but to save nature". To say the 'distinction' is not held so firmly in the Bible is simply to recognise that scripture speaks to us of a creation which has been wounded due to the cataclysmic effects of sin, first of the angels and then of mankind. To say this is some sort of 'alien' idea to Christian orthodoxy is incomprehensible to me and both Augustine and Aquinas held it.
One can see this, for example, in Aquinas' positing of a state of 'original justice' wherein man would have been free from the subjection to death that his materiality entailed. This would have been due to God's grace alone but the loss of grace by the creature does not render it simply a 'natural' being once again as if the supernatural were exstrinsically added to it. As Emile Mersch points out: the loss of grace wounds the creature to the core. Thus, although it may have been 'natural' for human beings to die before the fall without thereby calling into question the goodness of creation, once man was called to a supernatural destiny (and as Henri de Lubac argues, there never was a state of 'pure nature', man has always de facto existed with a supernatural orientation), the loss of this did not mean a mere return to man's 'natural' being.
David,
It was not my intention to be contrarian. I understand that you are not intending to say that creation is evil; and, the way I phrased my initial comment regarding Manichaeism in the first post, most likely, set us off on the wrong foot. I do, however, think that clarifying this, at this point, is beyond the scope of this forum. Suffice it to say that I think there is something in the relationship between moral evil, God's ordering of the whole, and the nature of the argument for creatio ex nihilo that is being overlooked here - something of deep importance. Particularly, this is related to your above claim that "natural evil is still evil." I just don't think this is right, from the perspectives of Augustine and Aquinas. I think you can say it is 'not perfected,' that it awaits for, longs for a perfection that is not-yet; but, the way your are positioning this argument vis-a-vis evolution, I simply think you are tracking pretty close to a line of reasoning that is de facto, even if not de jure, Manichaeian in perspective.
Nonetheless, despite our mutual misunderstanding, thank your for your engagment.
Peace.
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