Anglican Church Appologized to Charles Darwin

[uncleyap]

Finally, I see the church is also trying to conform with scientific truths of evolution. Darwin is one of my favorite scientists. Bravo Darwinism!

http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2008-09-15-anglican-darwin_N.htm?csp=34

Anglican clergyman: Church owes Darwin an apology

LONDON (AP) — The Church of England owes Charles Darwin an apology for its hostile 19th-century reaction to the naturalist's theory of evolution, a cleric wrote on an Anglican website launched Monday.


The Rev. Malcolm Brown, who heads the church's public affairs department, issued the statement to mark Darwin's bicentenary and the 150th anniversary of the seminal work On the Origin of Species, both of which fall next year.



IDEA CLUB: Does religion shape science in your mind or vice versa?
Brown said the Church of England should say it is sorry for misunderstanding him at the time he released his findings and, "by getting our first reaction wrong, encouraging others to misunderstand (Darwin) still."


The Church of England said Brown's statement reflected its position on Darwin but did not constitute an official apology.

The church's stance sets it apart from fundamentalist Christians, who believe evolutionary theory is incompatible with the biblical story of the Earth's creation.


Darwin was born into the Church of England, educated at a church boarding school and trained to become an Anglican priest.


However, his theory that species evolve over generations through a process of natural selection brought him into conflict with the church.


The Church of England did not take an official stance against Darwin's theories, but many senior Anglicans reacted with hostility to his ideas, arguing against them at public debates.


At an Oxford University debate in 1860, the bishop of Oxford, Samuel Wilberforce, famously asked scientist Thomas Huxley whether it was through his grandfather or his grandmother that he claimed to be descended from a monkey. Critics included the Rev. John Stevens Henslow and Adam Sedgwick, both scientists who had taught Darwin at Cambridge. Sedgwick wrote that he found some of Darwin's ideas "utterly false and grievously mischievous."


Brown said that from a modern perspective, it was hard to avoid the thought that the reaction against Darwin was based on what would now be called the "yuck factor ... when he proposed a lineage from apes to humans."


Brown called for a "rapprochement" between Christianity and Darwinism.
The bishop of Swindon, Lee Rayfield, who also is an immunologist, said religion and science were not mutually exclusive.


He said he opposed Christians for whom "evolution is equated with atheism" as well as Darwinists who felt ideas about evolution "completely undermine any kind of credibility for God."


"That's completely wrong," he told British Broadcasting Corp. radio. "It's a false polarization."


This is not the first time a cleric or a church has been pressed to apologize for past actions. In 1992, Pope John Paul II said the Roman Catholic Church was wrong to condemn astronomer Galileo Galilei for maintaining that the Earth is not the center of the universe.


The Church of England said sorry two years ago for its role in the trans-Atlantic slave trade.


Still, a descendant of Darwin's said the Anglicans' latest bout of soul-searching served little purpose.


"Why bother?" the scientist's great-great-grandson Andrew Darwin was quoted as saying by the Daily Mail newspaper. "When an apology is made after 200 years, it's not so much to right a wrong, but to make the person or organization making the apology feel better."


Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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[Alu862]

Never challenge Christianity

 

[uncleyap]

Never challenge Christianity

I adopt Darwinism.

It is the church themselves who offered apology to Mr. Darwin, this is not anything that I had done to demand for.

Mr. Darwin died 126 years ago. Church (then) was obviously wrong about Mr. Darwin. It is a good thing that church now admitted that they were then wrong.

I believe in evolution, that LKy the old dog evolved into a dictatorial moron who insist that it is golden period for US economy right now. And that Singaporeans evolved into No-Balls under LEEgime in the past decades.

Things were not as bad before, but evolution took place into negative directions.

 

[char_jig_kar]

I adopt Darwinism.

It is the church themselves who offered apology to Mr. Darwin, this is not anything that I had done to demand for.

Mr. Darwin died 126 years ago. Church (then) was obviously wrong about Mr. Darwin. It is a good thing that church now admitted that they were then wrong.

I believe in evolution, that LKy the old dog evolved into a dictatorial moron who insist that it is golden period for US economy right now. And that Singaporeans evolved into No-Balls under LEEgime in the past decades.

Things were not as bad before, but evolution took place into negative directions.

and also, spore evolve into a nation cant speak english or asian languages properly. all because of PAP ‘拔苗助长’ english as first language policy.

 

[Alu862]

What you have said is not evolution

 

[kakowi]

Instead of reading newspaper reports, you might like to go to the Anglican's site specially devoted to this issue:

http://www.cofe.anglican.org/darwin​

The title was misleading in the sense that it was not the Anglican Church that apologizes to Charles Darwin.

Rather the apology was issued by the Rev Dr Malcolm Brown, Director of Mission and Public Affairs, as follows:

Charles Darwin: 200 years from your birth, the Church of England owes you an apology for misunderstanding you and, by getting our first reaction wrong, encouraging others to misunderstand you still. We try to practice the old virtues of 'faith seeking understanding' and hope that makes some amends. But the struggle for your reputation is not over yet, and the problem is not just your religious opponents but those who falsely claim you in support of their own interests. Good religion needs to work constructively with good science – and I dare to suggest that the opposite may be true as well.​

The Anglican Church has been engaged with much controversies in recent years and there had been much internal discussions, almost leading to an internal schism over some matters. In life, there are not many clear-cut conclusions that can be drawn even on specific matters of faith. Sometimes this is because of human failings. Other times, people sincerely from the bottom of their hearts, believe in what they say.

Nonetheless, as a matter of accuracy, it is not an apology issued by the Anglican Church. Rather it is an apology issued by a worker within the Anglican Church. The difference is substantial.

The natural interpretation of the apology appears to be that the Church was wrong in the creation theory. But gauging from the words of Dr Brown quoted above, that is not what he is saying.

Perhaps his own summary can be used to sum up this discussion:

Good religion needs to work constructively with good science – and I dare to suggest that the opposite may be true as well​

source used as reference: http://www.cofe.anglican.org/darwin/malcolmbrown.html

 

[NgEjay]

I believe in evolution, that LKy the old dog evolved into a dictatorial moron who insist that it is golden period for US economy right now. And that Singaporeans evolved into No-Balls under LEEgime in the past decades.

Uncle Yap, you have insulted Science by mentioning LKY in the same paragraph as Science. Please do not desecrate science by relating it to a completely irrational personality that has defied all rules of reason and logic, and turned his back on human civility and decency. :p

E-Jay

 

[uncleyap]

Uncle Yap, you have insulted Science by mentioning LKY in the same paragraph as Science. Please do not desecrate science by relating it to a completely irrational personality that has defied all rules of reason and logic, and turned his back on human civility and decency. :p

E-Jay

LKy a piece of crap.

Even church will apologize for things they had wronged more than a century ago, bloody old dog thief will never apologize for any of his countless sins in his entire life. He will insist still that US economy will soon boom and it is Singapore's golden period. When Termasek is totally broke and all our CPF are gone, he will fucking insist that all are OK and well. Peasants are lining up at AIA to en-cash insurance since yesterday, next we don't know which bank will collapse in this inflation + recession + financial typhoon.

Meanwhile a political typhoon is sweeping Asia, LKy's heat beat already Tak Boleh Tahan. The day will come that LKy will insist that he is still in power and total control (just exactly like Prof Habibi & Wahid) on the eve of losing power.:p

 

[Alu862]

Do not insult the church