Scholars suggest way to reconcile Genesis, evolution

By CathNews New Zealand

June 17th, 2025

Adam, Eve, the serpent, and the forbidden fruit: design for a stained-glass window by Hans Christiansen 1898 (Wikimedia Commons)

Scientists and scholars say it is possible that the first humans with rational souls interbred with other humans many thousands of years ago. Source: Catholic News Agency.

Scholars discussed Church teaching and evolution at the Society of Catholic Scientists conference at the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC, in early June.

Most evolutionary biologists assert that biological humans did not evolve from only two humans, but rather as a group of humans. Although at first glance this may seem to conflict with the Catholic understanding of Genesis, the conference speakers argued that no contention exists and suggested there is a distinction between a “biological” human and a “philosophical” and “theological” human.

Kenneth Kemp, a professor emeritus of philosophy at the University of St Thomas in Minnesota, said a “biological” human would be any human that possessed human DNA, while a “philosophical” human is a human that also possessed conceptual thought and free will, and a “theological” human is one that has the ability to form a relationship with God.

According to Dr Kemp, modern-day humans descend from an ensouled creature with rationality who had the capability to develop logic, language and culture.

“Fully human beings were capable of interbreeding with the merely biological human beings despite the fact that they are distinct both behaviourally (being rational) and structurally (having the created souls that make that rationality possible),” Dr Kemp said.

A low level of interbreeding could be expected to produce a species, all of which would be descendant from the single original fully human couple, Dr Kemp argued. This position, said Dr Kemp, is both “scientifically possible and theologically orthodox”.

The exact moments when biological humanity came into existence, when the first two theological humans Adam and Eve were ensouled and when all of biological humanity possessed theological humanity cannot be easily determined, said Daniel Kuebler, a professor of biology at Franciscan University.

“The best signs of it are about 100,000 years ago,” he said.

FULL STORY

Scholars break down compatibility of evolution and Catholic doctrine at conference | Catholic News Agency (By Tyler Arnold/CNA)