Accounting for Beauty
Google Image I’m not among believers who deny evolution. To me, it’s a rational and elegant explanation for how the universe came to be. And neither I nor my church sees a contradiction between evolution and faith. For nearly a century, in fact, the Catholic Church has acknowledged evolution, especially in its teachings on the Bible. The Pontifical Academy of Sciences in the Vatican, established in 1936, promotes science and the theory of evolution. Still, I sit at my desk beside a second-story window that overlooks nearly a half-acre filled with trees and plants, watching the changes brought about by the rotating seasons. And with the color-drenched late afternoon sky in the background, I’m dazzled by the beauty. And that brings me to questions evolution doesn’t appear to answer. What accounts for the breath-taking beauty out my window, for how moved we are by natural beauty and how it has inspired generations of artists, poets and writers? How is it that the earth is so ...