Jimmy Akin with a Fascinating Discussion of Adam and Eve

Jimmy's posts are always top notch, and this one does not disappoint. The comments discussions are fascinating too. The main discussion lies with the origination and subsequent breeding of Adam and Eve and their descendants, and how this could fit in with the theory of evolution.

My personal take is that I don't think that a human beings immortal soul is (or can be) inherited - it is created directly by God each time. So it would be possible to posit a race of hominids who gradually evolved (not saying I necessarily believe this - I'm actually more or less an agnostic on macroevolution) and at some point God decided to infuse an immortal soul into two of them.

The genetic materials of Adam and Eve were probably optimum to avoid interbreeding problems, though as Jimmy says, the dangers of interbreeding are somewhat exaggerated anyway.

Another interesting theory, which I don't think would be necessarily a problem for our faith, though, is that humans with immortal souls mated with the biologically identical (or nearly identical) hominids that did not have the immortal souls. The immortal soul is created directly by God, so he simply chose to infuse souls into those who were descended from one with an immortal soul. In a handful of generations or so, everyone living would then have an immortal soul.

Anyway, it's all makes for a very nice cognitive chewy!

Drive-By Shootings At Mark Shea's Blog!

This tends to get annoying. When I was in sympathy with Evangelicalism, I believed many strange things about the Catholic Church. The funny thing is, the more educated about Christianity and the Bible one gets, the more sympathy one begins to have with Catholicism. In particular, it is hard to read Church history, particularly the earliest non-Biblical Christian writers, without coming to the conclusion that they were Catholics. John Henry Newman, a famous convert, said that "To be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant." One also comes to the amazing realization that it is in fact the Catholic Church which is the Biblical Church!

Essential early Fathers of the Church (Christians living from about 60 to 300 AD) include Clement, Ignatius of Antioch, Justin Martyr, and Irenaeus. Ignatius mentioned the Catholic Church as early as 107 AD.

Some essential reading material about early Christianity includes:

• Four Witnesses by Rod Bennett
• Faith of the Early Fathers - a three volume set by William Jurgens
• The Spirit of Early Christian Thought by Robert Louis Wilken

One of the first things you discover is that it was the Catholic Church, mostly in the context of determining what could or could not be read at liturgy, which determined the set (or canon) of books which were to be considered Scripture. Given that, it is extremely difficult for a Protestant to elucidate why they trust the Bible given that the canon was determined by the Catholic Church.

Once a Protestant reasons his/her way through that and decides that perhaps the Holy Spirit worked through the Church to ensure that the canon of Scripture would not be in error, they have conceded (at least in one case) the possibility and necessity of infallibility in a human being (or group of human beings) by the power of the Holy Spirit.

This concept of infallibility fits in very well with Matthew 16:17-19, where Jesus gives Peter the keys of the kingdom and says "Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." Unless one wishes to say that Jesus has no quarrel with allowing erroneous teachings to be bound and loosed in Heaven, it is hard to get around the fact that Jesus Himself here gave Peter (together with the other Apostles) the gift of infallibility.

To conclude this ramble, I'll link to a very astute comment by Mark Gordon on Mark's website, which commented on the "drive by shooting". Money quote: "Here's an observation from an Evangelical convert to the Catholic Church: The vast majority of those who move from Catholicism to Evangelicalism begin from a point of almost complete ignorance of their Catholic faith. By contrast, the vast majority of those who move from Evangelicalism to Catholicism begin from a point of deep immersion in their Evangelical faith."

BTW, speaking of the commenter above, check out Mark Gordon's sobering blog which chronicles the ongoing Suicide of the West.

Battlestar Galactica - Best Show on TV!

For the first time in many years, I've found myself watching quite a few TV series this year. This is probably because the success of "Lost" convinced networks to give science fiction a chance again. Science fiction is the genre I find most interesting anyway, and also has the added bonus of greatly reducing political correctness and gratuitous sex.

I have to agree with all the raves for Battlestar Galactica. It is probably the most realistic science fiction show I have ever watched. No artificial technobabble solutions on this show. It is quite edgy at times, though, so it may not be for everyone, especially younger children. It's highly recommended that you use TiVo or a similar product and review episodes ahead of time before letting your children watch. This also has the happy bonus of allowing you to skip all the commercials!!!

My rankings of the shows I currently TRY to keep up with:
1. Battlestar Galactica
2. Lost
3. Invasion
4. Smallville
5. Prison Break
6. Surface
7. The 4400

Don't be fooled by the low ranking for the shows at the bottom. All the shows are really well done, with the possible exception of Surface, which is pretty corny but still enjoyable.

R.I.P. Western Civilization?

Mark Steyn, one of my favorite conservative writers, today tackles the elephant in the living room, which till now has been tackled only by a select few such as George Weigel (see The Cube and The Cathedral).

Even when the events beg to have "the elephant" examined, for example, during the French riots, it is ignored in favor of causes such as unemployment.

The elephant, of course, is the upcoming collapse of much of Western Civilization due to a birth dearth, a vacuum which is being filled by the Muslims. My brother is visiting Europe this month; a visit I encouraged him to make - I told him that Europe may well largely become Eurabia during his lifetime.

Civilizations thrive or decline largely due to the birth rate. The birth rate is largely based on the balance of religious vs. secular values. Right now, especially in Europe, but throughout Western Civilization to one extent or another, there is a societal death wish, expressed in an absurdly low birth rate. People, in general, have decided "To Hell with the future; I'm going to get mine!" Europe is largely depopulating, and the vacuum is being filled with mostly Muslim immigrants. The irony, of course, is that the European secular democracies are hoping via mass immigration to prop up their welfare states (which of course require astronomical amounts of money) and by doing so, they are only hastening the transition of their societies to something quite different.

Anyway, of course, Mr. Steyn says all this much more eloquently than I...I encourage you to read the article! It's long but quite illuminating and rewarding.

Best Non-Hall of Fame players

This is a pretty interesting CNN/SI article, which should generate a lot of discussion around the blogosphere. Of the players mentioned, I am particularly among the cheerleaders for Bert Blyleven, Ron Santo, Alan Trammell, and Joe Torre. Also, though I'm not sure I'd vote for Dwight Evans, he was one of my favorite players of all time, and remains one of the most underrated players of all-time.