[♪♪♪]
ROBERT LAWRENCE KUHN: If God
 exists, doctrines of God
 must align
 with truths of science.
 For almost 60 years
 I've been thinking hard
 about theology
 in light of science.
 So, why have I not
 thought hard
 about theology
 in light of evolution,
 or the reverse,
evolution in light of theology?
 My indifference to evolution
 seems odd,
 because I do wonder about God,
 and my Ph.D.
 is in the biological sciences.
 Evolution works fine
without God, no challenge here.
 But how could
 evolution work with God?
 That's the real challenge.
 So, here's my approach.
 I will assume God exists,
 then ask,
 what follows for evolution?
 In other words,
 if God, what's evolution?
 I'm Robert Lawrence Kuhn,
 and Closer to Truth
 is my journey to find out.
[♪♪♪]
 I've tried to discern meaning
 or purpose, if any,
 by exploring cosmology
 and consciousness.
Because cosmology is fundamental
 and consciousness, well,
 might be.
 But not by exploring evolution
 because evolution
 is not fundamental.
 But evolution concerns
 human origins,
 and origins can reflect
 meaning and purpose, if any,
 which could affect theology,
compliment it or contradict it.
So, if I were to believe in God,
 how could I handle evolution?
I begin by arraying the issues,
 the problems, or difficulties
 that evolution
 brings to theology.
 I ask a theistic philosopher
 who takes evolution seriously,
 Michael Murray.
 We meet in St. Andrews,
 Scotland.
Michael,
what are the issues involved,
knowing evolution is true and
having to deal with theology,
which you know is true
and I wonder is true?
Let me say something first
about what we mean by evolution.
So, there are three
central components.
The first is the idea that
there's changing gene
frequencies over time.
There's something that's
happening as we go through
an evolutionary lineage, where
certain traits are becoming
more common and other traits
are becoming less common.
And that happens because
gene frequencies are changing.
The second component
of evolution
refers to common ancestry,
so, the idea that all
organisms that exist
spring from some single
common ancestor.
And the third component,
the changing gene frequencies
over time, is just referring
to something we observe.
But then evolution also
involves certain mechanisms
that explain those changes.
And the one that most people are
familiar with is just variation
or mutation and selection.
When we think of evolution
in that way,
it intersects with theology
in a variety of ways.
So, let me give you an
overview of what those are.
So, the first has to do
with the compatibility
between the evolutionary
story and the various claims
about origins
in revealed sacred texts.
Secondly, religious believers in
many traditions believe that God
was involved in some way
in the origins of life,
or at least in the origins of,
of humanity in some way.
But it looks like
the evolutionary story
is a purely naturalistic one.
So, how do we reconcile
those two,
where does God
come into the picture?
The third area has to
do with what looks like
the way in which suffering
and evil
is intrinsic to
the evolutionary process.
So, death, predation,
the sort of waste that comes
with extinctions,
the suffering that's involved
in all of those things
looks like it's incompatible
with the existence
of an all good creator.
Another issue
that comes up here
has to do with
evidence of purpose.
So, it looks like, according
to some evolutionary biologists,
evolution is a purely
random process.
And the sort of randomness
that's involved in evolution
seems to indicate that it's
not a purposive type of process.
And that seems intentioned with
theological views that hold
that God's revealing God's
purposes through creation
and through the processes
that lead to the diversity
and complexity of life.
And then finally there's the
question that's really related
to that question about whether
or not there's evidence
of directionality or teleology
in the overall course
of evolution.
So, some people like Gould claim
that there's none, and others,
like Simon Conway Morris,
claim that there's a lot.
That is, if you were to replay
the tape over and over again,
you'd get this very same result.
And that should lead us to look
for guardrails in evolution.
But you don't mean to imply
that there's an equal number
on each side?
I would think the skew
is heavily to the former,
not to the latter?
Well, when it comes to
the question of randomness,
I guess everyone agrees
that there's a certain element
of randomness in evolution.
When it comes to directionality,
I think there's an increasing
number of biologists
who are agreeing
that there are certain kinds
of directionality.
Now whether
it's purposive directionality
is another question.
Just to set the correct status,
the percentage of working
evolutionary biologists
is heavily skewed though, still
to the Stephen Jay Gould model.
That's probably right.
So, where, having looked at
the potential incompatibilities,
where do you see
compatibilities?
So, two things come to mind.
The first has to do with this
question of directionality.
So, for most theists who believe
that Gods purposes
are being lived out through
the natural world,
one would expect that
if we have a natural history
that goes from the Big Bang
to something like we see today,
where we've got complex forms
of intelligent life,
that there's got to be something
in the process itself
that's leading
in that particular direction.
And I think that leads some
people who have these kinds of
theistic motivations to go back
and look at the record
and ask, well, are there,
is there anything like that?
The second comes out of the work
that Al Plantinga did
in The Evolutionary Argument
 Against Naturalism.
The summary line is, you know,
if you're a naturalist
and an evolutionist,
then it looks like you end up
with certain kinds of paradoxes.
And the only way you can
resolve those paradoxes
is to invoke something
like a divine creator
who ensures that what we get
is reliable belief from them.
So, then there's two ways
that can happen fundamentally.
One is that from the beginning
the way the laws
were constructed, enabled,
even though it looks
random on the surface,
that there was this teleology
built into the process.
And then God didn't have
to fiddle with the dials
during this period of time.
The other says,
whatever it was to begin with,
God had to make
minimal interventions.
So those are two
radically different ways
that the world could work.
Both have a teleology.
Yeah. It's an interesting
question, and, you know,
I think what we've seen in the
course of the history of
theology is vacillating between
these two different poles.
So, at different junctures
when new theoretical paradigms
become predominate
in the sciences.
And you get theologians arguing,
well see, this is evidence
of the divine engineer,
the divine clockmaker.
I mean, some people argue
that that first view,
the view according to which God
sets the laws in motion
and it brings about the things
that God wants to bring about,
just isn't sustainable because
of the kind of randomness
that we find in the world.
That's probably wrong,
because even if there are
random processes,
if God were to put in place
certain kinds of guardrails,
- it can force evolution...
- And quantum mechanics...
KUHN: I like the clarity
 Michael stresses
 for tensions between
 theology and evolution:
origin stories in sacred texts,
 God is creator of life
 and human life,
 vast suffering,
and apparent waste in evolution.
 Absence of purpose
 and randomness of evolution.
 I find two
 fundamental questions.
 First question: Does
 evolution have directionality
 or teleology,
or is evolution entirely random
 without path or purpose?
But even if evolution does have
guardrails as Michael suggests,
 could those not be natural
 consequences of physical laws,
selected for by randomly evolved
 observers, like ourselves,
 in a vast unsolvable
 multiple universes.
 Second question: If God
 as creator does exist
and if God had a primordial plan
 to create human beings,
 how could God work
 through evolution?
 What could be the mechanisms?
 Proponents have answers.
 Several are attending
 a conference
at the University of Notre Dame
 called
 The Quest for Consonance:
 Theology
 and the Natural Sciences.
 Evolution naturally
 is a prime topic.
 I go to South Bend, Indiana.
 I begin with
 an atheistic philosopher,
 known for his vigorous
 and iconoclastic engagement
 with evolution and theology,
 Michael Ruse.
Michael the question,
the old question
between evolution
and versus theology.
Help me to understand
the real deep questions today
from your perspective
as one of the world's experts
on this unusual relationship.
First of all, it's not evolution
and theology,
it's evolution
and Western Christianity.
Because in so many respects
evolution is something which
comes out of or in contrast
to Western Christianity.
Starting with the whole
question of origins.
The Greeks didn't talk about
origins in those sorts of ways.
The Jews did,
and evolutionists did.
So, it's evolution
and Christianity.
Within about 10 years
after Darwin had published,
pretty much all the world
except the American South
had accepted evolution.
Catholics and Protestants
and people said,
of course there's evolution,
now let's get on with it.
As it were,
that boils been lanced,
it doesn't deny the existence
of God, that's how he worked.
I think it was after
the Second World War
that things started to change.
And a book called Genesis Flood
came out in 1961
and that's the kind of bible
of the creationist movement.
Championing of biblical
literalism, that raised,
obviously, biologists like you
and philosophers like me,
into saying, gosh,
something's here.
Of course, then we start
to work on it
and the academic side takes over
and the world starts to see
it's a lot more interesting.
So, give me some of the
sophistication that's going on.
Well, I think one of the big
issues, for instance,
that people
are very interested in
is issues to do with
the whole Christian story,
the Augustinian story
of original sin.
Why did Jesus die on the cross?
He died for our sins.
But why are we sinners
if we're made by a good God?
Because of Adam's sin.
And the whole story like that.
Now along comes evolutionary
biology, and particularly,
more recently paleoanthropology.
We now know a huge amount
about human evolution.
We know there wasn't
one Adam and Eve.
And more than that, we know that
Adam and Eve's mom and dad
were just as nice, but also just
as nasty as the rest of us.
So, there's something
wrong here.
Now, the Richard Dawkins
approach is to say,
that clearly show that
Christianity is false, move on.
The other way is to say,
well, hang on a minute,
not every Christian believes in
the Augustinian story.
So, I think what you're starting
to see now though,
is a much more
nuanced engagement
over the science-religion
relationship.
Even by people like myself
who are nonbelievers,
just as much as people
on the other side
like the late Ernan McMullin
who are believers.
Okay. I understand
from your perspective
how this is
a very pleasant story.
But from people who are
believers in Christianity,
when they see some fundamental
doctrines like the fall
and original sin
which goes back to Adam
and has to have a specific Adam.
If you take that away,
you're getting painted into
a smaller and smaller corner
on the dance floor of reality.
Smaller and smaller at one level
but not necessarily
at another level.
Because don't forget a
theologian is a theologian,
not a scientist.
So, in other words,
if the scientist says
to the theologian, sorry, you
can't believe in Adam and Eve,
okay, you're constrained
if you like core science.
How do we roll with this?
Let's look at
alternative traditions,
let's work on alternative ways.
What did Jesus represent?
Was it a blood sacrifice,
or was it being an exemplar?
Theologically speaking,
it seems to me,
it opens up a whole new vista.
Michael, you could be
a wonderful theologian.
[laughing] Yeah.
If you taught a course
in theology I would sign up.
My trouble is though,
I'm not prepared to wear
polyester suits and a tie.
Okay. Very good.
Are you happy to be
called a debunker?
Well I'm certainly
a debunker about morality.
I would probably
apply it to religion too.
But my feelings are a little
bit like Charles Darwin
in The Descent of Man.
He spends a huge amount of time
talking about morality
and this much time
talking about religion.
Because at some level
he feels that kind of debate
has moved on.
He's not anti-religion;
he just doesn't see
the conflicts
in quite those sorts of ways.
[♪♪♪]
KUHN: Michael himself
 is a proud atheist.
 Yet he does not begrudge
 believers their beliefs,
provided of course, they conform
 their theological doctrines
 through evolutionary science.
 A bit patronizing perhaps,
 though social tolerance
 is usually a good thing.
 How could theology so conform?
 What kind of moves
 must theology make
 to reconcile itself
 with evolution?
 Rationalizing the horrors
 of natural evil
 must come near
 the top of the list.
I ask philosopher Nancey Murphy,
 a believer
 who privileges science
 even when it challenges
 theological doctrines.
When Augustans set out
to explain why a universe
that was originally created good
would contain events
like floods, tsunamis, plagues,
famines, and so forth.
His explanation was partly due
to the fall of the sin of Adam.
And so, a lot of human suffering
was deserved punishment.
But how do you
explain natural cataclysms?
And his explanation was that
some of the Angels also fell,
being free
and mutable creatures.
And because, it's, was like
a chain of command from God,
to the Angels,
to the natural world.
If you've got rebellious Angels,
it's like cutting out a level
of the military command
in the Army.
And so, everything below
is disturbed, it's disordered.
And so that was an explanation
for natural evil
that was maintained
for centuries.
When any biblical basis
for the fall of Adam
and especially
for the fall of Angels.
Theologians and philosophers
focused on human moral evil
but never paid much attention to
what we've called natural evil.
And certainly
not enough attention
to the suffering
of sentient beings.
And here evolution, of course,
is relevant
because we now know that there
were sentient beings suffering
and dying long before
there were humans to sin.
What I look at is not
evolutionary theory
but the so called fine-tuning of
the cosmological constants
that determine that we live in
a world that has natural laws
almost exactly like the ones
we've got.
And when you ask,
why are there earthquakes,
why are there tsunamis,
why are there deadly parasites?
These things happen
as a result of laws of nature
and cause the suffering.
But those laws
had to be that way.
The question I'm asking
is about evolution per-se
which is the way that
if you believe God created
the evolutionary process
or enabled that.
You have to believe
that's the best,
the optimal way to do that.
Well I don't know that you could
say that's the optimal way
but it's just obvious
the way that God did it.
There was a position
in early modern science
called providential deism.
Which is not the deism
of the absentee God,
but it was part of the
development of the whole concept
of a law governed universe.
The laws given to Moses
for the Hebrews
was a providential way of
guiding and making a good life.
Likewise, the emphasis
in early modern science
was on God's laws
being his providential means
of taking care of
the universe as a whole,
with more emphasis
on taking care of the whole
than on interventions
to take care
of our particular individuals.
[♪♪♪]
KUHN: I agree with Nancey
 that the laws of nature
 certainly seem to operate
 within tight boundaries.
 But I'd not quickly
 buy the argument
 that an omnipotent
 creator of the universe,
 if such a being exists,
 would be bound by
 such simple constraints.
 And thus, compelled
 to allow natural evil.
 If a creator god exists
 I'd suspect another kind
 of explanation.
 Perhaps God planned,
 perhaps God doesn't mind
 all that evolutionary
 suffering -
 an explanation that
 gives theologians heartburn.
 Can theology ever be
 reconciled with evolution?
 If so, perhaps only
 in nontraditional ways
 at deeper explanatory levels.
 I ask a theologian
 whose different kind
 of Christological vision
 takes an expansive view
 of Christ in the world.
 With doctorates in biology
 and theology,
 she is director of the
Notre Dame Center for Theology,
Science, and Human Flourishing,
 Celia Deane-Drummond.
When I always started thinking
about theology and evolution
was the focus has always
been on God and evolution.
And making those two things
compatible between, you know,
how can you be a theist and also
be an evolutionary biologist.
But what I thought was,
hadn't been tackled sufficiently
were two aspects.
One was Christology,
how can you believe in
Christ as being divine and human
and also believe
in an evolutionary world?
And how can we think abut humans
being in the image of God
but also believe in this
evolutionary narrative?
You know, the way I tackled it
was actually to try
and answer the
Christological question first.
So, my first project
was Christ and Evolution
and I subtitled
wonder and wisdom.
And in that book, I tried to
work out how can we come to
a different kind of
Christological understanding
that still makes sense in the
light of evolutionary biology?
And so, what I wanted
to avoid was to say,
well, Christ is simply emergent,
an emergent religious figure
who's particularly unique
in his ability to relate to God.
To me that was dissatisfying
as a theologian
because it seems to undercut
Christ's divinity.
So, you're avoiding the sort of
Chalcedon definition,
which is to say that
Christ is both divine
and human simultaneously.
Really divine,
not metaphorically.
Yes. Truly divine rather
than just sort of
metaphorically divine,
just as you say.
So, I try to find a different
way of describing
Christ's narrative
or time in the world
that would somehow resonate
with the evolutionary account
but at the same time
say something distinct.
And I found that actually Hans
Urs von Balthasar's theo-drama
was one of the most
convincing narratives.
Theo-drama is different
from a grand narrative
because it's combining a story
or a narrative in a drama
with existential understandings
of what it is to be human.
Theo-drama was about
participating
in the actual drama of Christ.
So, Christ's incarnation,
life, death, and resurrection
is the kernel of
the theo-dramatic process.
Now the reason why
this is interesting
in relation to evolution is that
each stage of the drama
includes aspects of contingency
but also aspects of determinism,
if you like, or a frame
of thinking of things
where things are sort of
moving forward.
So, the common ground between
Christology and evolution,
for me,
was this dramatic narrative.
So, the agency wasn't
just about Christ's agency
but started to include
the agencies
of these other creatures
in the evolutionary process.
That then were caught up
in the evolutionary story
and became part of
this theo-drama.
So, there's a theo-dramatic
account but of course
at each stage in that drama
you have contingency.
But you also have a sense
of directedness as well.
And so, there is a sort of
uncanny convergence of forms
in the evolutionary world and
they can't particularly explain
precisely why that happens.
And yet if you see it now
through a lens of theo-drama
then that theo-drama resonates
with the evolutionary story.
It's not identical to it,
so I see these as they're sort
of analogies of one another.
I think it's a fascinating
metaphor,
but it sounds more like art
than science to me.
In that, first of all,
the convergence of evolution
is a controversial concept.
The point though, that if you're
drawing this parallelism
between evolution
and the theo-drama
of the four stages of Christ.
This is an artistic expression
but there's no
contingency there.
I mean, if there is a God
and God planned that,
that's the way it was going
to always happen. Right?
No. no, this is where
I disagree.
I think there's deep
contingency--
You think Christ is contingent?
I think that Mary's yes
could have been no.
Otherwise she doesn't
have pure freedom.
When Mary was asked
by the Angel Gabriel,
will you become the handmaiden
of the Lord?
She said, do it unto me
according to thy word.
She could have said,
I don't want to do this.
Do you think she really
understood
what the question was?
I think she didn't understand
but she was prepared to risk it.
And you assume contingencies
on both sides,
contingencies on evolution
and contingencies
on Gods relationship
with the world,
particularly with Christ. What
are the implications of that?
I think the implications are
that we don't live
in a fixed universe.
You mean as far as
God's plan is concerned?
Yes. There are
different possibilities.
There isn't such a thing
as God's plan;
it's a kind of fixed mode.
And I think that's a mistake.
And I think that's what theology
can learn from evolution.
[♪♪♪]
KUHN: Celia offers radical links
between evolution and theology,
 looking to theo-drama,
 a kind of participation
 in the Christ experience,
 as mediating between
 the contingency of evolution
and the determinism of theology.
 Although, well,
 something of a stretch,
 the unusual idea confirms
 that real reconciliation
 remains a real challenge.
 Having explored theological
 moves to co-opt
and explain evolution, I circled
 back to the basic question:
 If God exists,
 how does evolution work?
 I meet a distinguished
 evolutionary biologist
 and philosopher of biology,
 who in his early life
 was a Dominican priest
and in his later life, reflected
 on evolution and theology,
 Francisco Ayala.
Francisco, can you differentiate
between the God
who made
the evolutionary process
and then sort of stepped away
from an evolutionary process
that was designed specifically
to yield human
sentient creatures?
Can you differentiate there?
When the second one, you have
the issue of intelligent design.
God designed the world
so that it would produce
the human being we are now.
- Same problem occurs.
- Somehow that would have
to account for all the
problems that we have.
And not only ourselves
but the problems that exist
in the living world.
And in the whole world,
you know,
all the galaxies are collapsing,
and stars are disappearing.
So, what's your ultimate
conclusion
between evolution and theology?
Well if you accept evolution and
what we know about the origin
of organisms and the origin
of humans as we are.
And then places of God, there
for the people of faith,
is there, there's no need
to be removed.
This is an interesting issue
that bothers,
very often, theologians.
So, what do you do with God?
Are you willing to accept
that we were created by God?
Is it possible to accept
that we were created by God
and that we are a product
of evolution?
[♪♪♪]
KUHN: It is not for me
 to challenge evolution.
 Nor to use evolution
 to challenge theology.
 Harmonizing evolution
 and theology is not my goal.
 Forced congruence
 would be self-deception.
I'd not prior pursued evolution
 because I was sure nothing
 would follow.
 God, no God.
 Evolution would seem the same.
 I am no longer so sure.
 The default explanation
 is atheistic evolution,
 accidental and without
 purpose for humans,
 which is obviously consistent
 with science.
 If God exists,
 here are three options.
 One, God intervenes
 to guide evolution
in ways discoverable by science,
 I don't think so.
 Two, God intervenes
 to guide evolution
 but in ways imperceptible
 to science.
 If that's possible,
 by definition,
 it would be impossible
 to confirm.
 Three, God set the laws
 of nature so perfectly
that evolution would ultimately
 bring forth sentient creatures
 without God's
 further intervention.
 If God exists,
 this would be my bet.
 But I'd remain
 deeply dissatisfied
 and open to radical ideas
 not yet on my list.
 I'm sorry I do not have
 further clarity to get...
 closer to truth.
[♪♪♪]
ANNOUNCER:
 For complete interviews
 and for further information,
please visit closertotruth.com.
[♪♪♪]
