Stephen Hawking, the cosmologist and author of the bestselling A Brief History of Time, is to take part today in a conference at the Vatican on Darwin, evolution and intelligent design.

Pope Benedict XVI this morning opened the conference, organised by the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, which will last until next Tuesday. He said that like modern Popes before him, he saw no contradiction between the Christian concept of Creation and science. He cited Galileo, whom, he said "saw nature as a book whose author is God in the same way that Scripture has God as its author." He added: "To "evolve" literally means "to unroll a scroll", that is, to read a book. The imagery of nature as a book has its roots in Christianity, and has been held dear by many scientists."

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1. physician without health wrote: The big issue at stake is not evolution per se, but the idea of natural selection.  One can be a Christian and think that life evolved from lesser forms, but if one is a Christian, s/he will think that it did so because God made it happen. November 2, 11:22 pm | [comment link]

2. Tikvah wrote: The evolution of man from lower life forms still leaves us with the whole ‘image of God’ problem. When did we ‘evolve’ into that image? Now there’s a study to tackle, a theology to develop. T November 2, 11:45 pm | [comment link]

3. micah68 wrote: We have to be careful when we step away from Biblical revelation.  The concept of evolution is easily observable.  Variations and adaptations within species is can be demonstrated quite easily.  What is not observable is the extrapolation of that concept to the origin of life.  The evidence is simply not there.  The most reasonable explanation for the existence of the diversity of life remains that it was created that way. November 3, 2:08 am | [comment link]

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