Just got Fr Paul Robinson SSPX's book THE REALIST GUIDE TO RELIGION AND SCIENCE to read again from a friend. He said I could keep it. I can now answer any questions on it. I will be back later 9after dinner, steak tonight0 to answer Ladislaus first.
Understanding Fr Robinson's beliefs lies in the word REALIST of his book. Over 500 pages telling us in a very philosophic way what he believes in. In other words, he gives you two beliefs but rarely states the one he believes in. Ratzinger used the same tactics by quoting others. If later he is accused on holding this belief he sayas it wasn't his belief but the one he was quoting.
For him, the modern Catholic has two truths that cannot contradict one another, science first and faith last. He begins with his proof that the world is 13.5 billion years old. He bases this on the distance of stars, a proven scientific distance. He is a believer in the Big Bang that took 13.5 billion years to expand. This is his first 'science' that means we cannot take Genesis and the dates in it for then faith and science clash. And according to our Catholic faith, the two cannot clash.
Now in Genesis, Moses, inspired by the Holy Ghost, said literally, that God created the stars visible on Earth on the fourth day. So if one has fasith in God's revelations, there was never any delayed star-time.The Bible reveals God created the world geocentric, with the stars rotating around the Earth. Copernicus said if this was true, then the stars would expand like a circular swing. In other words, faith in Genesis would contradict modern science that conjured up a Big Bang from Hubble's find of expanding stars.
Now as a priest you would think Catholic faith in the word of God should come first and human reasoning second. Not with Fr Robinson. If he was present at the wedding when Jesus turned water into wine, and tasted what must have been the nicest wine ever made, he would have said: 'This is matured wine, it could not have been made today, it must have been stored up to mature its so nice.
Fr Robinson says he is not a theistic evolutionist. He certainly does not believe Adam's body came from a monkey. He stretches his understanding of animals being created by God in that time. How God did it he doesn't say but behing the screen lies theistic=-evolution. What other way could animals be if the Earth is billions of years ol;d.
Now to understand the faith and science of modern Catholicism, you must know it is basded on the 1820 concession to Galileo's heliocentrism and his heliocentric exeges and hermeneutics. Pope Leo ZIII in Providentissimus deus allowed 'science' to correct misunderstood meanings of the Bible. Fr Robinsobn quotesd Leo as Catholic faith with regard to faith and science. He also quotesd Pius XII saying to the PAS that the Big Bang billions of years ago was God's created act. Thus FGr Robinson can quote popes and Catholic belief as supporting his 13.8 billion years Genesis.
Apologies for any typo errors,.