INTERVIEW: Fr. Michael Chaberek, OP

Author of "Aquinas and Evolution"

Thank you to Fr. Michael Chaberek for agreeing to this interview and for offering an alternative to the standard acceptance of evolution by Catholics today.

Kaleb Hammond:

Thank you for agreeing to this interview, Father. To start, could you please tell us a little about yourself and your work?

Fr. Michael Chaberek, OP:

I am a Dominican Friar of the Polish Province. I got my doctorate in Systematic Theology from Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski University in Warsaw (2011) and the habilitation from Nicholaus Copernicus University in Torun (2025). I am a founder and director of Steno Institute for Faith and Science. My academic focus is on the relation between faith and science. I promote a new synthesis of theology, philosophy and science, which draws on the best of each of these levels (or domains) of knowledge. I propose that new evidence should make Catholics and other Christians abandon theistic evolution (i.e. the idea that God used evolution in creating the universe) and adopt intelligent design and the concept of progressive creation. In my publications, I show how the classic Catholic philosophy supports this new synthesis.

Hammond:

For this interview, I would like to focus especially on your excellent book, “Aquinas and Evolution.” What first motivated you to write this book?

Chaberek:

I could see that a vast majority of contemporary Thomists give a blank check to Darwinists, who claim to represent the science of the day. I am a reasonable person, so when I first encountered this attitude, I decided to look up the actual scientific evidence. And I found none to support the grand philosophical claims, such as universal common ancestry or natural transformation of species. So, the next logical step was to see what Aquinas actually teaches on the origin of species, especially the human being. What struck me was the fact how explicit was Aquinas’s support for the classic form of Christian creationism. It became clear that the writings of current Thomists, even those who are considered leaders in the field, are filled with inaccuracies, misrepresentations, or flat errors in presenting Aquinas’s doctrine on creation, specifically the origin of species. I would not consider myself a fully fledged Thomist, but I wanted to help those who believe themselves to be Thomists to see how many basic errors they make when it comes to Aquinas and evolution. Their research is clearly driven by ideological bias, which blinds them against seeing the most obvious problems with accommodating Aquinas to the grand evolutionary story. Having said that, I want to emphasize that I probably agree on 90% of what these Thomists say in other portions of their books. But when it comes to evolution they are grossly mistaken, and I wanted to expose their inconsistency and lack of clarity.

Hammond:

As a follower of Thomas Aquinas, you are careful to define your terms from the beginning. Could you explain the difference between microevolution and macroevolution in biological evolution and why this is an important distinction for your overall argument?

Chaberek:

Sure. This is an important distinction. Aquinas was very careful in defining his terms and we should follow his attitude, especially when it comes to the issues of such complexity and fragility as faith and science. To put it most simply, microevolution defines changes in living beings that remain within the limits of species, and macroevolution defines changes that are supposed to produce new species. Surely, the immediate question that needs to be addressed is: what is meant by “species”? For my purpose, I typically speak about natural species or taxonomical level of genus or family. A biologist Michael Behe shows that evolutionary changes have never been shown to go beyond the level of taxonomical family. Thus, we can safely say that microevolution, a phenomenon that can be observed in nature, never goes beyond the level of biological families. In most cases, however, these limits are even more restrictive, especially when it comes to so-called higher (or perfect) animals.

Hammond:

The thesis of your work, in summary form, is that the philosophy and theology of St. Thomas Aquinas, and the Church Fathers in continuity with him, is incompatible not only with atheistic but also with theistic macroevolution, the latter of which is believed by a majority of Catholics today. How would you distinguish between an atheistic and a theistic interpretation of evolutionary theory?

Chaberek:

Darwin said that species were not created but naturally evolved from one or a few organisms. First Catholic evolutionists bought into the idea of the natural emergence of species, so they wanted to square this idea with Catholic theology. They said that God used evolution as a means of creating species. They believed that by adopting this idea they could save both the alleged biological evidence for macroevolution and the Christian faith. I think they failed on both counts, because Darwin and his atheistic followers would never say that evolution is anyhow guided or started by God. And on the other hand, theistic evolutionists substantially changed the teaching on creation to the extent that I would not call it orthodox Christianity. Thus, looking for a compromise, they compromised faith while not even satisfying the demands of atheists, who supposedly speak on behalf of science.

Hammond:

Before you begin to defend your thesis, you first raise an objection, one many others today would ask, which you call “the problem of commensurability”: are theology and philosophy capable of critiquing the findings of science, and vice versa? Are they not independent realms or scopes (magisteria) of knowledge and investigation, as Galileo first asserted, autonomous within their own spheres of inquiry?

Chaberek:

I do believe in autonomy of science, philosophy and theology, however, I would not say that they are completely independent, let alone contradictory. As Christians we are committed to the concept of one truth, which means that there cannot be true scientific or philosophical claim that contradicts a true tenet of faith, and vice versa. And precisely for this reason we can compare and juxtapose these different levels of knowledge or even debunk some scientific claims based on our theological or philosophical knowledge. Of course, this requires deep understanding of these three domains. The condemnation of Galileo is probably one of a few, if not the only case when theology was abused in judging science. Today we see, however, an opposite situation when science of evolutionary biology is abused to disprove the belief in creation. So, it is very important to recognize the proper limits of each domain and realize which questions they can and which questions they cannot answer. I develop these criteria in my book “Knowledge and Evolution”.

Hammond:

Your thesis asks two key questions: is the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas compatible with (specifically theistic) evolution; and is it compatible with intelligent design (ID)? For the first, you list many of the most common objections that would be leveled against a Thomistic rejection of evolution. One focuses on the philosophical concept of secondary or instrumental causality: why can’t we just say that God uses evolution as His chosen method for creating biological diversity of species in nature?

Chaberek:

Because as Aquinas – and actually the entire Catholic tradition – asserts, creation can only be the work of the Creator alone. No creature can participate in such a very specific type of divine causality. Aquinas develops metaphysical reasons for why it is so. And one of them is that any creature always acts in some aspect, never universally. But in creation God produces the very being of a thing, which is a universal action, meaning it is not limited to an aspect of a being but encompasses the entire thing. In creation of a new species we do not deal with creation of being as such out of nothing (as it happened in the first creation of the universe out of nothing), but rather God forms the matter he had created in the first creation. Nevertheless, even in the formation of species there is an aspect of creatio ex nihilo, which consists of producing a new substance in matter. So, even though God uses a substrate which is the previously created matter, He nevertheless creates a new substance or essence from nothing. And such action goes beyond the capacity of any creature. This is why, as St. Thomas says, in natural generation, a horse does not produce the nature of a horse but an individual participating in the horse nature. But the horse nature, as taken absolutely, was produced directly by God when God created the first horse. And this is the main metaphysical reason for why any account of theistic evolution fails in the light of classical metaphysics.

Hammond:

You also give another common objection: if only God can create new species, how can we account for the standard scientific understanding of history which describes new species appearing at different times? Or should we say that God, who holds all things in existence at every moment, directly creates these species continuously over time?

Chaberek:

There are several issues which we need to distinguish here. One thing is the timeline of creation. As you know, Augustine believed that all species were created at once in a single act. Most Christian writers before geology came about believed that the age of the universe was short, so the creation events happened just a few thousand years ago. But actually very few of them would claim that the six days of creation were six 24 hour periods of time. Today with the new data from geology, cosmology, paleontology and archeology we need to vastly extend the age of the universe. Some Christians still cling to the young earth, some support the old earth and virtually no one supports Augustine’s one time creation. But all of this is secondary to the question of the origin of species. From the scientific standpoint we need to accept deep time. But from the theological standpoint, which is more important because it impacts our faith, we need to adopt separate (so called “special”) creation of species, which means they do not share common ancestry, they did not evolve from one another. Each specific nature was produced in matter directly by God. And this is essential for our faith and sound philosophy. We also believe that the time of creation was ended once and for all with the creation of man. It means that totally new natures of living beings do not emerge anymore. This belief is compatible with what we actually observe in the universe. The fact is that species die out, we do not see new species being produced by any natural laws. So, the scientific facts and data support the classic Christian position, even if some theories, such as the Darwinian one, contradict it.

Hammond:

As you explain, the standard version of evolutionary theory, in both its atheistic and theistic forms, asserts that chance is the primary mechanism by which new species arise in nature, through processes such as genetic mutation and natural selection. St. Thomas also recognized the reality of chance. So, aren’t these chance-based processes sufficient to explain the origin of species?

Chaberek:

Yes, this is a very popular argument coming from the so-called “Thomistic evolutionists”. Aquinas says that God uses both chance and planned events equally well to achieve His own goals. Based on this Thomistic teaching on divine providence, Thomists say that God used chance mutations in the production of species. But this argument is totally mistaken at least for two reasons: First, it confuses Aquinas’s teachings on divine providence with Aquinas’s teaching on creation. The origin of species belongs to the work of creation and thus it is not due to divine ordinary providence. St. Thomas says explicitly that species cannot emerge by any kind of change and therefore they need to be created (produced directly by God). The second reason why this argument fails is that it assumes that production of species is an effect of a process. A process is a set of natural events in which one event causes another. But because a process can only act on particulars, it cannot produce a new species. If it could, any species would be reducible to its parts, which means there would be no specified natures and we would end up in nominalism. For instance, a process can produce a watch or a car, which we see in factories around the world. But this is possible only because artifacts such as cars and watches do not constitute any specific natures, they are reducible to their parts. In contrast, living beings have the internal immaterial principle of their operation, which is sometimes called a soul. No process (a set of natural causes) can produce a soul, which would be the case if evolution produced species. So, on Aquinas’s view, it really does not matter whether the evolutionary process is guided or not, either way it would not achieve what it is claimed to have achieved. Evolution is a problem not just because it is random, but because it is a process. It is hard to believe that even Thomists who are well regarded by the philosophical community do not see such obvious problems.

Hammond:

You mention that St. Thomas preferred St. Augustine’s interpretation of Genesis, which posits that God created all species in the beginning, some as complete forms and others as “seminal reasons” that developed over time. This seems to leave an opening for an Augustinian/Thomistic version of theistic evolution: couldn’t we just say that, once natural selection disposes matter to receive a new species, God introduces it from His primordial “seminal reasons” through a substantial change?

Chaberek:

Aquinas nominally prefers Augustine’s one time creation, but actually in all of his commentaries on Genesis he adopts the more classic, i.e. the Ambrosian view of consecutive acts of creation. Either way his views are incompatible with theistic evolution at least for three reasons: 1. There is no universal common ancestry in Aquinas. Species have separate origins. 2. Transformation of one species to another by means of natural processes such as natural generation is explicitly excluded by Aquinas. 3. Aquinas attributes the origin of species directly to the divine causation, without any active help of creatures. All of this makes the Augustinian and Ambrosian traditions, which constitute the crux of the Christian understanding of creation, entirely incompatible with the theistic evolutionary stories. The idea that God introduces a new substantial form anytime when matter is properly disposed is no different from occasionalism and it also denies the Aristotelian-Thomistic hylemorphism by implying that disposition in matter is something that exists really (in re) without the appropriate form. I expose these problems in greater detail in my articles, in which I offer a critique of the metaphysical account of evolutionary change proposed by Fr. Mariusz Tabaczek.

Hammond:

The pre-modern Christian understanding of natural history usually relied on the first two chapters of Genesis, read in a literal, historical sense. But these two chapters seem to contradict one another in their ordering of things God created. This is why Pope John Paul II, Pope Benedict XVI, the Catechism of the Catholic Church and others today say that the Genesis Creation accounts use figurative and symbolic language to convey the deeper truth that God is the ultimate origin of all things, which doesn’t seem to exclude evolution. Would St. Thomas accept this interpretation?

Chaberek:

Obviously not. And not just Aquinas but any faithful author before Darwin. What strikes me the most is that none of the authors you bring up actually ever try to defend the traditional Catholic position even though it is by all means defensible. Mind that even if the two accounts were contradictory, it would only follow that both cannot be read literally at the same time; it would not follow, however, that neither of them can be read literally. This argument is therefore based on defective logic. But the argument is also based on false premises because there are no actual contradictions between these two accounts of creation. I show that they are compatible and complementary in my book “Aquinas and Evolution”.

Hammond:

Following from my previous question, the Church today, at least since Pope Pius XII’s Humani generis, seems to be more open to evolution, with John Paul II even saying that it is “more than a hypothesis” and that scientific research provides a “decisive argument” in its favor. As Catholics, even if evolution does contradict St. Thomas, are we still bound to accept it or at least remain open to it in obedience to modern Church teaching?

Chaberek:

I can deliver two answers to this question. In one, I could defend Pius XII, John Paul II and other authorities of the 20^th century. In the other, I could accuse them of being unfaithful to the Bible interpreted according to the long lasting tradition of the Church. The reason why it is possible to give these two contradictory answers stems from the fact that none of these authorities said anything decisive or even clear on evolution. Typically, out of love for the Church, I decide to choose the first answer. So, I would say that Pius XII did nothing more than just allowed for the debate on the evolutionary origin of the human body (excluding the soul). But he delineated very strict conditions for the debate which are not followed by today’s theologians. Pius XII explicitly banned discussing polygenism, which is now a commonplace in theology. John Paul II said that evolution is more than a hypothesis, but he did not say it is true or compatible with Church doctrine. In one place he says that evolution of nature does not, in principle, contradict the Bible, assuming that it does not deny divine causality. But he does not define what he means by “evolution of nature” nor does he say what kind of divine causality he means. So again, this utterance is not clear enough to make any judgment. The same kind of ambiguity and lack of clear terms is found in any other statements by the recent popes, the new Catechism etc. So, the most that we can deduce is that today we do not have a clear teaching of the Magisterium on evolution and we have the permission to continue the debate. The real question is not whether Catholics are bound to accept evolution, but whether they can drop the classic position which speaks about the special creation of man according to his body and soul.

Hammond:

As a conclusion to your first overall question, how would you summarize St. Thomas’s thoughts on the origin of species and his incompatibility with macroevolution?

Chaberek:

Aquinas was a creationist, meaning that he explicitly supported special creation of species and man. Some may not like Aquinas’s creationism, but it is one thing to admit I do not like his doctrine and I disagree with him, and another thing is to tinker with his teachings and push the narration about the alleged possibility of reconciling these two worldviews. I understand that one may reject Aquinas’s views, but I do not see how a Thomist can misrepresent his views in order to convince others about the alleged openness of Aquinas to evolution. This latter attitude borders on intellectual dishonesty. In my writings I typically say that there is a head-on opposition between Aquinas and theistic evolution, regardless of which one I’d support. Indeed, I think Aquinas was much closer to the truth than Darwin was, but this is another conclusion and quite independent from the first one.

Hammond:

One of the most important questions related to Catholicism and evolution is the origin of man. The Church dogmatically teaches that the soul of each man is created immediately by God. But, based on evolution, are we allowed to believe that the bodies of Adam and Eve evolved from previous, non-human animals, and that God simply created human souls for them once their bodies were properly disposed? Or even that Adam and Eve are only figurative names representing a first group of humans created by God, since evolution seems to teach that humans couldn’t have had only two first parents?

Chaberek:

When it comes to human origins, we see a striking progress of naturalism beginning with the first “Catholic evolutionists” of the 19^th century. Initially they only claimed that the body of Adam was somehow prepared by evolution, but the “final touch” must have been made by God. By the time of Pius XII the common opinion among theologians was already special transformism – the idea that the human body evolved but the soul was created. Soon after Humani Generis (1950) theologians started discussing polygenism [more than two first human parents], which effectively invalidates the doctrine on original sin. By now, many influential theologians don’t believe in the real existence of Adam and Eve, they reject monogenism, and they speak about emergence of the human psyche by means of natural evolution, which contradicts the doctrinal teachings on the human soul. So, over the last few decades we can observe how naturalism has been cutting through Catholic teachings, ultimately leading to the dissolution of subsequent truths. This process will continue until nothing of Christianity remains. Some naïve theologians still believe that defending the creation of the soul while allowing the evolutionary origin of the human body is a satisfactory solution that may bring peace to the tension between Christianity and evolution. But this is illusory thinking. The only way to stop the progress of naturalism and restore the Catholic faith is to clearly state that both human body and human soul were created directly by God in a single act of the creation of man.

Hammond:

Your second overall question addresses the compatibility between St. Thomas’s thought and Intelligent Design (ID). You give many intriguing reasons for ID’s compatibility with Catholicism in general, but for St. Thomas in particular, doesn’t ID’s reliance on modern science and its apparently mechanistic view of nature, with God imposing order onto matter from outside, contradict St. Thomas’s metaphysical understanding of substantial form as immanent in things, as well as his Fifth Way which proves God’s existence by the finality of the immanent formal natures in all things, seemingly without any reference to ID’s concepts of ‘irreducible complexity’ or direction by intelligent agency?

Chaberek:

In my publications I explain that the old Thomistic arguments for God’s existence are neither contradictory nor even alternative to the current argument for intelligent design in nature (ID). One reason for that is that these two arguments are found on different levels of knowledge – Thomistic arguments are philosophical in nature while the argument for intelligent design is scientific (meaning presented within natural science). The Thomistic arguments argue for the existence of God while the ID arguments prove the existence of design in nature. They use different methodology, they are based on different premises. But they do not contradict each other. Rather, ID arguments constitute a kind of scientific support or a vestibule for the philosophical arguments. Similarly, philosophical arguments are the vestibule for theological arguments (praeambula fidei). ID is an opportunity not a challenge for Catholic theology. It is only regrettable that so many Catholic scholars do not see the opportunity to bring back serious apologetics into theology. Instead, they try to incorporate Darwinism – a theory that is not even scientifically viable – into Catholic theology. It means they believe that ID is not compatible with Catholicism but Darwinism is. This kind of self-delusion which comes from ideological bias and poor education is a road to nowhere. What I show in my books is that ID should become a part of modern science-faith synthesis that takes into account the best of our theology and philosophy on the one hand, and the best of today’s science on the other.

Hammond:

You explain that ID, in your usage of the term, is specifically a scientific theory, not theological or philosophical. So, what role would you say that ID can play in relation to St. Thomas?

Chaberek:

As I mentioned before, this theory is like a vestibule to Catholic philosophy and theology. Classically, Catholics speak about truths that are preambles to faith (praeambula fidei). These are truths that may be recognized by natural reason (without the help of revelation) but are independently revealed in the Bible as well. Some examples are that God exists, that He is the ultimate cause of everything, that He is eternal, omnipotent etc. All these truths can be called “philosophical”, because we come to them by means of natural philosophical reasoning. Thomas Aquinas masterfully developed these arguments using the tools of classical metaphysics. ID remains within science, so it cannot prove the existence of God, because science cannot tell us whether God exists or not. But ID proves the existence of design in nature. And design can be only a product of a mind. This obviously opens a possibility of God’s existence. This way ID becomes a preamble to philosophy as philosophy is a preamble to theology.

Hammond:

In your discussion of ID, you also address the question of Creationism, which tends to be conflated with any theory of ID or rejection of evolution. Would you say that St. Thomas’s thought can be characterized as ‘creationist,’ and if so, are there different ways of using this term?

Chaberek:

As I mentioned, Aquinas was a creationist meaning that he believed in the separate creation of species. This belief seems to be constitutive for any kind of real creationism. However, I am not a big fan of the term “creationism” at all, because I think that the ending “–ism” suggests some kind of reductionism or even ideology akin to Marxism, communism, genderism etc. But the core of the Christian understanding of creation, which is that God created the universe out of nothing and then formed it supernaturally, is not any reductive philosophy. On the contrary, it is a worldview and a belief which gives us the correct understanding of the origins of the universe, species and man. Christians hold many beliefs that go beyond science. For instance, we believe in the resurrection of Christ. But science clearly teaches that dead men do not rise when they want. So, our belief goes beyond scientific evidence. Even so, we do not call Christians resurrectionists or virginalists (from the virginal conception of Jesus). Similarly, we should not call the classic belief in creation creationism, because it is not any ideology or reductive philosophy. It is simply one of the tenets of Christian faith. There are, however, some forms of this belief that tend to some ideological interpretations or even denial of scientific evidence, such as young earth creationism. I think the name creationism should be reserved for these interpretations. In popular discourse it is difficult to maintain such sophisticated distinctions and proper vocabulary, so perhaps those who believe in creation as the Bible and Catholic tradition teach are doomed to be labeled creationists.

Hammond:

As a final question, practically all Thomists today, like most Catholics, accept some form of theistic evolution. They usually say that to dispute evolution is irrational and unscientific. They then try to make St. Thomas fit with their beliefs. If, as you argue, St. Thomas’s thought is incompatible with evolution, why do so many Thomists seem to be in denial about this?

Chaberek:

It is a very complex issue. I will just point out several factors that may be contributing to such a situation. Obviously in each individual there can be a different admixture of each of these factors or even some other factors may play a role. So, the first reason is the biased science teaching that has been established on each level of education from kindergartens through universities, no matter whether secular or religious. This biased education is greatly supported by the media propaganda which claims that biological macroevolution is proven and that it is an established science. One needs to put significant amount of effort into studying the actual scientific evidence to overcome this narration. And this is probably possible just for those who are somehow scientifically inclined, meaning they understand how nature works. For most so-called humanists (vs. scientists) this challenge seems to go beyond their intellectual or moral capacity since they tend to rely on authority rather than evidence. And because theological studies are mostly humanistic, most priests and catechists are not even equipped to critically evaluate the claims of scientific evolutionists. The second big factor is the “science complex” that the Church contracted after Galileo’s affair. Today it is commonly believed that the Church should stay away from judging any claims of scientists and that any denial of Darwinism would result in a new Galileo affair. Interestingly enough, this argument has been proposed mostly by nonbelievers who suddenly become quite concerned about the good of the Church and her correct pastoral attitude. Another big factor is an overall victory of theological modernism in Catholicism, which destroyed many classic theological interpretations, one of them being the theology of creation. Moreover, modernism cannot exist without evolutionism (even if not all theistic evolutionists are modernists). This is why whenever you have modernism, you must have theistic evolutionism as well. On top of these “objective” factors there are many “subjective” ones such as the social cost that comes with criticizing evolution. Not many scholars want to pay such a price. The list of reasons could be extended, but I think you can already tell how complex the issue is and how hard it will be to restore the authentic Catholic interpretation of creation.

Hammond:

Thank you for taking the time to answer our questions today, Father. Do you have any new work in development that you would like to tell us about?

Chaberek:

I am working on a video series on Catholicism and Evolution which should become available this fall. Please, look up my personal website www.mchaberek.com where I post all my academic activities. Thank you and God bless you.