Faith and Evolution: A Grace Filled Naturalism
Authors: Haight Roger 
Published: November 2022

FAITH AND EVOLUTION: A Grace Filled Naturalism by Roger Haight. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2019. 241 pages. Paperback; $30.00. ISBN: 9781626983410. *Roger Haight is a Jesuit priest, theologian, and former president of the Catholic Theological Society of America. He is the author of numerous books and has taught at Jesuit graduate schools of theology in several locations around the world. In 2004, the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) barred Haight from teaching at the Jesuit Weston School of Theology in response to concerns about his book Jesus Symbol of God (1999). In 2009, the CDF barred him from writing on theology and forbade him to teach anywhere, including at non-Catholic institutions. In 2015, Haight was somewhat reinstated and when Faith and Evolution was published, he was Scholar in Residence at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. He is regarded as a pioneering theologian who insists that theology must be done in dialogue with the postmodern world. His experiences with censorship have led to widespread debate over how to handle controversial ideas within the Roman Catholic church. *The main presupposition of this book is that Christian theology must be developed from the findings of contemporary science in general and from the process of evolution in particular. In chapter one, Haight briefly summarizes five principles about our world that can be drawn from science. These principles include the following: (1) our universe is unimaginably large; (2) everything exists as constantly dynamic motion and change; (3) everything in motion is governed by layers of law and systems conditioned by randomness; (4) life is marked by conflict, predatory violence, suffering, and death; and (5) science is constantly revealing new dimensions of the universe. *Haight seeks to explain how the disciplines of science and theology relate to each other in chapter two. He begins by summarizing the four positions proposed by Ian Barbour which include conflict, independence, intersection (dialogue), and integration. After presenting several differences between scientific knowledge and faith knowledge, he concludes by suggesting that the independence model is the one that best describes the practices of most scientists and theologians. Any integration between the two disciplines can occur only within the mind of a person who is able to see things from different points of view, and entertain them together. *The next two chapters deal with creation theology: chapter three focuses on what we can "know" about God, and chapter four describes how God acts in an evolutionary world. Several theological conceptions of God are summarized in chapter four. These include the following: God is pure act of being (Thomas Aquinas), God is ground of being (Paul Tillich), God is serendipitous creativity (Gordon Kaufman), God is incomprehensible mystery (Karl Rahner), and God is transcendent presence (Thomas O'Meara). This last definition of God is the one that Haight latches on to, and he mainly refers to God as "creative Presence" throughout the rest of the book. While acknowledging that God is personal, he emphasizes that God is not a "big person in the sky," but a mysterious and loving presence within all material reality. He insists that all anthropomorphic language about God needs to be discarded as it not only misrepresents scientific knowledge but also offends religious sensibility. God is the "within" of all that exists which emphasizes God's immanence, but God is also "totally other than" created reality, which allows for God's transcendence. Haight's understanding of God is basically a form of panentheism, a term that he introduces in chapter three and then revisits in later chapters of the book. *Chapter four, entitled "Creation as Grace," attempts to answer the question of how God acts in an evolutionary world. Haight states that "one can preserve all the assertions of tradition without the mystifying notions of a supernatural order or interventions into the natural order by following the path laid out by creation theology" (p. xi). His answer to the question of how God acts in history is to be found in the classic notion of creatio continua, God's ongoing dynamic presence within all finite reality. God does not act as a secondary cause but works as the primary agent present to and sustaining the created world. This concept of God as creative Presence is then compared to the scriptural understanding of God as "Spirit," which Haight concedes is the most applicable way of talking about how God works in history. A third way that God acts in the world is then developed from a brief history of the theology of grace. These three sets of theological languages that include God's ongoing creation, the working of the Holy Spirit, and the operation of God's grace in people's lives are, according to Haight, different ways of referring to the same entity. *Chapter five examines the doctrine of original sin in light of evolution. Haight argues that this doctrine in its classic form contains serious problems and therefore needs to be discarded. The Genesis account of Adam and Eve is nothing more than an etiological myth which has no historical basis. Consequently, "when original sin becomes unsteady, the whole doctrine of salvation in terms of redemption begins to wobble" (p. 121). Human beings have not "fallen" and, even though they retain the influences of past stages of evolution, they cannot be born sinful. While Haight admits that humans are sinners, the sins that we commit are nothing more than social sins derived from our participation in sinful institutions that are a part of our evolutionary heritage. It is these sinful social structures that are primarily responsible for corrupting our moral sensibility, rather than some innate propensity to sin. *The person of Jesus Christ and the doctrine of Christology are the subjects of chapters six and seven respectively. Haight introduces chapter six by contrasting the different ways of interpreting Jesus of Nazareth that are presented by Marcus Borg and N. T. Wright. He obviously sides with Borg's perspective as he suggests that one should think about Jesus as simply a "parable of God." Jesus was not an intervention of God in history, but a human representative of God who was "sustained from within by the Presence of the creator God in a way analogous to all creatures and especially human beings" (p. 202). While Haight admits that God was present within Jesus in a unique and more intense way, this same God can also be more powerfully present in others, making them in some measure true revelations of the divine Presence. Jesus provides salvation by "revealing God" and, although this particular revelation of God is meant for all humankind, it does not exclude the likelihood of similar kinds of revelation within other religious traditions. *The last chapter of the book, chapter eight, is a response to the question of what we can hope for in an evolutionary worldview. Haight discusses the following possibilities: faith in a creator-finisher God who injects purpose into the process of the universe, hope for a cosmic preservation of the value and integrity of being, hope for a restoration of meaning relative to innocent suffering, and hope for the preservation of the human person and personal resurrection. He describes resurrection as a passing out of materiality into the sphere of God that transcends the finite world, or in other words, eternal union with God. The resurrection of Jesus was not a historical event, but a spiritual conviction developed by his followers after his death. It was this "Easter experience" which became the basis for the written witness to the resurrection of Jesus that is recorded in the New Testament. In death, Jesus was "received into God's power of life; he did not cease to exist as a person, but lives within the sphere of God" (p. 179). Our hope for an analogous form of personal resurrection ultimately comes down to faith in a creator God who is the "lover and finisher of finite existence." *For whom then is this book written? As stated in the preface to the book, it is not written for scientists, as one will learn very little actual science from its pages. Haight writes that he is mainly addressing Christians who are affected by our present scientific culture and who do not know how to either process their Christian faith in this context or call it into question. However, most of those who fall into this category will likely have difficulty understanding the ideas that are presented in the book without some type of graduate-level training in theology. The book appears to be written primarily for like-minded theologians who are associated with the more liberal wing of the Roman Catholic church. (Many of the footnotes in the book cite publications written by fellow Catholic priests such as Teilhard de Chardin, John Haught, Hans Jung, Karl Rahner, Edward Schillebeeckx, and William Stoeger.) *While Haight's main purpose for writing this book is admirable, it is doubtful that many outside of academia will take the time and put in the effort that is needed to read it and actually understand it. Christians with more conservative, biblically based faith commitments should probably bypass it altogether, as there is very little, if any, orthodox Christianity that is upheld within its pages. *Reviewed by J. David Holland, Clinical Instructor, Department of Biology, University of Illinois at Springfield, Springfield, IL 62703.