Catholic Church On Adam And Eve
What does the Catholic Church’s teach about Adam and Eve? Were they myths or real?
I had a theology professor who told me that Adam and Eve were simply misconceptions, and that the rest of Genesis was all just myths … is that exactly what the Church teaches?
Absolutely not! The Church has actually always instructed that Adam and Eve were genuine people and were the first human beings from whom all other human beings are descended. In 1950, Pope Pius XII, in Paragraph 37 of an encyclical entitled Humani Generis, states, “… the faithful can not accept that viewpoint which preserves either that after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin with natural generation from [Adam] as from the first parent of all, or that Adam stands for a certain lot of first moms and dads.” In other words, the Church teaches that all humanity descended from Adam and Eve. They had to be genuine for that to take place.
Paragraph # 38, states: “This [encyclical], in fact, clearly mentions that the first l l chapters of Genesis … do nevertheless concern history in a true sense …” Again, Adam and Eve are not misconceptions, and the rest of Genesis is not legend. They are history in a “real sense.”.
Paragraph # 39: “Therefore, whatever of the preferred narrations have been placed into the Sacred Scriptures must in no way be considered on a par with misconceptions or various other such things …” Can it be specified any clearer than that?
And listen to what the Catechism states, Paragraph # 375, “The Church … instructs that our first parents, Adam and Eve …” No mention of a myth here.
Paragraph # 404: “By yielding to the tempter, Adam and Eve dedicated a personal sin. Someone please tell me, how do misconceptions dedicate individual sins?
Adam and Eve are not myths. Genesis does not include misconception or legend. That is Church teaching. Challenge anybody, who instructs differently, to produce their sources from a magisterial paper. They can not do it. They can, nevertheless, produce numerous books and posts by “theologians”. Not good enough.
