Apologizing to Darwin

From the First Things blog: Reuters brings us the latest in the ongoing quest to conflate the news so readers don’t have to:

“Evolution fine but no apology to Darwin: Vatican”

The Vatican said on Tuesday the theory of evolution was compatible with the Bible but planned no posthumous apology to Charles Darwin for the cold reception it gave him 150 years ago.

Wait a second. Why is the Church expected to apologize to Darwin in the first place? According to the very same news article,

Pope Pius XII described evolution as a valid scientific approach to the development of humans in 1950 and Pope John Paul reiterated that in 1996. . . . Darwin’s theories were “never condemned by the Catholic Church nor was his book ever banned”. . . .

Creationism is the belief that God created the world in six days as described in the Bible. The Catholic Church does not read the Genesis account of creation literally, saying it is an allegory for the way God created the world.

Christian churches were long hostile to Darwin because his theory conflicted with the literal biblical account of creation.

Earlier this week a leading Anglican churchman, Rev. Malcolm Brown, said the Church of England owed Darwin an apology for the way his ideas were received by Anglicans in Britain.

Let me get things straight: Other Christian churches understand the creation story literally. An Anglican in Britain hopes his church apologizes for not adopting evolution from the start. Sounds like the Vatican has some explaining to do.

Another commentary on the state of "religious" reporting: the capabilities of "religion" reporters.