Wolfgang Smith - Teilhardism And The New Religion: A Thorough Analysis of the Teachings of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Teilhardism and
the New Religion

A Thorough Analysis
of the Teachings of
Pierre Teilhard de
Chardin

Wolfgang Smith

Copyright 1988 by Wolfgang Smith.

Library of Congress Catalog Card No.: 87-50749

ISBN: 0-89555-315-5

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Brief quotations may be excerpted without permission for inclusion in a review.

TAN Books
Charlotte, North Carolina
www.TANBooks.com

1988

To the Blessed Virgin Mary,
Mother of God,
and Unfailing Help of Christians

"My people have been a lost flock, their shepherds have caused them to go astray, and have made them wander in the mountains: they have gone from mountain to hill, they have forgotten their resting place."

Jeremias 50:6

Contents

About Teilhard de Chardin

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was born on May 1, 1881, at Sarcenat, near Orcines, Puy-de-Dme, in south-central France. His father was a gentleman farmer with an interest in geology, and his mother a descendant of Voltaire. Teilhard was educated at the Jesuit Collge at Mongr, and joined the Society of Jesus in 1899. He studied philosophy and continued his seminary education from 1901 to 1905 at the Jesuit house on the Isle of Jersey. This was followed by a three-year sojourn in Cairo, Egypt, where he taught physics and chemistry at a Jesuit school and developed his paleontological interests. Teilhard returned to England in 1908, studied theology at Hastings, and was ordained in 1911. He subsequently returned to Paris and devoted himself to the study of paleontology at the Museum of Paris under the direction of Marcellin Boule, a noted authority of the time. These studies were interrupted by the outbreak of World War I. Refusing to serve as an army chaplain, Teilhard joined the French forces as a stretcher bearer. In recognition of his bravery he was subsequently decorated and received into the Legion of Honor.

Teilhard continued his paleontological studies after the war, and took a doctorate in 1922 from the Sorbonne. For a brief period he taught geology at the Catholic Institute in Paris. His less-than-orthodox theological opinions, however, especially with reference to Original Sin, led to the termination of this employment and his d facto exile to China. Thus, in 1923, Teilhard came to Tientsin, where he took up research as an assistant to the Jesuit paleontologist mile Licent. He subsequently collaborated in the excavations at Choukoutien which led to the discovery of the so-called Sinanthropus ("Peking Man"), supposedly a "missing link" in the evolution of man from subhuman ancestors. And although this presumed discovery was later challenged (if not indeed disproved), it caused Teilhard to become widely looked upon as a paleontologist of note. His reputation was further enhanced in 1931 when, together with the well-known Abbe Henri Breuil, he supposedly established that Sinanthropus had known the use of fire and primitive tools.

During World War II Teilhard continued his activities in Peking, where on account of the Japanese occupation he lived in virtual captivity. He returned to France in 1946 and tried unsuccessfully to gain permission from the Church for the publication of his philosophical writings and to secure a teaching post at the Collge de France. Unpublished copies of his numerous writings were widely circulated, however, and commenced to arouse great admiration and enthusiasm in Catholic circles, beginning with high-placed members of the Jesuit order. In 1952 Teilhard accepted a position with the Wenner Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research in New York. He died in that city on Easter Sunday, 1955.

Preface

Charles Darwin would have been greatly surprised to see his atheistically slanted doctrine turned into a religious creed, a self-styled ultra-Christianity, no less, hailed and embraced by men of the cloth. Yet as we know, this unlikely turn of events did come to pass in our day, thanks to Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, the once-exiled Jesuit of posthumous fame who introduced the world to Point Omega, the "God of Evolution," and forged what purports to be a kind of scientific theology.

For many years, it will be recalled, the prophet of theistic Darwinism was silenced under orders from Rome. Yet all the while he wrote prodigiously, and communicated his thought to an ever-widening circle of admiring and influential friends. And when at last he emerged from the underground, the moment was opportune. The stage had been set, and it appears that a goodly portion of the believing and unbelieving world was ready and most willing to receive his message. And the doctrine did spread like wildfire, especially within the Roman Catholic Church. It struck on the eve of the Second Vatican Council, with an impact that could be felt around the world. Translated before long into twenty-seven languages, the posthumous treatises of the controversial Jesuit have exerted an inestimable influence.

Today, of course, the rage has abated. The picture has changed: by now Teilhard's ideas (which in the sixties had appeared so revolutionary) have become almost commonplace, and in their essentials seem to be accepted in many quarters as an unquestionable truth. And it is plain that the fashionable theologies of our day are in fact rooted in the Teilhardian Weltanschauung, and that the New Christianity, in its multiple forms, owes a lasting debt to the priestly scientist, who in the eyes of many was its martyr and prophet.

Our concern, however, is not with the person of Teilhard de Chardin, nor with the history of his influence, but purely and simply with the fundamental ideas of his doctrine, and particularly with the question of their validity. And herein lies the weakness of those numerous writings, not a few of which were penned by intimates and sympathizers of the French savant: the fact is that despite the extensive literature on Teilhard produced in the sixties, and notwithstanding recent studies (more than ten have been published in the U.S. since 1980), there exists as yet no definitive critique, no cogent and comprehensive treatise, which dispels rather than perpetuates Teilhardian fictions.

We wish to emphasize, however, that the present work is intended, not just as a critique of a particular thinker, but primarily as a contemporary exposition of perennial truth. It views questions in the light of the metaphysical traditions, and seeks to promote a deeper understanding of orthodox Christian doctrine. The problematic of the Teilhardian system serves mainly as a point of departure for the application of universal principles to a number of basic and vital issues, such as the status of Darwinism, the so-called mind-body problem, and the meaning of history. In a way, the present book follows along the lines of the ancient "adversus" treatises, wherein polemic and didactic are intertwined. From start to finish we have been motivated and spurred in our endeavor by one paramount concern: to safeguard and render intelligible a living legacy which is incomparably more than a mere philosophical system or formal doctrine.

Acknowledgments

The author and publisher gratefully acknowledge permission to reprint excerpts from the following material:

Activation of Energy by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, copyright 1963 by Editions du Seuil; English translation copyright 1970 by William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd., London. Reprinted by permission of Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc.

Christianity and Evolution