ABSTRACT
Science-engaged theology has recently emerged as an influential new research program in which theologians engage directly with the practices, theories, and conclusions of empirical science on the basis that this might “enhance our understanding of key concepts in theology and the philosophy of religion and may in some cases enable us to evaluate, revise, and improve claims about spiritual topics”. Evolution is the biological mechanism that produces the diversity of all life on Earth. Charles Darwin, whose evolutionary theories remain foundational to the modern biological sciences, proposed that natural selection is the mechanism that gives rise over time to the immense diversity of life in the natural world. On his account of natural selection, there are variations between the individuals of any species; these variations are heritable and affect the individual’s chances of survival and reproduction. For Bonaventure, the universe is a “vast society of diverse beings”.
