Ahead of the anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birth, a new page paying tribute to the ‘forgotten’ church work of Charles Darwin in his local parish of Downe, Kent, has been published on the Church of England’s website, at www.cofe.anglican.org/darwin/downe.html.The Church hopes that the page will illustrate how science and the work of the Church can combine together.
The page ‘Darwin at Downe' is one of a number of pages on the website celebrating the naturalist’s significant scientific progress, marking the bicentenary of his birth, and anticipating the 150th anniversary of the publication of the ground-breaking text ‘On the Origin of Species’, in November.
It lists how Darwin supervised church and school finances, founded a Friendly Club and served as its treasurer for 30 years, ran the local Coal and Clothing Fund savings club for 21 years, and built up a close friendship with parish priest the Rev John Brodie Innes - who once wrote: “I never saw a word in his writings which was an attack on Religion. He follows his own course as a Naturalist and leaves Moses to take care of himself.”
The new page concludes that, whilst Darwin lost his own personal Christian faith, he did not become anti-church or anti-religious, and his valuable contributions to the world extended beyond his scientific writings into the local parish in which he lived and served for 40 years.
It quotes ‘A History of Darwin’s Parish’ (1933), by OJR Howarth and Eleanor K Howarth: “If his own thoughts led him away from the doctrines of the established church, he did not cease to second its social activities in Downe.”
The Rt Rev Dr Lee Rayfield, Bishop of Swindon, a former biological scientist, commented: “This bicentenary is providing a much needed opportunity to gather a more rounded appreciation of Charles Darwin, his life and his work. I hope these pages will assist broader reflection on the relationship between religious conviction and scientific endeavour in ways which will be creative for our own time.”
‘Darwin at Downe’ is accompanied at www.cofe.anglican.org/darwin by the pages ‘A Brief History of Darwin’, ‘Darwin and the Church’, ‘Darwin and Faith’, and the essay ‘Good Religion Needs Good Science’ by the Rev Dr Malcolm Brown, Director of Mission and Public Affairs.
In ‘Good Religion Needs Good Science’, Dr Malcolm Brown says that initial reactions from the Church to Darwin’s theories were “misjudged” and writes: “Christian theologians throughout the centuries have sought knowledge of the world and knowledge of God. For Thomas Aquinas there was no such thing as science versus religion; both existed in the same sphere and to the same end, the glory of God.”
‘Darwin and the Church’ explains how Darwin was influenced by the Church his entire life: he was educated at a Church school, trained to be a priest before becoming a naturalist, married a devout Anglican, his cousin Emma Wedgwood, and was buried at Westminster Abbey.
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(Source: RI)