Science and the Catholic Church

Tanya Lewis of LiveScience has penned a short refresher on the history of the Catholic church's relationship with science.  She reminds us that it's relationship with evolution has been a rocky one, writing:

The church's views on evolution have themselves evolved over the years. For the first hundred years or so after Charles Darwin first put forth his theory, the church took no formal stance on evolution, though some church figures rejected it. As late as the 1950s, the church maintained a neutral position on the subject, but by the end of the 20th century the Catholic Church showed general acceptance of 'theistic evolution,' which states that God created a universe where cosmic and biological evolution occurred.

"The theory has been progressively accepted by researchers, following a series of discoveries in various fields of knowledge," former pope John Paul II said in a speech to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences at the Vatican in October 1996.

It is known that Pope Benedict's views on evolution seemed to be in flux during his pontificate. There has been no word about what the views of Pope Francis I are in this matter. I will see if I can find any writings.