Pope considers evolution at seminar

CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy, Sept. 2 (UPI) -- Pope Benedict XVI is spending the weekend outside Rome in an extended seminar on evolution with some of his former students.

The gathering at Castel Gandolfo, the pope's country home in Italy, includes speakers from both sides of the issue, the New York Times reports. That has some worried that the pope will get the Roman Catholic Church into another battle with science over evolution.

Benedict has been holding these annual get-togethers with his former graduate students for years. But in the past, even when as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger he was one of the church's leaders on doctrine, he was not the church's supreme authority on Earth.

The debate also comes at a sensitive time, when proponents of evolution and intelligent design are waging court battles in the United States.

The Rev. Joseph Fessio, a U.S. priest who planned to be at the meeting, told the Times that he thought the pope would avoid any endorsement of intelligent design or Biblical literalism. He believes that the pope is more concerned with those who believe that accepting evolution is incompatible with belief in God.