Deny geocentricism - deny the Virgin Birth

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‘The condemnation of Galileo in 1633 is one of the most embarrassing episodes of Catholic history. Galileo’s further proofs and calculations appeared to treat Copernicus’ findings with more credence than a mere hypothesis…The Galileo affair is still a stick for the Church’s critics to beat it with. The Church’s methods and conclusions were shameful. The whole affair remains a warning for those who put rigid dogmas before humility.’

Noting first the propaganda of centuries, let us now continue the story in the light of truth. ‘Galileo returned to Florence [1616] discouraged but not defeated’ writes J.J. Langford in the 1967 New Catholic Encyclopaedia. Galileo, as usual, is attributed the persistence of a saint in the face of persecution, and the teaching Church is treated as though Galileo had a moral right to reject and defy it. In Galileo Cremonini had a champion, a bulldog so proud and arrogant that he would never let go of his mission, not until he was dead, and then he would do his work from the grave. From all over Europe Galileo began to get letters and visits of support, even from within the Church itself, and if we are to abide with the Church’s teaching, potential heretics all.

With the appearance of three comets around 1618, the debate moved over to their nature and place. In response, one of the senior Jesuits of the Collegio Romano, Horatio Grassi, published an opinion similar to that of Tycho de Brahe, that comets were solid bodies independent of the sphere of earth, sun and planets. Inevitably, Galileo was asked to comment, and true to form went on to attack Tycho’s deduction. In return, but using the name Sarsi, Fr Grassi responded by questioning Galileo’s ability to interpret appearances properly.

On 28 Feb. 1619, the Congregation of the Index condemned and prohibited Kepler’s Epitome of Copernican Astronomy published in 1618. Then a new Index appeared in which not only books by Copernicus, de Zúñiga, Kepler and Foscarini were banned but ‘all books that teach the motion of the earth and the immobility of the sun.’

In 1620, a monitum was issued by the Holy Congregation of the Index laying out ‘corrections’ they wanted in Copernicus’s De Revolutionibus before it could receive an imprimatur. It seems Osiander’s preface was no longer considered enough to allow it to be read by Catholics.

Given the subject of comets had no doctrinal strings attached, Galileo felt safe in responding with a new book The Assayer, published in August 1623 by the Academia Lincei and which sold out immediately. The Academy, by placing the Pope’s coat-of-arms on the frontispiece of the book and by dedicating it to Urban VIII - a Florentine, an intellectual with a brilliant mind and an old friend of Galileo’s - hoped to gain his goodwill and support. The main purpose of The Assayer - a brilliant piece of prose, satire and sarcasm by all accounts, enjoyed even by the Pope himself - was to try to undermine the expertise of the Jesuit astronomers. What historians and authors fail to emphasise however, is that Galileo’s arrogance was based upon the error that comets are near-earth phenomena caused by some sort of light refraction. It seems it was the Jesuits who got it correct this time, and Fr Grassi was proven correct, Galileo could not always interpret the appearance correctly.

Meanwhile the Lincean Academy went about trying to improve its status. In September 1623, the Academy elected Francesco Barberini, the twenty-six-year-old nephew of Pope Urban VIII to their ranks. A few days later he was made a cardinal and the Lynceans had themselves a cardinal member.

 

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The Dialogue Banned

It had been late spring 1632 before the Dialogue reached the authorities at Rome. Pope Urban now saw in Galileo a man who, although given warning not to postulate the Copernican heresy as a truth, was once again touting it to the world. As pope, Urban VIII’s first duty was of course to defend the Church, not seek revenge; as many suggested later for his actions against Galileo. Towards the end of the summer His Holiness ordered a special commission to examine the work and draw up a report of the circumstances under which the imprimatur was obtained. This body returned a corpus delicti of eight points. The immediate result of this was an injunction to stop the Dialogue and to sequestrate all obtainable copies. Then, on the 23rd September 1632, a letter was sent by the Pope’s command to the Inquisitor-General of Florence, bidding him serve Galileo with a summons to present himself before the Commissary of the Holy Office in Rome some day during the ensuing month to explain himself.
On the first day of October 1632, Galileo acknowledged the execution of this order and promised obedience. At the same time he did not mean to go if he could avoid it. A week later he wrote to Cardinal Barberini expressing his surprise that his ‘enemies’ had been able to persuade the authorities in Rome his work should be suppressed and complained of the great hurt he felt at being summoned there as though he had committed some grave fault. In all his writings, he claimed, he had ever kept the interests of the Church steadily in view; and though he would rather die than disobey, he trusted that his great age, the state of his health, and what he must suffer in a journey to Rome might be considered sufficient reasons for the congregation to grant him at least a reprieve. Francesco Niccolini, the Florentine ambassador, not without misgivings and mainly in deference to Fr Castelli’s advice, presented the letter to the Cardinal. In writing back to Galileo on the subject, Barberini points out the necessity of absolute submission, and that he must not think of defending his opinion, but must be prepared to make any retraction the Holy Office chose to demand.
In the meantime the ambassador left no stone unturned to get the order rescinded. It was however, all in vain. Ginetti, one of the cardinals, and Monsignor Boccabella, the Assessor of the Holy Office, listened to his representations but said nothing. He then tried to soften the Pope. ‘I went this morning,’ he writes in a dispatch dated the 13th of November, ‘into all the circumstances of the case with his Holiness, and tried to stir up his compassion for the poor old man Galileo. I asked him if he had seen his letter to Cardinal Barberini. The Pope said that he had, but could not dispense with his coming to Rome. Niccolini hinted that he might die on the road. ‘He may come slowly,’ said the Pope, ‘in a litter, and have anything he pleases to lessen the discomforts of the journey; but he must be examined here in person; and God forgive him for having got into such a scrape after I, when cardinal, had extricated him on a former occasion.’
On the 20th November 1632, the Inquisitor at Florence wrote to say that he had again cited Galileo before him and that he had now expressed his willingness to obey, but pleaded his age, his bodily ailments, that he was then under medical treatment, and so forth. He had exacted from him a promise, in the presence of witnesses, to start at the end of the month, ‘non so poi se L’eseguira.’ ‘If he does not,’ his Holiness replied, ‘he must be made to do so.’ But on the 18th of December the Inquisitor notified that his vicar, on visiting Galileo, had found him confined to his bed, declaring himself quite incapable of undertaking the journey to Rome in his then state of health. A certificate was forwarded, signed by three of the most eminent medical men in Florence to the effect that Galileo was suffering from hernia, and could not be moved without peril to his life. But his Holiness and the congregation were incredulous, and returned on the 30th Dec. the famous letter with stringent orders that Galileo had better come to Rome. Galileo’s friends begged him to start at once. On the 2Oth January 1633, he managed to get well enough to begin the journey in one of the Grand Duke’s litters. On the 13th February Galileo reached Rome; and on the next day he paid his visit to the Commissary of the Holy Office.
Fr Roberts writes: ‘It has been contended that the Pope was under an impression that Galileo meant to hold him up to ridicule in the Dialogo, and that mortified vanity prompted his conduct. But the evidence does not warrant this charge. What Urban did fully agrees with what he said - that he was taking up the case on purely public grounds, from a conviction that the interests of religion and the faith were at stake; and sorry as he was to pain an old friend, and one standing so high in the favour of the Grand Duke, he could not do less than prohibit the doctrine of the Dialogo and make an example of the author.’

 

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The Special Commission

Because of his position as ‘the Pope’s official scientist’ and his high standing within the state of Florence, Galileo was not like other men who came under the investigation of the sacred tribunal, for Pope Urban VIII himself directed the affair at all times. Had all the copies of Dialogue been successfully seized, some compromise might have been possible, but by the time the authorities acted a thousand copies of the book had been well distributed throughout Europe. To handle such a sensitive case the Pope ordered his nephew, Cardinal Francesco Barberini, to set up a special commission to investigate the matter. ‘Such an extraordinary commission could be justified only in cases of exceptional gravity, but above all in cases of a difficult theological nature,’ says the historian Pietro Redondi. In his book, Redondi, failing to see the seriousness of the heliocentric heresy, but aware of the significance of a special commission, proposes a theory that Galileo’s crime was the threat ‘atomism’ presented to the dogma of transubstantiation. The facts are however, that the subject under examination was that of the doctrine of the earth’s movement and the sun’s immobility - all historians agree to that.

‘Our commission, too, was motivated by very serious concerns of a theological nature, for the pope reveals its existence to the Florentine Ambassador Niccolini on Sept 4, 1632, he will justify his decision by saying that “it was a matter of the most perverse material that one could ever have in one’s hands… doctrine perverse to an extreme degree.” ’

The special commission set up to investigate and examine Galileo was made up of three of the most eminent theologians of the time. The first was Pope Urban VIII’s personal theologian, Monsignor Agostino Oreggi, an ex-pupil of Cardinal Bellarmine’s and a consultant to the Inquisition or Holy Office. The second investigator was also chosen because he too was ‘a pope’s man’, Fr Zaccaria Pasqualigo, a brilliant professor of theology. The third commissioner chosen was a Jesuit, Fr Melchoir Inchofer S.J., Professor of Theology at the Spanish University at Messina who was not only a theologian but had a fair knowledge of astronomy and mathematics as a reading of the Dialogue demanded.

Ambassador Niccolini, who had been very active trying to save Galileo throughout the summer of 1632, requested an audience with the Pope. On Sept. 4th he was granted a meeting at which he presented a letter of protest against the makeup of the special commission. The Pope became very angry with this request saying that ‘Galileo had dared enter where he should not, into the most grave and dangerous subjects that one could possibly raise at this moment.’ He added that those theologians would examine ‘every word’ of the book. Insisting Galileo was still his friend, Pope Urban VIII said there would be a trial ‘in the interests of faith and religion,’ because the matter was ‘troublesome and dangerous, far more serious than His Highness believes.’ Ordering the Ambassador to secrecy, the Pope told him to ‘try to be a bit alert, and I should immediately explain to His Highness that Signor Galileo, under cover of his school for young men, should not impress on them troublesome and dangerous opinions.’ Pope Urban VIII also communicated with Ambassador Niccolini through his private secretary Pietro Benessi, telling him that it was impossible to avoid an official trial due to the damning evidence in the Dialogue. It was, the Pope said, a matter that ‘put Christianity in danger.’ The seriousness with which the Pope viewed the matter is evident. Later, during an audience on March 13, 1633, Urban VIII reiterated to the Ambassador that Galileo must be put on trial for these ‘new and dangerous doctrines’. What the Pope made clear was that this was a case of serious heretical subversion, ‘which’ he repeated once again, ‘put Christianity in danger.’

 

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The commission met in secret five times. Once it completed its investigation it submitted the findings directly to the Holy Office. Satisfied that the 1616 decree was safe, three points were made:

1. Galileo had transgressed orders in deviating from the permitted hypothetical standpoint by maintaining decidedly that the earth moves and that the sun is stationary:
2. He had erroneously ascribed the phenomena of the tides to the stability of the sun and the motion of the earth, which is not true:
3. He had been deceitfully silent about the command laid upon him in 1616, viz., to relinquish altogether the opinion that the sun is the centre of the world and immovable and that the earth moves, nor henceforth to hold, teach, or defend it in any way whatsoever, verbally or in writing.

There then followed the remark ‘it now remains to be considered what proceedings are to be taken against the person of the author, and against his printed book.’ The rest of the submission was taken up with an elaboration of the charges against Galileo and a fuller account of the negotiations for the imprimatur.

 

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The 1633 Trial

On April 12, 1633, Galileo appeared before the Commissary-General of the Inquisition for the first time.

‘Every one admits that Galileo during his trial was treated with unusual indulgence; and his sentence was a much lighter one than he had reason to expect. Let us look at things from the standpoint of the court. It assumed; we must bear in mind, that the doctrinal question had been settled, and that the decision of 1616 was absolute. The issues before it were these two, - had Galileo wilfully transgressed the order he was under, not to treat of Copernicanism in any manner? Did he hold, and had he written advisedly in favour of that condemned opinion? If so, according to the ruling of the court, his crime was heresy.
Galileo’s answer on the first count was that he had completely forgotten the order contained the words “teach in any manner.” And to render this statement credible he produced Bellarmine’s record of the order without the words. He had taken, he said, that certificate as a complete account of the transaction it referred to. Nor had it occurred to him to tax his memory on the subject. Further, since it was obvious that the judgement notified to him was one and the same thing with the declaration of the Index, he had not supposed himself to be under any special restriction, and had not thought it necessary to mention the order when he applied for the imprimatur.
With regard to the second point he absolutely denied that he had meant the Dialogo to be a defence of Copernicanism. He granted that vainglory, and the desire men have to show off their cleverness in arguing even for propositions they allow to be false, had led him to give an appearance of strength to the Copernican side; but his real intent had been to show the inconclusiveness of the argument for the theory. And he begged the court to allow him to add a dialogue to the work, to make the thing quite unmistakable. But the evidence was dead against him. And we cannot wonder that the three consulters of the Holy Office, Orogius, Inchofer and Pasqualigus protested against his defence, and declared their conviction that the accused had held, defended, and taught, the theory of the earth’s motion. It remained for the Pope to determine what should be done. He must have been morally sure that Galileo had not spoken the truth and had it been his object to crush the man, he might, I take it, have condemned him for heresy on the data he had. Instead of doing this, he decreed as follows:
Galileo was to be questioned about his intention. He was to be threatened with the torture. If he stood the threat, he was to be condemned, after making the abjuration “de vehementi” in a full assembly of the Holy 0ffice, to imprisonment during the pleasure of the Sacred Congregation. An injunction was to be laid on him never again to treat of the heliocentric theory, for and against, by word of mouth or in writing, under pain of being dealt with as a relapsed heretic. The Dialogo was to be prohibited. And that all might know those things, his Holiness commanded the Congregation to send copies of the sentence to all the nuncios Apostolic, to all the Inquisitors of heretical pravity and expressly to the Inquisitor of Florence, who was to summon a number of mathematical professors to hear it read publicly.
Accordingly, on the 21st of June 1633, Galileo underwent a final examination with respect to his intention in writing the Dialogo. He was asked to say whether he held or had held, and since when, that the sun is in the centre of the universe, and that the earth is not the centre, but moves, and with a diurnal movement. He replied that before the determination of the Congregation of the Index, and until he received an order to the contrary, he had suspended his judgement on the matter, and had thought it an open question whether the truth lay with Ptolemy or Copernicus, there being no reason in the nature of things why either might not be right. But when his superiors decided the point, he ceased to doubt, and held, and continued to hold, the opinion of Ptolemy, that the earth is fixed, and that the sun moves.
The Congregation submitted that his having written the Dialogo was inconsistent with this statement, and urged him to speak the truth. He said that his object in writing the Dialogo was to exhibit the astronomical and physical arguments that might be advanced on both sides of the controversy; and to show that, as reason could not settle the question, recourse must be had to a higher teaching – “alla determinatione di piu sublimi dettrine.” He concluded by again asserting that he did not hold the condemned opinion, and had not held it since its condemnation. He was then warned that the presumption was so strong against him, that if he did not confess, the court must have recourse to the remedies the law provided for such cases. He repeated his assertion that he had not held the opinion of Copernicus since he had been ordered to give it up: “I am in your hands, and you must do what you think fit. He was then told, in plain terms, that if he did not speak the truth, he would be put to the torture. “I am here,” he said: “to obey. I have not held that opinion since the decision against it.”
The Congregation, having so far carried out the Pope’s orders, dismissed him to his place: The next day he was summoned to the convent of the Minerva; and there, in the presence of the Cardinals and prelates of the Holy Office, the sentence was pronounced:’

 

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The Inquisition’s Sentence

Fr Roberts continues the story:

‘… “And to the end,” said the document, “that so pernicious a doctrine might be altogether taken away, and spread no further to the heavy detriment of Catholic truth, a decree emanated from the Sacred Congregation of the Index [in 1616], in which books that treat of doctrine of the kind were prohibited, and that doctrine was declared false, and altogether contrary to the sacred and divine Scripture.”
And observe in what emphatic and unmistakable terms Rome repudiated the notion that the decree might be interpreted as a practical direction, as a measure of caution for the time being, or as anything short of an absolute settlement of the question.
“Understanding,” the Congregation said, “that, through the publication of a work at Florence entitled Dialogo di Galileo Galilei delle due massime Sisteme del Mundo Ptolemaico e Copernicano, the false opinion of the motion of the earth and the stability of the sun was gaining ground, it had examined the book, and had found it to be a manifest infringement of the injunction laid on you, since you in the same book have defended an opinion already condemned, and declared to your face to be so, in that you have tried in the said book, by various devices, to persuade yourself that you leave the matter undetermined, and the opinion expressed as probable; the which, however, is a most grave error, since an opinion can in no manner be probable which has been declared, and defined to be, contrary to the divine Scripture.”
Thus the declaration of the Index, for which all the authority of an absolutely true decision was claimed, was identified with the condemnatory judgement made known to Galileo by a Congregation held in the Pope’s presence. This was significant enough; but mark what followed.
“And when a convenient time had been assigned you for your defence, you produced the following certificate in the handwriting of the most eminent Lord Cardinal Bellarmine [Here the Commission quotes Bellarmine’s letter]:

‘We, Robert Cardinal Bellarmine, …declare that the said Signor Galileo Galilei has not abjured, … but only the declaration made by the Holy Father, and published by the Sacred Congregation of the Index, has been intimated to him, …-that the earth moves round the sun, and that the sun is stationary in the centre of the world, and does not move from east to west- is contrary to the Holy Scriptures, and therefore cannot be defended or held.’

… procured, as you said, to protect you from the calumnies of your enemies, who had put it about that you had abjured, and had been punished by the Holy Office; in which certificate it is affirmed that you had not abjured, had not been punished, but only that the declaration made by our Lord the Pope, and promulgated by the Sacred Congregation of the Index; had been announced to you the tenor whereof is, that the doctrine of the motion of the earth, and of the fixity of the sun, is contrary to the Sacred Scriptures, and therefore can neither be defended, nor held. “But this very certificate produced in your defence has rather aggravated the charge against you; for it asserts that the above-mentioned opinion is contrary to Holy Scripture: yet you dared to treat of it, to defend it, and advance it as probable.” Here, then, the Congregation plainly made it known that the decision of the Index was Papal. But Papal in what sense? In a sense, according to what had been said above, to make it a most grave error to suppose that the opinion condemned thereby could in any manner be probable. In a sense, according to the sentence that followed, to justify its being classed with those declarations and definitions, the conclusiveness of which it would be heresy to deny. Papal in such a way that a Catholic might be compelled to yield its doctrine the assent of faith.
“Invoking, then, the most holy Name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and that of His most glorious Mother Mary ever Virgin, by this our definitive sentence we say, pronounce, judge, and declare, that you, the said Galileo, on account of these things proved against you by documentary evidence, and which have been confessed by you as aforesaid, have rendered yourself to this Holy Office vehemently suspected of heresy, that is, of having believed and held a doctrine which is false and contrary to the sacred and divine Scriptures -to wit, that the sun is in the centre of the world, and that it does not move from east to west, and that the earth moves, and is not the centre of the universe; and that an opinion can be held and defended as probable after it has been declared and defined to be contrary to Holy Scripture. And consequently that you have incurred all the censures and penalties decreed and promulgated by the sacred canons and other constitutions, general and particular, against delinquents of this class. From which it is our pleasure that you should be absolved, provided that, with a pure heart and faith unfeigned, you in our presence first abjure, curse, and detest, the above-named errors and heresies, and every other error and heresy contrary to the Catholic and Apostolic Roman Church, according to the formula which we shall show you.
“And that this your grave and pernicious error, and transgression remain not altogether unpunished, and that you may be the more cautious for the future, and be an example to others to abstain from offences of this sort, we decree that the book of the Dialogues of Galileo Galilei be prohibited by public edict; and you we condemn to the prison of this Holy Office during our will and pleasure; and, as a salutary penance, we command you for three years, to recite once a week, the seven Penitential Psalms; reserving to ourselves the power of moderating, commuting; or taking away altogether, or in part, the above-mentioned penalties and penances.” ’

 

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Galileo’s Abjuration

 “I, Galileo Galilei, son of the late Vincenzio Galilei of Florence, aged seventy years, appearing personally before this court, and kneeing before you, the most eminent and reverend Lord Cardinals, Inquisitors-General of the universal Christian Republic against heretical pravity, having before my eyes the most holy Gospels, and touching them with my hands, swear that I always have believed, and now believe, and with God’s help will always believe, all that the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Roman Church holds, preaches, and teaches. But because, after this Holy Office had juridically enjoined me to abandon altogether the false opinion which holds that the sun is in the centre of the world, and immovable, and that the earth is not the centre, and moves; and had forbidden me to hold, defend, or teach in any manner, the said false doctrine; and after it had been notified to me that the said doctrine is repugnant to Holy Scripture, I wrote and caused to be printed a book, wherein I treat of the same doctrine already condemned, and adduced arguments with great efficacy in favour of it, without offering any solution of them; therefore I am judged vehemently suspected of heresy, that is, of having held and believed that the sun is the centre of the world and immovable, and that the earth is not the centre, and moves. Wherefore, desiring to remove from the minds of your Eminences, and all Catholic Christians, this vehement suspicion legitimately conceived against me, with a sincere heart and faith unfeigned, I abjure, curse, and detest, the above named errors, and heresies, and generally every other error and sect contrary to the above-mentioned Holy Church; and I swear for the future, I will neither say, nor assert by word of mouth, or in writing, anything to bring upon me similar suspicion. And if I shall know any heretic, or one suspected of heresy, I will denounce him to this Holy Office, or to the Inquisitor, or Ordinary of the place in which I may be. Moreover I swear, and promise, to fulfil, and observe entirely, all the penances that have been or shall be imposed on me by this Holy Office. And if -which God forbid- I act against any of these said promises, protestations, and oaths, I subject myself to all the penalties and punishments which the sacred canons, and other constitutions, general and particular, have enacted, and promulgated against such delinquents.  So help me God, and His holy Gospels, which I touch with my hands.
 “I, Galileo Galilei above-named, have abjured, sworn, promised, and bound myself as above; in token whereof I have signed with my own hand this formula of my abjuration, and have recited it word by word.”

Thus did Rome’s supreme Pontifical Congregation, established, to use the words of Sixtus V., “tanquam firmissimum Catholicae fidei propugnaculum . . . cui ob summam rei gravitatem Romanus Pontifex praesidere solet,” known to be acting under the Pope’s orders, announce to the Catholic world that it had been ruled that the Papal declaration of 1616 was to be received, not as a fallible utterance, but as an absolute sentence and abjuration with the following message:

“To your vicars, that you and all professors of philosophy and mathematics may have knowledge of it, that they may know why we proceeded against the said Galileo, and recognise the gravity of the error in order that they may avoid it, and thus not incur the penalties which they would have to suffer in case they fell into the same.” ’

This was accomplished, and in many cases the professors of mathematics, physics, and astronomy were assembled like their students at roll call and the trial documents read to them. Theologians and scholars were then urged to use their learning to show Copernicanism to be a serious heresy. Soon Europe was flooded with these critiques. Often, however, such publications ventured into the realm of science and foolish reasoning. It seems some missed the point and considered the objective was to defend the scientific integrity of geocentricity rather than its theological certainty. Throughout Europe however, there were theologians who were relieved with the ban. Andrew White records that the Rector of the University of Douay, referring to the opinion of Galileo, wrote to the papal nuncio at Brussels; ‘The professors of our university are so opposed to this fanatical opinion that they have always held that it must be banished from the schools. In our English college at Douay this paradox has never been approved and never will be.’

‘Throughout the proceedings Galileo had been treated with great consideration and courtesy. Against all precedent he was not confined to the dungeons of the Inquisition but was allowed to stay as the Tuscan Ambassador’s guest at the villa Medici until after his first examination. Then he had to surrender formally to the Inquisition, but instead of being put into a cell, he was assigned a five-roomed flat in the Holy Office itself, overlooking St Peter’s and the Vatican gardens, with his personal valet and Niccolini’s major domo to look after his food and wine. Here he stayed from 12 April to the third examination on 10 May. Then, before his trial was concluded, he was allowed to return to the Tuscan Embassy, a procedure quite unheard of, not only in the annals of the Inquisition but of any judiciary. Contrary to legend, Galileo never spent a day of his life in a prison cell.’

 

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Today the legend depicts Galileo in prison, defending his so-called proofs for a heliocentric world before a cruel, scientifically and theologically ignorant, unjust and heartless Inquisition. The truth however, shows Galileo was guilty as charged. It shows he lied through his teeth as he perjured himself, and that had Pope Urban VIII and the Inquisition wanted to totally destroy him they could have done so. Instead they showed Christian mercy and left his reputation as a famous scientist intact.
After the trial and abjuration Galileo was eventually permitted to return home to his country estate at Arcetri and then on to his house near Florence, where he was confined under house arrest for the rest of his life. His penance, the recitation of the allotted Psalms, was transferred to his daughter Sister Marie Celeste, the Carmelite nun he had placed in a convent many years before, and who now gladly took upon herself her father’s penance. Galileo continued his study of dynamics, even publishing a new work Discourses Concerning Two New Sciences in 1636. What he never postulated publicly again, only in private conversation and letter, was the forbidden heresy, Copernicanism.
Galileo was not the only one to suffer the consequences of their beliefs and actions in the wake of Urban VIII’s purge of Copernicanism. Fr Castelli, Galileo’s devotee, was banished. So too was Fr Riccardi, the Master of the Sacred Palace, as well as Fr Ciampoli, the papal secretary, for their failings in the affair. Redondi names others ‘displeasing to the regime’ who for one reason or another had their careers cut short and were removed from office. These included Fathers Grassi, Ridolfi, di Guevara, Pallavicino and others who had important positions at the time. Galileo also lived to see his Copernican ideas weeded out of most Catholic Colleges and universities in Europe. Alas, such a ban was only temporary, for within all such institutions were those who privately held the heresy, the secret Copernicans, biding their time for things to change.

Galileo Dies

Galileo’s punishment was to follow him into death and after it. He had wanted to be buried in his family tomb in Santa Croce, but this was denied to him. When he died in 1642, friends wanted to erect a monument over his grave, but Pope Urban VIII forbade this. In a letter to the Florentine Ambassador Niccolini the Pope said ‘it would be an evil example for the world if such honours were rendered to a man who had been brought before the Roman Inquisition for an opinion so false and erroneous; who had communicated it to many others, and who had given so great a scandal to Christendom.’ Galileo was buried next to the chapel of Saints Comas and Damian apart from his family without any notable ceremony and without any monument to his name.

 

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To Cassini:

How many times do we have to tell you. Catholics do NOT have to believe in geocentricism. As other posters have asked you without response from your side, where in the Catechism of the Catholic Church does it teach geocentricism. The CCC is a summary of ALL Church teachings (infallible and not) which we must accept. Tell us where geocentricsm is in the CCC.

 

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Galileo Heretic?

Much has been written about Galileo’s demeanour at the time of his death. The 1913 Catholic Encyclopaedia points out that Urban VIII sent his special blessing to the dying Galileo, who, while denied ‘monumental’ honours was interred not only in consecrated ground, but also within the church grounds of Santa Croce at Florence. In 1992 Pope John Paul II will sing his praises marking him as a ‘sincere believer’. Biographers and Catholic historians fall over backward telling us what a great Catholic Galileo was. Others, on the other hand, having dug up some of Galileo’s private correspondence after his 1633 abjuration, tell us much more than they mean to.

‘Galileo felt crushed by the verdict of “vehement suspicion of heresy” because it cut him off from the Church he loved; because he knew that no heresy had crossed his mind; because the verdict was a second error by an institution to which men looked for truth, and because his own life work stood condemned. He was not disheartened because he considered the Copernican astronomy or anything in science as he saw it, to be absolutely and completely true. This is evident from a letter he dictated to a friend in 1641, the last year of his life, with no hope of reward or any fear of further punishment.
Galileo’s own conscience was clear both as a Catholic and as a scientist. On one occasion he wrote, almost in despair, that at times he felt like burning all his work in science; but never as much as thought of turning his back on his faith…
The cause for which Galileo suffered in his own view, was clearly not Copernicanism but sound theology and Christian zeal… What grieved Galileo was the theologians’ error of 1616, as an indirect result of which he had been punished. Their error was in his eyes a misapplication of law established by the ancient Fathers who had wisely separated science from religion.’ –
S. Drake: Galileo, Past Masters, p.91.
Such pious nonsense can only belong to the legend of Galileo. Other dissidents throughout history, I’m sure, also had a clear conscience, for that’s the way unmoved heretics are. Here Drake portrays Galileo - who never had a shred of empirical evidence to confirm his ‘truth’ in his life, clinging to the condemned heresy he swore to God he had abandoned - as a Catholic who loved his Church. What kind of contradiction is that? Countless historians and authors, many intelligent and learned, have rushed in to defend this preposterous illusion. It is enough that the world should have to suffer Galileo and his opinions without the likes of this compounding such ignorance for our generation. Exactly what constitutes a Catholic in the eyes of the Copernicans would be hard to define. But more than that, for you see the 1616 decree of the Church stood firm and unchanged well past the day Galileo died in 1642, and it required internal as well as external rejection of the heliocentric heresy in order to be free from ipso facto excommunication from the Catholic Church. Consider then Drake’s conviction that Galileo believed in the ‘absolute truth’ of Copernicanism, to the day he died. If this is true, then here is Drake inferring that Galileo was not only a liar and perjurer, but indeed remained a heretic ipso facto excommunicated even unto death. Yet, like others of his ilk, he tries to portray him as a faithful and maligned Catholic. Here the contention that he lied at his trial is surely confirmed and that the Church’s judgement that he was guilty of suspicion of heresy was just and legal, and that the critics in history never had a leg to stand on.
So it is that throughout the years we find men walking hand in hand with Galileo, supporting him in every act of betrayal against God and mankind, and all the time trying to make a martyr out of him. ‘Galileo’s conscience’, if he had one, should have been informed, and God knows few men that ever lived were instructed better or given more chances. Read his abjuration again and consider him as Drake and many others, including the 1989-1992 commission, portray him, and you will find instead a hypocrite, a coward and a liar beyond comparison in history.

Two years later Pope Urban VIII died. It took nearly forty years before Pierrozzi was allowed place an inscription over Galileo’s remains, and nearly a hundred before his bones – minus a finger - were moved into the church of Santa Croce. In 1737, when the hermetic sun-centred doctrine was infiltrating into the minds of most and Galileo was perceived as having been correct all along, Pope Clement XII (1730-1740) finally authorised the erection of a monument to be built in his name. Even then this was subjected to correction in that nothing could be written on it that the Inquisition would disapprove of. Nevertheless, with every step the writing was on the wall, the ‘most perverse and dangerous heresy that put Christianity in danger’ was spreading like wildfire.

 

[grannymh]

Thanks cassini, for giving me the source for the phrase “vehemently suspected of heresy.” All my other posts stand as written,yet, open to correction.

Blessings,
grannymh

 

[warpspeedpetey]

but none of you can show where and when the Church’s decision was abrogated, where the Vatican II popes, cardinals and bishops got a legal and canonical right to ridicule their predecessors in the eyes of the world. That is all that matters**. If one of you can show me an abrogation I will disappear immediately.** But you cannot show me or anybody where this decree - supported by the 1633 pope and the 1664 pope - was ever recinded legally. This is what you guys just cannot cope with. Call me all the names under the sun if you like, but you still have to deal with what Providence allowed the Church to decree in 1616.

didn’t you make this promise bolded in the above quote?

and didnt i then post that Vatican 1 dogmatically defined infallible statements as only concerning Faith and Morals?, thereby abrogating any previous statements, concerning other matters than Faith or Morals? didn’t Vatican 1 specifically, dogmatically, define infallibility in that manner in light of the galileo affair?

as infallibility is dogmatically defined as only possible in matters of Faith and Morals, you personally cassini, are required to accept this? regardless of your opinion?

as, a faithful son of the church, you have been shown where you are required to believe that the church only speaks infallibly on matters of Faith and Morals.

so there is a dogmatic abrogation of all infallible statements, concerning matters other than Faith and Morals, prior to Vatican 1 in 1870, including and obviously specific to the galileo affair. this you are required to believe.

in light of both the dogmatic nature of Vatican 1s definition of infallible statements, and its abrogation of previous statements, concerning matters other than Faith and Morals. which you are required to believe.

and in light of your promise to leave immediately should you be shown such an abrogation, i ask again

Why are you still here?

i can only think of a few reasons.

1. you posted those words with no intention of following up on your promise, you told an untruth.
2. you are not a faithful son of the church, and refuse to accept the dogmatic definition of infallibility as defined by Vatican 1
3. you have me on your ignore list. in which case i can only hope someone else poses or quotes this argument, but i will not go away,

 

[grannymh]

Dear cassini,

May I remind you of a previous post by warpspeedpetey. It follows:

According to the teaching of the First Vatican Council and Catholic tradition, the conditions required for ex cathedra teaching are as follows:

1. “the Roman Pontiff”
2. “speaks ex cathedra” (“that is, when in the discharge of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, and by virtue of his supreme apostolic authority….”)
3. “he defines”
4. “that a doctrine concerning faith or morals”
5. “must be held by the whole Church”
   (Pastor Aeternus, chap. 40

---------Quote: from cassini
“But you cannot show me or anybody where this decree - supported by the 1633 pope and the 1664 pope - was ever recinded legally.” --------
.

ok, there you go. see #4, its the faith and morals thing? heliocentrism is a purely scientific matter. before you cut and paste more bellarmine, his opinion is no more official than yours

I would like to add that this Council also declared when the Pope was NOT infallible. Accordingly, infallibility does not belong to the Pope as a private theologian and much less as a private individual. The Holy Office was made up of private theologians and even if the Pope joined them, he would be considered a private theologian. Consequently, there was no infallible anything.

So no matter how one looks at the situation, there was not any infallible dogma. One cannot rescind legally what was not there in the first place.

Blessings,
grannymh

 

[thistle]

To Cassini:

How many times do we have to tell you. Catholics do NOT have to believe in geocentricism. As other posters have asked you without response from your side, where in the Catechism of the Catholic Church does it teach geocentricism. The CCC is a summary of ALL Church teachings (infallible and not) which we must accept. Tell us where geocentricsm is in the CCC.

 

[CWBetts]

To Cassini:

How many times do we have to tell you. Catholics do NOT have to believe in geocentricism. As other posters have asked you without response from your side, where in the Catechism of the Catholic Church does it teach geocentricism. The CCC is a summary of ALL Church teachings (infallible and not) which we must accept. Tell us where geocentricsm is in the CCC.

Just give up. He will just re-assert thet only he has the wisdom to expose this centuries-old heresy.

 

[rossum]

Just give up. He will just re-assert thet only he has the wisdom to expose this centuries-old heresy.

He seems to follow a White Queen version of Catholicism - you have to believe six impossible things before breakfast.

rossum

 

[grannymh]

This has been a long thread…with a variety of posters.

What seems to be the driving force is a real need for a literal interpretation of Scripture. To use geocentricism as evidence of a literal interpretation becomes futile in the light of modern science and technology. Turning heliocentricism into a heresy failed from a variety of perspectives given in this thread.

The question which remains is how does a fundamentalist or one who wants a literal interpretation handle Scripture. One could choose any church which interprets Scripture in the same fashion. Or one could choose the Catholic Church which uses Scripture as a source of truth concerning faith and morals.

Blessings,
grannymh

 

[Michael_Francis]

Thread closed pending cleanup.

 

[abafte]

here are the same geocentrism destroying photographs straight from NASA nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/photo_gallery/photogallery-solarsystem.html

How do those photographs destroy geocentrism?

 

[abafte]

are you sure you know what falsified means? it just means testable.

even better than peer review i have pictures from voyager

solarviews.com/raw/misc/vgr_fam3.gif
solarviews.com/raw/misc/vgr_fam2.gif
solarviews.com/raw/misc/vgr_fam1.gif

Those are individual pics of various bodies which were then retrofitted into an abstract heliocentric illustration (with drown lines of orbits and what not).

Not one single of those photos (over 40 of them) contains a photograph of the “solar system”