Galileo is a good guy,now!

[That_one_guy]

I think you may find this interesting.It’s from the encyclopedia here at Catholic answers.

oce.catholic.com/index.php?search=galileo&fulltext=Search

 

[PerryJ]

And it came to pass that the thread on Galileo died.Many a poster was relieved that day.And everybody said,"HUZZAH!"

I just read this thread. Some of the information is not accurate or needs clarification. Prior to Galileo Copernicus a low level Catholic Cleric proposed heliocentrism. At the time the Church embraced his thoughts. Galileo later used Copernicus’ idea and published his own heliocentic theory. The Pope and Galileo became close friends. Galileo took it upon himself that the Bible should be changed and his theory should be made laws. The Pope rejected this thought. Galileo then created a play that called the Pope “Simplico”. The Pope took offense and felt he had to take action. Note at this time the Reformation was taking place. The Pope felt it necessary to respond. Galileo was put in house arrest with the Medici family; which, was one of the most influential and wealthy families in its day. He was hardly mistreated. This family was very close to Catholicism and actually had several family members become Pope. Galileo continued to produce theories and they were blessed by the Pope. He was not allowed to continue to publish theories about heliocentrism. One major fact that most ignore was that Kepler proved Galileo’s heliocentric theory to be in error in Galileo’s own lifetime. Kelper was a Protestant that ran from the Reformation to the Catholic Church because of persecution. The Catholic Church supported Kepler and his theory. Note also that two of Galileo’s daughter were nuns. One left because of a mental illness. The other remained a nun her whole life. If the Church was so cruel to Galileo why did his daughter remain a nun.

Both the Protestant Reformers and the Catholic Church later became more hard line about heliocentrism.

 

[Dale_M]

If the Church was so cruel to Galileo why did his daughter remain a nun.

A popular blogger, who is a nun, recently revealed that her mother was brought up in an orphanage where she had been pretty much abused and traumatized by the nuns who ran the place. Yet… her daughter became a nun.

Children lead their own lives, often in contradiction to their parents.

 

[bobzills]

You really should cite what you are quoting. Until I can see the context, I can’t comment.

J.S. Daly, “The Theological Status of Heliocentrism”, October 1997:
Condemnation of Urban VIII:
“The proposition that the Earth is not the centre of the world and immovable but that it moves, and also with a diurnal motion, is equally absurd and false philosophically and theologically considered at least erroneous in faith.”

 

[PerryJ]

J.S. Daly, “The Theological Status of Heliocentrism”, October 1997:
Condemnation of Urban VIII:
“The proposition that the Earth is not the centre of the world and immovable but that it moves, and also with a diurnal motion, is equally absurd and false philosophically and theologically considered at least erroneous in faith.”

Bobzillis,

It appears that this quote maybe taken out of context of JS Daly’s total paper. The short 75 page paper; which, certainly does not delve into many of the intrinsicies such as books I have read uses many opinions and short statements pulled out of context. I am not sure this paper is truly objective as so many subjective opinions are given. With that said this same paper also states:

“our opinion, in a nutshell, is that the Holy See condemned heliocentrism by noninfallible decrees, branding it as heretical on the grounds of its manifest opposition to Holy Scriputre but without implying that the geocentric sense of the scriptural passages was infallibly proposed by the Church.”

This quotes goes on as this debate continued for several decades with Galileo.

 

[PerryJ]

The rise of Modern Philosophy by Anthony Kenney and Anthony John Patrick

Page 24

Pope Paul V “if there was real proof of heliocentrism, he told one of Galileo’s friends, then we would have to re-examine the biblical texts which appeared to contradict it; but as a matters stood, Copernicus’ theory was only an unapproved hypothesis. And indeed, Galileo’s own heliocentrism system, though it fitted the phenomena better, was almost as complicated as the geocentric system of his opponents demanding constant appeal to epicycles. The evidnece he had discovered did not justify the degree of certainity with which he maintained his thesis.”

Of course this is true as Kepler proved that Galileo’s theory was in fact substantially wrong.

Page 25

“In 1632 Galileo published … Dialogue on the Two Chief World Systems, In the book one character, Salviati presents the Copernican system and another Simplicius, defends the traditional one…However, Simplicius could also be interpreted as meaning simpleton and the pope was furious when he found some of his own words placed in the mouth of Simplicius.”

Galileo was given the approval to print his theory as long as he showed both theories. The Pope ordered this as Galileo could not prove his hypothesis.

Page 25

“Galileo was condmened to life imprisonment, a sentence that he served out until his death in 1642, in confinement in houses of distinguished friends and eventually in his own home at Bellosguardo outside of Florence… Galileo continued to write and incorporated the fruit of his lifetime’s work in Discourse and Mathematical Demonstrations Concernng Two New Sciences.”

People are quick to condemn the Church for not approving Galileo’s theories because they believe his theory to be correct. It was not. The Church was correct for rejecting his theory. In addition the Church never made an infallible statement concerning geocentrism. Galileo was imprisoned for breaking his word to the Pope and insulting the Pope publicly with his character of “Simplico”. Perhaps this was not proper, which I would agree with, however to claim that the Church was ignorant and refuted heliocentrism at the time of Galileo is false.

One should also remember that both Luther and Calvin rejected heliocentrism.

 

[PerryJ]

A popular blogger, who is a nun, recently revealed that her mother was brought up in an orphanage where she had been pretty much abused and traumatized by the nuns who ran the place. Yet… her daughter became a nun.

Children lead their own lives, often in contradiction to their parents.

I am sure we could find exceptions to everything.

This post seems to lack credibility. Taking a popular blogger thoughts is hardly worth noting. Especially since they ar enot named.

Many people believe they were traumatized by there parents etc. Some are some aren’t.

 

[That_one_guy]

Here is an interesting passage I found right here at CAF/This Rock.

catholic.com/thisrock/2004/0401bt.asp

There are certain passages of Scripture that make it sound like the earth stands still while the sun rotates about it (e.g., Josh. 10:13; Ps. 93:1; 104:5; 19, 22; Eccles. 1:5). This is understandable, since the biblical writers—like people in every land—spoke and wrote as things appeared to them, and it does appear from the earth that the earth is stationary while the sun moves.

Before the Copernican Revolution, the Church had taken these passages at face value and had not considered the literary nature of these statements—that they were written in the language of appearances (what is sometimes called phenomenological language) and did not express a God’s eye view of cosmology.

Following Copernicus and Galileo, theologians rethought these passages, saw that they could be taken in a phenomenological sense, and gradually got comfortable with the idea. The same thing happened after Humani Generis. Taken at face value, Genesis 2:7 seems to say that God created the first man directly from the dust of the ground, and that is how most folks took it. There had always been a strand in both Christian and Jewish interpretation—even before the rise of modern science—that recognized that the early chapters of Genesis contain non-literal elements, that they present the mysterious, unseen-by-human-eye work of the Creator in a stylized manner. But the majority had tended to take these passages literally.

The excerpt is from an article on evolution. But, it seems to be relevant.