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trth_skr
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Respectfully, St. Augustine and many other Fathers disagree with Mr. Staples.
Mark
www.veritas-catholic.blogspot.com
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Mark
www.veritas-catholic.blogspot.com
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PhilVaz
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Reid << As a former Baptist I had the honor of sitting through a creation seminar by Dr. Dino himself. >>
Hee hee, that Dr. Dino is trippy.
So now you left Kent Hovind and accept the Catholic teaching that we came from a rock. Just kidding.
Phil P
Hee hee, that Dr. Dino is trippy.
So now you left Kent Hovind and accept the Catholic teaching that we came from a rock. Just kidding.
Phil P
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PhilVaz
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truth Mark << Respectfully, St. Augustine and many other Fathers disagree with Mr. Staples. >>
Buddy, this is a discussion about the age of the earth and not geocentrism, you are out of your league.
Phil P
Buddy, this is a discussion about the age of the earth and not geocentrism, you are out of your league.
Phil P
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flamingsword
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Additionally we have to continue to ask ourselves.
If God did make the world, which I firmly believe, and he made it good, which I firmly believe, then why would he create the world in such a way as to deceive and lie to his creatures. The only answer is that he wouldn’t. Nothing that has been scientifically proven, has disagreed with divine revelation. People’s interpretations of what science has revealed may be wrong, but the science itself, if properly done, cannot. That is only if we believe that God would not lie to us, which I hope you all firmly believe.
If God did make the world, which I firmly believe, and he made it good, which I firmly believe, then why would he create the world in such a way as to deceive and lie to his creatures. The only answer is that he wouldn’t. Nothing that has been scientifically proven, has disagreed with divine revelation. People’s interpretations of what science has revealed may be wrong, but the science itself, if properly done, cannot. That is only if we believe that God would not lie to us, which I hope you all firmly believe.
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trth_skr
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Who is being deceived? Are we talking geocentrism here? No one has proven it untrue! No one has yet proven the earth rotates or translates. Think about that.
Science is far from absolute. Only God is absolute. Science draws consusions within its axioms and previous “proofs”. Once a previous proof or axiom is overturned, new theories emerge. The enlightment ideal implies that science is truth which continually gets added to, but in actuality science contuinually disproves older theories and replaces them with newer ones.
Science deals more in the ability to make predictions than in truth.
Mark
www.veritas-catholic.blogspot.com
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flamingsword
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I never said how much of science, or what areas of science, have been proven. Though there are many, many areas that have been proven. I am not limiting myself to theories you maybe thinking of.
But lets take for example gravity, I know its just a theory, a very good one at that. Now we must ask ourselves, does gravity really exists or is God deceiving us. I tend to think gravity exists. Why? because I don’t believe God would deceive us. Why would he create the universe that always appears to act in a certain way by a set of laws, but not? God gave us the laws of nature for our benefit. I would hate to wake up every day and wonder if gravity will be working today. What a terrible way to live. Or wake up and wonder if today when I step off of my bed will I fall through the floor because God decided to turn off the law that two objects cannot exist in the same space? Both are areas that science provides a pretty good explanation for. But again why would he go through all the trouble to make the appearance of laws, laws that he gave us the reason to figure out, but not adhere to them?
Now when nature doesn’t abide by these rules we call that a miracle. So if we didn’t have these rules of nature how would we recognize anything as a miracle? Because a miracle is afterall something that doesn’t follow the natural order. Are you willing to give up miracles, just so you can say that science doesn’t deal in absolutes?
Back to geocentricism. It has in fact been disproven. Geocentric theory states that everything revolves around the earth, When in fact we have seen other moons revolving around other planets. Everything does revolve around the sun. There is no way, other than God completely deceiving us, that the earth could be the center of the solar system. The same holds true for the age of the earth. Why would God have fossils of creatures, movements of the earth that could only have taken millions of years, radio carbon dating that shows things to be older than a mere 6,000? The only reason would be that God would be deceiving us in a lot of different areas of physics, mathematics, biology, chemistry, and any other science that you could possibly think of.
I for my part will have to say that, yes I believe that God is not an evil deceiver. You may chose to believe what you wish. Nothing I hold goes against dogma or doctrine of the Catholic faith.
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flamingsword
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I found this
Which backs up
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JKirkLVNV
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Respectfully, St. Augustine beleived that the Genesis account was an allegory.
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trth_skr
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Science really has no explanation for gravity. As I said previously, we can make predictions about the effect of a phenomenon we call gravity.
Newtonian physics basically relates two masses and a force between them (gravity). No explanation why. Relativity can be viewed as a geometrical effect (warped space-time) or a field phenomenon. In either case for simple cases, as we see in the solar system, the math boils down to Newtoinaian mechanics.
The only area of science which attempts to give an explanation for gravity is corpuscular and related graviton theories. In these cases the mass is more indirectly related to greavity, but again the math for most solar system cases boils down to Newtonian.
I agree. Actually the reason the Fathers supported a geocentric interpretation of Scripture is because they rejected a phenonomological interpretation (i.e., the Holy Spirit is only talking about appearances, not realities), especially in Joshua 10. Assuming that the earth stopped rotating and the moon seperately stopped in its orbit in a sense made the Holy Spirit appear to be a liar, and they rejected this.
If an apple flew upwards for no reason, I would strongly suspect a miracle. Again, being able to predict the effect of gravity and having confidence in its continued operation does not explain it.
You are building a straw man, then arguing against it. Geocentrism is basically a consequence of the earth not moving (neither rotating nore translating). This is really what the Fathers and Popes stated. If the earth is stationary and we see objects moving around us, we call this geocentrism. An explanation is that the universe is rotating, the sun moves around us with the universe. The planets (earth not being a planet) orbits the sun. The stars rotate with the universe. This is the Tychonian system.
Who is being deceived? We do not feel motion. No one has proven the earth rotates or translates. No observation can prove it because relative motion is all we can observe. We see the sun and stars rotating around us every 24 hours. Yet you believe the earth is rotating? Scientifically and mathematically either system is equivalent, but the Hoy Spirit led the Fathers and three Popes to believe the geocentric case based on interpretation of Scripture. Think about who is being deceived.
I am not conversant enough on the this question; though I am very skeptical.
No, God is not a deceiver.
Three Popes, and the Fathers interpreted Scripture geocentrically. No one has overturned this. We “see” the stars and sun travelling around us, if this is important to you. To state the earth is actually rotating is to choose one of two relative motions. Why would God tell us the sun and stars go around us, then make it seem so, then expect us to believe otherwise?
Your arguments work better in favor of geocentrism! Think about it with an open mind.
Mark
www.veritas-catholic.blogspot,com
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PhilVaz
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truth Mark << Your arguments work better in favor of geocentrism! Think about it with an open mind. >>
Forget about Geocentrism for 2 seconds and give me your incredibly great scientific arguments for a YOUNG earth (6,000 to 10,000 years young).
But first read these and make sure you aren’t repeating stuff that’s been demolished a thousand times over.
Phil P
Forget about Geocentrism for 2 seconds and give me your incredibly great scientific arguments for a YOUNG earth (6,000 to 10,000 years young).
But first read these and make sure you aren’t repeating stuff that’s been demolished a thousand times over.
Phil P
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Wildgraywolf
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Why does it matter? I’m only aware of thirteen dogmatic pronouncements and none of them have to do with defining any kind of science.
What issues of faith and morals would this address?
How does it benefit humanity for the Church to say the earth is 6,000 or 4 billion years old?
How does it benefit humanity for the Church to say the earth is the center of the universe or not?
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trth_skr
Guest
Why did God choose to reveal it?
Maybe the benefit is that we would know that we are not carbon based accidents spiraling in the aftermath of an exposion in a giant vacuum on the surface of a solidifed molten blob, but rather that God created us and the place we were created for a purpose and according to His will.
Mark
www.veritas-catholic.blogspot.com
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Wildgraywolf
Guest
Reveal what? The age of the earth or earth’s physical location in relation to the rest of the universe? He didn’t reveal any of those things; people extrapolated them from scripture references taken out of context and/or wishful thinking. I can make a better case that God is anti-science/technology by the Tower of Babel story. Or when God told Noah to build the ark, God didn’t bother to educate Noah on the principals of bouyancy, displacement & etc. That would have been a perfect opportunity to teach practical useful science don’t ya think? So teaching science through scripture isn’t and never has been a priority for God. Now there are some scientific principals mentioned arrived at through observation, not by divine revelation. God asked Job a bunch of science questions. Job couldn’t answer them and God didn’t help him out with the answers either.
He did that throughout scripture and without the need of any science. God did not reveal how He created creation, but that He did in fact create it.
Leaving the planet is most certainly a milestone in human technological and scientific development. Scripture MUST have mentioned it! So, how many beans would Abraham have to feed a sheep so it could: (a)build up enough methane fuel (there may be containment issues here), (b)which when ingited would propel said sheep fast enough to (c)reach escape velocity and (d)orbit the planet with out any instrumentation from Giligan’s Island?
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KWilliam
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Having just recently come back home to the Catholic Church, I really have no clue at all what the Church has to say about this issue. I agree with some of the posters here that it is not really an important question, but it surely is an interesting one 
Interesting enough that during my years away from the Church I came up with an idea of my own that I’ll share with you. In no way do I suggest that it is correct, or even likely … just that during my time on my own it seemed to answer the question well enough for me.
To me, it seemed that there were really two questions to ask here. Not just “How old is the Earth?” but also “What is the age of the universe?”. These are two very different though similar sounding questions. The first one asks how long something has been in existence, but the second one asks the maturity of that something. And I mean maturity in the sense of where it is in it’s state of development.
This got me thinking about Adam. Picture just one minute after God had created Adam and ask those two questions about him. How old was he? Well, just one minute old. But then consider what was his age? Surely he wasn’t a newborn one minute old infant, but rather a fully developed human being, likely in his 20s (just a guess). He showed all the signs of a human who had lived and grown for 20 some years, though his actual length of existence had only been for one minute.
Considering that right there God gives us an example of Himself creating something brand new but showing signs of lengthy development, it doesn’t seem at all odd to me to imagine that 6000 (or however much) years ago he created the Universe, but at a mature age of billions of years. After all, what good would a brand new, immature universe be to Him? There would seem no purpose to just let that time go on without His greatest creation (man) around to experience it. He created this universe to be a place for us. Without His creation (man), the universe is just empty space with no purpose.
Anyway, that’s just something that rattled around in my brain some years ago. I neither put it forth as truth or the view of the Catholic Church, but rather as something that satisfied me when I did not have the Church to guide me.
Something interesting I came across some time ago that also deals with this topic can be found at geraldschroeder.com/age.html
I have no idea whether the science behind this is accurate, or if it even remotely accurately describes the Torah at all. But it seemed interesting enough to remember and share with anyone who feels like reading it. If for any reason what is described on that thread would be in any way considered Anti-Catholic or Anti-Christian please let me know and I’ll gladly edit this portion of my post out
Interesting enough that during my years away from the Church I came up with an idea of my own that I’ll share with you. In no way do I suggest that it is correct, or even likely … just that during my time on my own it seemed to answer the question well enough for me.To me, it seemed that there were really two questions to ask here. Not just “How old is the Earth?” but also “What is the age of the universe?”. These are two very different though similar sounding questions. The first one asks how long something has been in existence, but the second one asks the maturity of that something. And I mean maturity in the sense of where it is in it’s state of development.
This got me thinking about Adam. Picture just one minute after God had created Adam and ask those two questions about him. How old was he? Well, just one minute old. But then consider what was his age? Surely he wasn’t a newborn one minute old infant, but rather a fully developed human being, likely in his 20s (just a guess). He showed all the signs of a human who had lived and grown for 20 some years, though his actual length of existence had only been for one minute.
Considering that right there God gives us an example of Himself creating something brand new but showing signs of lengthy development, it doesn’t seem at all odd to me to imagine that 6000 (or however much) years ago he created the Universe, but at a mature age of billions of years. After all, what good would a brand new, immature universe be to Him? There would seem no purpose to just let that time go on without His greatest creation (man) around to experience it. He created this universe to be a place for us. Without His creation (man), the universe is just empty space with no purpose.
Anyway, that’s just something that rattled around in my brain some years ago. I neither put it forth as truth or the view of the Catholic Church, but rather as something that satisfied me when I did not have the Church to guide me.
Something interesting I came across some time ago that also deals with this topic can be found at geraldschroeder.com/age.html
I have no idea whether the science behind this is accurate, or if it even remotely accurately describes the Torah at all. But it seemed interesting enough to remember and share with anyone who feels like reading it. If for any reason what is described on that thread would be in any way considered Anti-Catholic or Anti-Christian please let me know and I’ll gladly edit this portion of my post out
J
JimG
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The age of the earth (and of the universe) is both interesting and important. It just doesn’t have anything to do with religion.
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Gottle_of_Geer
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In much the same as one decides whether the page of a newspaper one is reading is an obituary, a film review, a political speech, or a classified advertisement
IOW, one uses common sense, and knowledge of the different types of literature . I sometimes think that Rome is expected to do all our thinking for us, and to make all our decisions for us, as if Rome were a sort of super-nanny ##
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Gottle_of_Geer
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papalencyclicals.net/Leo13/l13provi.htm
- In the second place, we have to contend against those who, making an evil use of physical science, minutely scrutinize the Sacred Book in order to detect the writers in a mistake, and to take occasion to vilify its contents. Attacks of this kind, bearing as they do on matters of sensible experience, are peculiarly dangerous to the masses, and also to the young who are beginning their literary studies; for the young, if they lose their reverence for the Holy Scripture on one or more points, are easily led to give up believing in it altogether. It need not be pointed out how the nature of science, just as it is so admirably adapted to show forth the glory of the Great Creator, provided it be taught as it should be, so if it be perversely imparted to the youthful intelligence, it may prove most fatal in destroying the principles of true philosophy and in the corruption of morality. Hence to the Professor of Sacred Scripture a knowledge of natural science will be of very great assistance in detecting such attacks on the Sacred Books, and in refuting them. There can never, indeed, be any real discrepancy between the theologian and the physicist, as long as each confines himself within his own lines, and both are careful, as St. Augustine warns us, "not to make rash assertions, or to assert what is not known as known.’’[51] If dissension should arise between them, here is the rule also laid down by St. Augustine, for the theologian: “Whatever they can really demonstrate to be true of physical nature, we must show to be capable of reconciliation with our Scriptures; and whatever they assert in their treatises which is contrary to these Scriptures of ours, that is to Catholic faith, we must either prove it as well as we can to be entirely false, or at all events we must, without the smallest hesitation, believe it to be so.”[52] To understand how just is the rule here formulated we must remember, first, that the sacred writers, or to speak more accurately, the Holy Ghost “Who spoke by them, did not intend to teach men these things (that is to say, the essential nature of the things of the visible universe), things in no way profitable unto salvation.”[53] Hence they did not seek to penetrate the secrets of nature, but rather described and dealt with things in more or less figurative language, or in terms which were commonly used at the time and which in many instances are in daily use at this day, even by the most eminent men of science. Ordinary speech primarily and properly describes what comes under the senses; and somewhat in the same way the sacred writers – as the Angelic Doctor also reminds us – “went by what sensibly appeared,”[54] or put down what God, speaking to men, signified, in the way men could understand and were accustomed to. ##
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Gottle_of_Geer
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Steve Andersen:
I hope sincerely that you are right - sometimes, it can seem as if one can be a Catholic only provided that one rejects astronomy, geography, geology, and probably the sciences in general. I don’t want to hasten forward to the fifth century AD, thank you very much
I don’t
We’ve had this conversation before
It would be foolish for the Church to insert itself into a debate which is frankly not really in its area of competence. We learned our lesson after that Galileo incident
I hope sincerely that you are right - sometimes, it can seem as if one can be a Catholic only provided that one rejects astronomy, geography, geology, and probably the sciences in general. I don’t want to hasten forward to the fifth century AD, thank you very much 
. Or the fourteenth, for that matter
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trogiah
Guest
I don’t know exactly what the official teaching of the church is but consider the words from the 2nd letter of Peter
“But do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day”
If one insists on a “literal” interpretation of scripture, this phrase tells us that 6000 years can be converted by multiplying by 365 and by 1000. The result is just over 2 billion years.
I think it is an interesting coincidence.
peace
-Jim
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trth_skr
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Gottle of Geer said:## In much the same as one decides whether the page of a newspaper one is reading is an obituary, a film review, a political speech, or a classified advertisement
IOW, one uses common sense, and knowledge of the different types of literature . I sometimes think that Rome is expected to do all our thinking for us, and to make all our decisions for us, as if Rome were a sort of super-nanny
Regardless of what “type of literature” was being used, the interpretation of Scripture by the Fathers is held in high regard by the Church. See my part III of Geocentrism 101:
veritas-catholic.blogspot.com/2005/08/geocentrism-101-part-iii-scriptural.html
Mark
www.veritas-catholic.blogspot.com
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