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Aurelio
Guest
Hi!I may be misreading his text, as it is given to us by The Classics of Western Spirituality: Robert Bellarmine Spiritual Writings, pages 66-67, but to me it sounds pretty radical for around 1619, nearly 400 years ago.
Example:
While pondering the greatness of the earth according to Sirach 1:2, Bellarmine adds:
“This [greatness] can also be seen from the fact that in the many thousands of years which have flowed by since the foundation of the earth [emphasis added!] the whole surface of the earth has not yet become known to us men, despite our careful explorations.”
And as for the heavens?
“And if every star in the firmament is greater than the whole earth, as scholars generally believe, and still these stars seem tiny specks to us because of the almost infinite distance, who can grasp in thought the heavens where so many thousands of stars shine?”
And as for a possible concept of “other worlds,” St. Robert reassures us that "…if another world were created, God would fill it too, and if there were many worlds or even an infinite number of worlds, God would fill them all." emphasis added.
Here, it’s almost as though St. Robert Bellarmine is willing to go along with some of the Elizabethan poets, or one, anyway. I THINK it might have been somebody named Dryden?? Who more or less said that “forget all the wild tales of your Magellans and Drakes, what will be even better someday will be the stories and yarns of those who will someday circumnavigate the Milky Way, and shoot their barks through the Pleides (sp?),” or whatever!
.What I like best about this particular approach to spirituality by St. Robert Bellarmine is that it shows us a person keenly aware of the age in which he is living, and not afraid to dream for all that!
And yet, who maintains that important element called, I guess, “continuity,” a sort of harmony with all the ages that were, that are, and that are to come, so to speak.
And, who knows? Maybe sometime in the second half of this current century, a fleet of multiple stage rocket ships may indeed blast off from a certain country 'way down in the Southern Hemisphere, each space shuttle emblazoned with the legendary Cross of Santiago, outbound for a long voyage to who knows where. And with everything from Captains to Chaplains aboard, Saints, Sinners, Original Sin the whole shebang, outbound on what may become a sort of intergalactic Pilgrimage to Canterbury!
“Move over all you banal episodes of Star Trek.”
See ya!
Aurelio
