Was the Catholic church right to murder those who thought the earth went round the sun?

Question

If no, then how can the church have any authority at all if their doctrine is wrong, they are clearly not informed by God. How can the church condem people today, when they are clearly not in a stright line of people inspired by god?

If yes, why would god condone the murder of people who were correct, and then have his church change their story to eventually accept the truth.

In other words. Religion is bad for human progress. Right?

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Answer 1

No they weren't right to murder anyone but you raise a good point that people were persecuted for simply trying to discover the truth. The church holds a similar stance today but instead of murdering anyone they simply comdemn them verbally.

Answer 2

Of course it wasn't "right," but we're talking about 400 years ago when the knowledge of science was quite paltry, and the Church preyed on the people's ignorance in order to maintain absolute power.

400 years later, the Church apologized to Galileo and said he was correct, but that didn't do him much good, did it?

God did not make people to behave as robots, nor does god jump in every time a person makes a mistake. People were endowed with freedom of choice. Unfortunately the Church, which is a human institution, has rarely understood how god functions. After all, god is infinity. How could finite beings understand?

Answer 3

It was wrong. It was wrong to place Galileo under house arrest and burn his books about a heliocentric universe when the church endorsed a geocentric universe. Similarly, Richard Nixon was impeached for spying on people illegally. And our current government is wrong for invading Iraq, purporting that there are weapons of mass destruction, subjecting our troops to death, torture and separation from their families. Religion and Government per se are not bad. Leaders in those institutions can be bad. I am Catholic but pragmatic. Where there is ambivalence..I appeal directly to God. For example I think that pedophiles need to be prosecuted to the full extent of the law, but at the same time I admire and am proud to be associated with people who have pledged their life to service to the poor, sick and oppressed. You cannot categorically condemn an institution on bad acts, or we would not have any institutions at all.

Answer 4

do I believe that ANY group of people is "right" for murdering those who have different opinions...? absolutely not

i dont believe the church has authority nor the right to condemn people, but im not saying their beliefs are wrong...

im all for people believing what they want to believe, as long as it doesnt harm other people


is religion bad for progress..... i dont think so.. i dont agree with alot of things that go on in the world today, but that doesnt mean i dont think they're necessary.. i think religion is probably a PART of progress...

Answer 5

No religion is good and many people do need it. And there have been signs all over that God really does exsist.

Have there been people withint religious power that misused that power throughout history, yes. But that can be said just about anything..

Answer 6

Religion has always tried to repress science. Plus the Bible said that the sun rotated the earth. Which just goes to show how ignorant the goat-herders who wrote the damned thing were.

Answer 7

No, the Catholic church wasn't right to murder.

Answer 8

No, they manipulated scripture and the ignorance of the common people in order to murder someone who threatened their fascist hold over Europe. The Bible preaches AGAINST murder.

Answer 9

a lot of things were wrong about civilization as a whole centuries ago, it wasn't just the church...it's called PROGRESS, which is exactly what the catholic church and civilization as a whole has done.

Answer 10

I see, we're supposed to ignore all those witches, both real and imagined, that the Protestants murdered. Right? I mean really, let's be fair in our criticism.