Considering that the Church persecuted Galileo for believing that the Earth revolved around the Sun?

Question

How can we be sure that it has wisen up?

Answer 1

wisen up?

Answer 2

Before Galileo said that the earth revolves around the sun, the Polish astronomer/priest Copernicus said the same thing. And Copernicus never got in trouble for saying this. Why the double standard?

Anyway Galileo just had a personality that made enemies. The Church long ago admitted that it treated Galileo unfairly and has repented of this. More recently it has even made some statements supporting evolution.

So the Church can make mistakes but it tries to straighten itself.

Answer 3

In fact, the Church's action against Galileo was the result of Galileo's published suggestion that perhaps the laws of nature might explain the cosmos without reference to God. It was not due to his astronomical observations, which were being made by other scientists at the same time. In any case, the notion that the earth occupied a central position in the cosmos was not a defined doctrine of the Church. It was just the universally accepted SCIENTIFIC view of the time, and therefore the universally accepted world view. The Church today accepts the prevailing scientific viewpoint, just as it did then. But it is not a matter of doctrine now, any more than it was then.

Answer 4

The Church has apologized for all of this activity (I don't know if Galileo was specifically mentioned in it). It's amazing, though: I saw a book titled the "Politcally Incorrect Guide to Science" at Borders the other day which denied that this ever happened!

I believe the Church has wisened up and is now trying to work with science more than it has in the past.

Answer 5

"wisen" that is a weird word if it is even a word, but anyway you blame the Church, but most people at the time thought Galileo was crazy for his beliefs, not just the Christian community. As for the Church becoming wiser, that can be evident with the Catholic Church supporting evolution.

Answer 6

You can't be sure of anything. But jeez, you start out with a semi-intelligent, though unanswerable question, then you mess it up with " How can we be sure that it has wisen up"? Come on, your not paying attention to what you are writing. And if it could be proved beyond a doubt that it has wisen uped, how would that help you? You want proof of God, there is none. It's called faith for a reason. If you want to judge God by the actions of humans, then you have a conundrum.

Answer 7

My dumb question: Why compare Galileo and evolution???

Well, the Catholic Church did something wrong in the past. Seriously. But tell me, is there's someone here that never do something wrong in the past?

The Catholic is the living church, which grow and learn from their experienced. Slowly maybe, but surely.

And for the Galileo, the Catholic church nowdays allways prays that for the soul that been murdered (include Galileo ,etc), may God the Most Wiser accept them at the Heaven. Too late? I don't think so, since we don't know how God works.

Answer 8

Because the church (the Catholic church that is ... the one that persecuted Galileo), is NOT resisting evolution or Darwin. The church is quite clear that evolution and Christianity are compatible.

In that respect the Church has wised up.

However, there are a lot of other (non-Catholic) Christians (specifically certain branches of fundamentalist Christians who basically are turning themselves into the Taliban of Christianity), who are insisting on repeating the same mistakes the Catholic church made in the 1600's. How "wise" is that?

Answer 9

Somewhere in Proverbs it says that it's the glory of God to conceal a matter, and the glory of kings to figure it out.

As long as the church is run by people, it will never be as wise as God himself. Hopefully, the church has wisened up about some matters; unfortunately, it remains ignorant and arrogant over others.

BTW, different churches have different attitudes toward different matters.

Answer 10

Sure the church didn't accept that the earth revolved around the sun. And guess what? No one else did either at that time.

Answer 11

the church was in charge, and they simply went with what the rest of the world believed. I agree, they probably were to close-minded, but there was a time when everyone thought the world was flat.

consider this, someone walks into the vatican claiming that his particular religion is the best and will wipe Catholicism from the face of the earth? should we believe him?