There is nothing in the wave of anti-Catholic hysteria that overwhelmed Europe after the so-called “Reformation” that compares with the question of Galileo (1564 – 1642). The usual myth says that the Church tried to censure the spunky Italian because his scientific findings went against the Bible. Called before the Roman Inquisition, Galileo was forced to recant his views that the earth revolved around the sun. Under his breath he is rumored to have said, “Yet it does move.” It matters not at all that little of that is true. What matters is the myth.
To state the question another way, Galileo said that the sun was the center of the universe—heliocentrism. The Catholic Church said it was not. Who was right?
DennyApril 27, 2022, 10:50 AM
Sorry Mike, but the Galileo dispute with the RCC was a tiny nothing-burger compared to the many other vastly more important matters brought by the “so-called” Reformers and forced before the Roman Church in the sixteenth century. It appears to me that there exists at least a dozen empty shelves in your very accomplished personal library. I do not wish to begin an endless argument here, so I’ll just bow out as gracefully as I can.
I have 200 books on theology out of the 1000 books on my shelves. Most of these theological tomes are Protestant. It was a Protestant book, “Mere Christianity”, that brought me back into the Light. And it was a Protestant preacher’s son that asked me to read that book. It can be argued that Protestantism saved my eternal soul—quite literally, and quite permanently.
Whatever differences exist among Christian faiths, the differences between those faiths and the outside world are fundamentally and profoundly more important. The enemy of Christianity is Lucifer, not other Christians.
DennyApril 27, 2022, 1:36 PM
Mike, I apologize for misinterpreting what I took as a possible insult towards the spirit of the Reformation. I do believe that the well aimed criticism by the Reformers, especially in that period of time in history, was well deserved by the RCC and the unscriptural and immoral behavior of its magisterium.
Dear Denny: No apologies necessary. The Catholic Church before 1517 needed reform—and not even the Church herself disagrees. The Council of Trent (1545 – 1563) provided that reform, and reaffirmed Catholic Dogma and Catholic Doctrines.
The condition of the Church circa 1530. The worldly Cardinal Wolsey and Saint Thomas Moore. Moore would be beheaded by Henry VIII in 1535.
Whatever was the condition of the Catholic Church at the time of the Reformation, her condition now is far worse. I would guess that 90 percent of all cardinals and bishops today are either practicing sodomites, in favor of sodomy, or heretics. And “Francis” is pope in the same manner as Biden is “president”.
Jesus wept. Jesus weeps.
Dr. JayApril 27, 2022, 1:54 PM
Amen. “The enemy of Christianity is Lucifer, not other Christians.” And Lucifer (Satan if you’ll allow) has his own gospel.
The gospel of Satan is not a black gospel that impels reprobates into the worship of darkness and despair. It is not a gospel that preaches war and cancerous living. It is not a gospel that divides and separates families. It is not a gospel that belittles man and calls forth the darker angels of our nature. Rather, the gospel of Satan lifts up man to lofty heights. It calls men to acts of benevolence, peace and unity. It rewards the highest acts of natural charity and human endeavor. It encourages man to seek the common good of humanity and uplifts the “human spirit” as supreme. The gospel of Satan denies the total depravity of man, and supports the teaching of man/god cooperation in the area of salvation and “godly” living. The gospel of Satan declares that God is a mere witness in the redemption of mankind, not the author and finisher of it, and that He has merely made a way for those who can find it within themselves to seek after Him. The gospel of Satan does not deny Jesus Christ so much as it demotes Him from His sovereign throne.
“Religion today is not transforming people; rather it is being transformed by the people. It is not raising the moral level of society; it is descending to society’s own level, and congratulating itself that it has scored a victory because society is smilingly accepting its surrender.” A. W. Tozer
PS: We also have a house full of books. About 1/3 are theological.
You have summed up well Satan’s game plan. Christ desired that the world be conformed to His Church. Modern man conforms the Church to the world. Here is a recent headline that shows the modern “church” in all its Satanic majesty:
“World’s First Lesbian Bishop Calls for Church to Remove Crosses, to Install Muslim Prayer Space”
Christ did not die for this.
VanderleunApril 27, 2022, 2:28 PM
IT IS well to remember, always, that regardless of doctrinal disputes, “The Church is One.”
gwbnycApril 27, 2022, 9:12 PM
“spunky Italian”
-5 pts.
Casey KlahnApril 27, 2022, 10:40 AM
With the absolute and total shitshow that is now “science,” I wouldn’t be surprised if science next declares that the sun is not a sun at all but a mirror. Or, something absurdist like that.
My beloved governor, yesterday, Tweeted that the next event to cringe about is the predicted total loss of glaciers on the Olympic Mountain Range in Washington. I say bullshit and he’s a ruddy bullshitter of the first order. How will the glaciers melt? Gaslighting! That’s how.
Anyway, I am greatly amused at the honorification of Galileos middle finger.
jscd3April 27, 2022, 2:44 PM
Galileo did not run afoul of the Pope because he wrote about the sun being the center of the solar system
That had been taught (along with a couple of other models) as a possible explanation for planetary movement in Catholic universities since shortly after Copernicus
He ran into trouble because besides being a genius, he was, first and foremost, an asshole, and secondly, because he decided to introduce an utterly unneeded point of contention into his work (probably because of point one)
As to point one – the Copernican model assumed orbits were circular, which, of course they are not; therefore epicycles (fudge factors) that were the Achilles heal of other earth centered models were still required (though not as many). When other astronomers pointed this out and developed alternative orbital models (elliptical – Kepler) – Galileo publicly insulted and attacked them, thereby making them his enemies. Relatedly, when a comet was being carefully observed by Jesuit astronomers, who concluded that the body must have an elliptical orbit around the sun to explain its movement, Galileo not only said they were wrong, but went so far as to deny that the comet was an astronomical body – that it was simply a trick of light; thereby pissing off the Jesuits
But most important – in his published presentation, he had the individual presenting the earth-centric case appear to be an idiot – his name was Simplicitus – and had him mouth phrases that were known to be spoken by the Pope. At a time when Rome was part of the Papal States and the Pope was also an earthly prince in whose kingdom Galileo resided – a prince, by the way, who had defended Galileo from critics, promoted him, and funded his work – well, Galileo decided to very publicly insult that same guy.
You just did not do that in Europe at this time to a ruler in whose land you resided – Pope or no Pope
I think that establishes the veracity of point one
As to point two – Galileo felt the need to include a passage in his paper stating that where science and the Bible seemed to differ, folks should just interpret the Bible their own way. Now, given that the Reformation was raging and that there had just been a little bit of associated unpleasantness in Germany called the Peasant Revolt (led by an heretical priest who felt that his personal biblical interpretations were correct, which infuriated Luther, who urged the princes of Germany to destroy him – story for another day) that had resulted in 50,000 or so people being slaughtered in one or two battles… this was, you might say, sort of an indelicate suggestion to mention at that time
You will note, none of the above really had anything to do with any theological opinion concerning heliocentrism – and it really is only tangentially – through historical coincidence – related to the Reformation.
It is really not even about science
It is really about a guy – albeit a really, really brilliant guy – who threw eggs at the people in his vicinity and was then surprised when they turned on him
Later on, the story was reworked to became about Science! (as opposed to science) triumphing over Superstition! (i.e. Christianity in all of its variants)
By the way, when Kepler later published his final papers on elliptical orbits of planets, the Church fairly quickly adopted his models of planetary movement in Catholic universities – because his model worked
A brilliant summation of the issues involved. I wish all history texts would refer to Galileo as what he was—and what you said he was: an asshole. I would throw in “arrogant prick” as well.
Incidentally, Galileo’s father was a musician and composer of renown. Here is his “Ancient Airs and Dances”.
Excellent summary jscd. Appreciate the effort. Mike is right that Protestants get the Bible right and not Catholics. Even though I am Catholic I only agree with the doctrine, not the personalities. It is the Protestants that get Genesis 15. Catholics never do – at least I rarely meet a Priest that does. If you don’t get Genesis 15, then the Crucifixion, the redemption, the whole thing is insanity. Ayn Rand didn’t get it either even though she arrogantly said she studied Christianity and the other philosophers. (Mike got that right too) If you understand Gen 15 then the whole thing makes perfect sense.
Intellectual disgrace
Stares from every human face,
And the seas of pity lie
Locked and frozen in each eye.
Follow, poet, follow right
To the bottom of the night,
With your unconstraining voice
Still persuade us to rejoice.
With the farming of a verse
Make a vineyard of the curse,
Sing of human unsuccess
In a rapture of distress.
In the deserts of the heart
Let the healing fountains start,
In the prison of his days
Teach the free man how to praise.
– – WH Auden
from “1054 AD”
Sometimes it seems I had a dream, and, as a dreamer woke immersed in mineral baths closed within a cool, dark chamber fed by streams flowing in from the center of nowhere.
Hanging from the granite ceiling a kerosene lantern cast shards of light through the pale steam rising from the surface of the pools.
Ripples radiated outwards from the edges of my body and tapping faintly on the rock revealed the edges of the chamber.
Outside I could hear the wind slide across the spine of the mountains, speaking in a language that I remembered but could no longer understand.
Steam filled my nostrils and heat penetrated my bones until, after a time, I had no body, only a sense of silence and distance and calm.
The steel mill sky is alive.
The fire breaks white and zigzag
shot on a gun-metal gloaming.
Man is a long time coming.
Man will yet win.
Brother may yet line up with brother:
This old anvil laughs at many broken hammers.
There are men who can’t be bought.
The fireborn are at home in fire.
The stars make no noise,
You can’t hinder the wind from blowing.
Time is a great teacher.
Who can live without hope?
In the darkness with a great bundle of grief
the people march.
In the night, and overhead a shovel of stars for keeps, the people
march:
“Where to? what next?”
— Carl Sandberg
Camouflage
Sourdough Mountain Lookout
Down valley a smoke haze
Three days heat, after five days rain
Pitch glows on the fir-cones
Across rocks and meadows
Swarms of new flies.
I cannot remember things I once read
A few friends, but they are in cities.
Drinking cold snow-water from a tin cup
Looking down for miles
Through high still air.
BY GARY SNYDER
Chimes of Freedom
Starry-eyed an’ laughing as I recall when we were caught
Trapped by no track of hours for they hanged suspended
As we listened one last time an’ we watched with one last look
Spellbound an’ swallowed ’til the tolling ended
Tolling for the aching ones whose wounds cannot be nursed
For the countless confused, accused, misused, strung-out ones an’ worse
An’ for every hung-up person in the whole wide universe
An’ we gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing
“From a student radical/hippie/leftist of the Free Speech Movement/Vietnam Day Commitee era and a full-on Democratic Liberal in the decades after, I think I’ve evolved a politics that is neither right nor left but is, in its elemental nature, draconian. In the last 20 years, I’ve taken apart my beliefs with a sledgehammer. Now I’ve got to put the surviving parts back together with tweezers and other ‘shabby equipment, always deteriorating’.”
Byzantium
That is no country for old men. The young
In one another’s arms, birds in the trees
—Those dying generations—at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.
An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.
O sages standing in God’s holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.
– – W. B. Yeats, 1865 – 1939
De Breanski
VAN GOGH
Hillegas
To the Stonecutters
Stone-cutters fighting time with marble, you foredefeated
Challengers of oblivion
Eat cynical earnings, knowing rock splits, records fall down,
The square-limbed Roman letters
Scale in the thaws, wear in the rain. The poet as well
Builds his monument mockingly;
For man will be blotted out, the blithe earth die, the brave sun
Die blind and blacken to the heart:
Yet stones have stood for a thousand years, and pained
thoughts found
The honey of peace in old poems.
— Robinson Jeffers
Real World Address for Donations, Mash Notes and Hate Mail
Gerard Van der Leun
1692 MANGROVE AVE
APT 379
Chico, Ca 95926
from “1054 AD”
Sometimes it seems I had a dream, and, as a dreamer woke immersed in mineral baths closed within a cool, dark chamber fed by streams flowing in from the center of nowhere.
Hanging from the granite ceiling a kerosene lantern cast shards of light through the pale steam rising from the surface of the pools.
Ripples radiated outwards from the edges of my body and tapping faintly on the rock revealed the edges of the chamber.
Outside I could hear the wind slide across the spine of the mountains, speaking in a language that I remembered but could no longer understand.
Steam filled my nostrils and heat penetrated my bones until, after a time, I had no body, only a sense of silence and distance and calm.
Museo Galileo – Enlarged image – Middle finger of Galileo’s right hand (Inv. 2432)![That Was the Whopper Weekend That Was [Illustrated]](https://americandigest.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/welcometohell-150x150.jpg "That Was the Whopper Weekend That Was [Illustrated]")
![Allen Ginsberg: The Interview, <strong> ➡ 1972 ⬅ </strong> [Republished by unpopular demand]](https://americandigest.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/ginsbergnirvana-150x150.jpg "Allen Ginsberg: The Interview, <strong> ➡ 1972 ⬅ </strong> [Republished by unpopular demand]")
Stone-cutters fighting time with marble, you foredefeated
Comments on this entry are closed.
There is nothing in the wave of anti-Catholic hysteria that overwhelmed Europe after the so-called “Reformation” that compares with the question of Galileo (1564 – 1642). The usual myth says that the Church tried to censure the spunky Italian because his scientific findings went against the Bible. Called before the Roman Inquisition, Galileo was forced to recant his views that the earth revolved around the sun. Under his breath he is rumored to have said, “Yet it does move.” It matters not at all that little of that is true. What matters is the myth.
To state the question another way, Galileo said that the sun was the center of the universe—heliocentrism. The Catholic Church said it was not. Who was right?
Sorry Mike, but the Galileo dispute with the RCC was a tiny nothing-burger compared to the many other vastly more important matters brought by the “so-called” Reformers and forced before the Roman Church in the sixteenth century. It appears to me that there exists at least a dozen empty shelves in your very accomplished personal library. I do not wish to begin an endless argument here, so I’ll just bow out as gracefully as I can.
I have 200 books on theology out of the 1000 books on my shelves. Most of these theological tomes are Protestant. It was a Protestant book, “Mere Christianity”, that brought me back into the Light. And it was a Protestant preacher’s son that asked me to read that book. It can be argued that Protestantism saved my eternal soul—quite literally, and quite permanently.
Whatever differences exist among Christian faiths, the differences between those faiths and the outside world are fundamentally and profoundly more important. The enemy of Christianity is Lucifer, not other Christians.
Mike, I apologize for misinterpreting what I took as a possible insult towards the spirit of the Reformation. I do believe that the well aimed criticism by the Reformers, especially in that period of time in history, was well deserved by the RCC and the unscriptural and immoral behavior of its magisterium.
Dear Denny: No apologies necessary. The Catholic Church before 1517 needed reform—and not even the Church herself disagrees. The Council of Trent (1545 – 1563) provided that reform, and reaffirmed Catholic Dogma and Catholic Doctrines.
The condition of the Church circa 1530. The worldly Cardinal Wolsey and Saint Thomas Moore. Moore would be beheaded by Henry VIII in 1535.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GI3-ZcJVN_k
Whatever was the condition of the Catholic Church at the time of the Reformation, her condition now is far worse. I would guess that 90 percent of all cardinals and bishops today are either practicing sodomites, in favor of sodomy, or heretics. And “Francis” is pope in the same manner as Biden is “president”.
Jesus wept. Jesus weeps.
Amen. “The enemy of Christianity is Lucifer, not other Christians.” And Lucifer (Satan if you’ll allow) has his own gospel.
The gospel of Satan is not a black gospel that impels reprobates into the worship of darkness and despair. It is not a gospel that preaches war and cancerous living. It is not a gospel that divides and separates families. It is not a gospel that belittles man and calls forth the darker angels of our nature. Rather, the gospel of Satan lifts up man to lofty heights. It calls men to acts of benevolence, peace and unity. It rewards the highest acts of natural charity and human endeavor. It encourages man to seek the common good of humanity and uplifts the “human spirit” as supreme. The gospel of Satan denies the total depravity of man, and supports the teaching of man/god cooperation in the area of salvation and “godly” living. The gospel of Satan declares that God is a mere witness in the redemption of mankind, not the author and finisher of it, and that He has merely made a way for those who can find it within themselves to seek after Him. The gospel of Satan does not deny Jesus Christ so much as it demotes Him from His sovereign throne.
“Religion today is not transforming people; rather it is being transformed by the people. It is not raising the moral level of society; it is descending to society’s own level, and congratulating itself that it has scored a victory because society is smilingly accepting its surrender.” A. W. Tozer
PS: We also have a house full of books. About 1/3 are theological.
You have summed up well Satan’s game plan. Christ desired that the world be conformed to His Church. Modern man conforms the Church to the world. Here is a recent headline that shows the modern “church” in all its Satanic majesty:
“World’s First Lesbian Bishop Calls for Church to Remove Crosses, to Install Muslim Prayer Space”
Christ did not die for this.
IT IS well to remember, always, that regardless of doctrinal disputes, “The Church is One.”
“spunky Italian”
-5 pts.
With the absolute and total shitshow that is now “science,” I wouldn’t be surprised if science next declares that the sun is not a sun at all but a mirror. Or, something absurdist like that.
My beloved governor, yesterday, Tweeted that the next event to cringe about is the predicted total loss of glaciers on the Olympic Mountain Range in Washington. I say bullshit and he’s a ruddy bullshitter of the first order. How will the glaciers melt? Gaslighting! That’s how.
Anyway, I am greatly amused at the honorification of Galileos middle finger.
Galileo did not run afoul of the Pope because he wrote about the sun being the center of the solar system
That had been taught (along with a couple of other models) as a possible explanation for planetary movement in Catholic universities since shortly after Copernicus
He ran into trouble because besides being a genius, he was, first and foremost, an asshole, and secondly, because he decided to introduce an utterly unneeded point of contention into his work (probably because of point one)
As to point one – the Copernican model assumed orbits were circular, which, of course they are not; therefore epicycles (fudge factors) that were the Achilles heal of other earth centered models were still required (though not as many). When other astronomers pointed this out and developed alternative orbital models (elliptical – Kepler) – Galileo publicly insulted and attacked them, thereby making them his enemies. Relatedly, when a comet was being carefully observed by Jesuit astronomers, who concluded that the body must have an elliptical orbit around the sun to explain its movement, Galileo not only said they were wrong, but went so far as to deny that the comet was an astronomical body – that it was simply a trick of light; thereby pissing off the Jesuits
But most important – in his published presentation, he had the individual presenting the earth-centric case appear to be an idiot – his name was Simplicitus – and had him mouth phrases that were known to be spoken by the Pope. At a time when Rome was part of the Papal States and the Pope was also an earthly prince in whose kingdom Galileo resided – a prince, by the way, who had defended Galileo from critics, promoted him, and funded his work – well, Galileo decided to very publicly insult that same guy.
You just did not do that in Europe at this time to a ruler in whose land you resided – Pope or no Pope
I think that establishes the veracity of point one
As to point two – Galileo felt the need to include a passage in his paper stating that where science and the Bible seemed to differ, folks should just interpret the Bible their own way. Now, given that the Reformation was raging and that there had just been a little bit of associated unpleasantness in Germany called the Peasant Revolt (led by an heretical priest who felt that his personal biblical interpretations were correct, which infuriated Luther, who urged the princes of Germany to destroy him – story for another day) that had resulted in 50,000 or so people being slaughtered in one or two battles… this was, you might say, sort of an indelicate suggestion to mention at that time
You will note, none of the above really had anything to do with any theological opinion concerning heliocentrism – and it really is only tangentially – through historical coincidence – related to the Reformation.
It is really not even about science
It is really about a guy – albeit a really, really brilliant guy – who threw eggs at the people in his vicinity and was then surprised when they turned on him
Later on, the story was reworked to became about Science! (as opposed to science) triumphing over Superstition! (i.e. Christianity in all of its variants)
By the way, when Kepler later published his final papers on elliptical orbits of planets, the Church fairly quickly adopted his models of planetary movement in Catholic universities – because his model worked
Good job. Thank you.
A brilliant summation of the issues involved. I wish all history texts would refer to Galileo as what he was—and what you said he was: an asshole. I would throw in “arrogant prick” as well.
Incidentally, Galileo’s father was a musician and composer of renown. Here is his “Ancient Airs and Dances”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ab1WyWzTLq0
Excellent summary jscd. Appreciate the effort. Mike is right that Protestants get the Bible right and not Catholics. Even though I am Catholic I only agree with the doctrine, not the personalities. It is the Protestants that get Genesis 15. Catholics never do – at least I rarely meet a Priest that does. If you don’t get Genesis 15, then the Crucifixion, the redemption, the whole thing is insanity. Ayn Rand didn’t get it either even though she arrogantly said she studied Christianity and the other philosophers. (Mike got that right too) If you understand Gen 15 then the whole thing makes perfect sense.