Tea at Trianon: The Galileo Myth

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Sunday, December 10, 2023

The Galileo Myth

From Catholic Exchange:

The Jesuits were a Catholic religious order that made significant scientific contributions, and Jesuit astronomers were able to confirm the observations of Galileo Galilei in 1610, and he was celebrated by illustrious Cardinals and Prelates, along with Pope Paul V when he visited Rome for the first time. After his Letter on Sunspots, his first public presentation of the Copernican model, the future Pope Urban VIII celebrated his accomplishment.

Since the Protestants were accusing the Church of not paying proper mind to the Bible, the Church desired facts to support the Copernican model, which appeared at the time to contradict the Bible. Galileo was instructed in 1616 to stop presenting his findings as absolute truth without proper evidence. Galileo at first complied, and during his second visit to Rome was once again celebrated with the same fanfare that he received the first time he made his appearance there.

Galileo was not later condemned by the Church for his Copernican model, but for publishing his findings as factual without adequate proof in his book, Dialogue on the Great World Systems, in 1632 after Pope Urban VIII requested he present his findings as a hypothesis rather than as matter of fact. He was not excommunicated, burned, or tortured for his developments in science; such falsehoods are a part of the Galileo Myth.

Again, it was not the scientific discovery that was refuted by the Church, but Galileo’s disobedience to the request by the Church to not present his findings as factual without sufficient evidence to defend Copernicanism as true without any doubt. However, the truth is that the Copernican model does not contradict Sacred Scripture since the Bible is not meant to be read like a science textbook. Pope Leo XIII in the nineteenth century, and St. Albert the Great, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Robert Bellarmine, and Galileo illustrate how the truths of faith and the truths of science can co-exist together. The English organic chemist, Derek Barton once said, “God is truth. There is no incompatibility between science and religion. Both are seeking the same truth. Science shows that God exists.” (Read more.)