From: jmm25@po.CWRU.Edu (Jessica M. Mcgeary)
Newsgroups: alt.pagan
Subject: Re: Yhe church and Galielo
Date: 10 Nov 1992 15:54:08 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (USA)
NNTP-Posting-Host: thor.ins.cwru.edu


>Article #22295 (22316 is last):
>Newsgroups: alt.pagan
>From: markbr%radian@natinst.com (markbr)
>Subject: Re: Yhe church and Galielo
>Date: Mon Nov  9 14:13:37 1992
>
>In article <2AFC5090.4984@news.service.uci.edu> cortese@skid.ps.uci.edu (Janis Maria Cortese) writes:
>>In article <BxD4nz.Gw2@umassd.edu> rolls@cis.umassd.edu (Frank Pinto) writes:
>>>Hello all
>>>
>>>I;m new to this group, however, does any
>>>one have any comment about the church finnaly
>>>agreeing with Galileo about the center of the solar system?
>>
>>Just one:  DUH!
>>
>>Blessings,
>>Janis
>>
>No, NO, Janis. That's Dum de dum-dum.
>I read that they declared it to be "...a tragic misunderstanding...". Right.
>It's probably about as near as the Pope'll get to saying "fergit Papal
>infallibility, il Papa was ***->WRONG<-***". Let's see, Hitler and the Jews
>had a "tragic misunderstanding, too", as did the Church & the Albignesians....
>
>        mark, celebrating the Earth going around the Sun!


   It gets a bit annoying sometimes, being a Catholic, because I've also 
got this sense of honor that leads me to defend even the most medieval of 
institutions when people attack them for the wrong reason.

   Yes, the pope was pigheaded. Yes, they are almost all pigheaded. Yes, 
the only pope in the twentieth century that I can really feel good about is 
John XXIII (dunno about John Paul I, he died too soon). BUT-

   they didn't declare themselves to be infallible about the earth/sun bit.

   Y'all have gotta understand, unless the pope SPECIFICALLY says that he's 
being infallible, it doesn't count. Takes a LOT of chutzpah to claim 
infallibility for anything, true. But that partickler doctrine is only to 
be applied to questions that are REALLY concerned with the Catholic faith. 
The pope can change his mind, or in this case the mind of Urban the 
Whatever, about anything he wants, unless it was declared infallible by a 
pope who SAID he was "speaking from the seat of Peter". The whole 
infallibilty thing, as far as I can see, is just the pope's way of saying 
"This is REALLY one of the rules, and if you don't like it then you can't 
be a Catholic any more." While that was what happened to poor old Galileo, 
more or less, it wasn't made a Really Official Cross-My-Heart-And-Hope-To- 
Die rule via infallible pronouncement, and therefore can be reversed.
   The church has ALSO never said anything infallibly about birth control 
or abortion. Humanae Vitae was simply a papal encyclical, a pronouncement 
after a long period of study and meditation and prayer. The church still 
has the option of coming to its senses. It isn't until the Great White 
Father In Rome gets on his throne and says "this is an unchangable rule" 
that it becomes so. For now, there's still a chance.

Sorry; had to be said. I'm in an odd sort of mood owing to lack of sleep 
and a calc test.
-- 
"In place of your dream of an omniscient automaton, accept the fact that
any knowledge man acquires is acquired by his own will and effort, and that
_that_ is his distinction in the universe, _that_ is his nature, his 
morality, his glory."  --Atlas Shrugged, p. 1058