Devoted Catholic. His birthdate is 24 May 1443 and he died on 3 Oct 1543, age 75. He was canonized by Pope Pius IX in 1851. Copernicus' ideas about the Earth's movement were not new at the time but they did much to promote them. He published his theories in a book titled De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres). This work presented the theory that the Earth revolves around the Sun in order to explain some astronomical observations that could not be explained by the accepted geocentric model at the time. Although Copernicus proposed his ideas as a scientific explanation of reality, many people at the time rejected them because they believed that it was God who had created the Earth's movement; not humans. They also thought that if the Earth moved then men would fall off when standing on shore lines and that there would be earthquakes whenever the Earth moved against its natural course. In conclusion, Copernicus was a devout Catholic who tried to spread awareness about science despite religious leaders warning him not to do so.