Copernicus Gets Reburial by Roman Catholic Church

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The remains of Nicolaus Copernicus were recently laid to rest again in a Cathedral in Poland in a ceremony with all the pomp the Roman Catholic Church could provide. Quite different from his original humble burial in 1543. This time Poland's highest-ranking clergymen officiated as an honor guard escorted his casket to the original burial site. The grave's black granite tombstone, adorned with six planets encircling a golden sun, now trumpets his authorship of the modern heliocentric theory.

Check out this article for how they tracked down his remains using modern CSI techniques!

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/news/94698114.html

Interesting this is happening in the same year as the remains of Tycho Brahe have been exhumed to establish his cause of death.

http://skyscript.co.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5161

Mark
Last edited by Mark on Sat Jun 05, 2010 5:26 pm, edited 2 times in total.
As thou conversest with the heavens, so instruct and inform thy minde according to the image of Divinity William Lilly

Re: Copernicus Gets Reburial by Roman Catholic Church

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MarkC wrote:The remains of Nicolaus Copernicus were recently laid to rest again in a Cathedral in Poland in a ceremony full of all the pomp the Roman Catholic Church could provide. Quite different from his original humble burial in 1543.
On the other hand, whatever Inquisition and all the rest, Galileo rests ( between Astronomy and Geometry) in Santa Croce in Florence- the church famous for the burials of famous Italians, we have another poem very known on it for Italian teenagers- since his death.


margherita
Traditional astrology at
http://heavenastrolabe.wordpress.com

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On the other hand, whatever Inquisition and all the rest, Galileo rests ( between Astronomy and Geometry) in Santa Croce in Florence- the church famous for the burials of famous Italians, we have another poem very known on it for Italian teenagers- since his death.
Good to see it is the Church that has now 'recanted' on its views. :wink:

Mark
As thou conversest with the heavens, so instruct and inform thy minde according to the image of Divinity William Lilly

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Good timing, my 13-year has chosen Copernicus for his astronomy project - now he can finish it off with this piece of news.

And that church in Florence is amazing when you walk around reading all the names of such brilliant people!

Tracey

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Interesting this is happening in the same year as the remains of Tycho Brahe have been exhumed to establish his cause of death.
This business of digging up people to satisfy conspiracy theorists is getting ghoulish. Not that he has a lot in common with Tycho Brahe, but American train robber/bank robber/murderer Jesse James suffered the same indignity when someone claimed he was not as popularly claimed killed while straightening a picture on the wall. DNA tests proved it was Jesse, but that, as expected, didn't satisfy the conspiracy theorists.

Then there was the movement, abandoned only within the last year or so, to dig up not only Billy the Kid, but his mother as well to see if the DNA matched. Small problem with that one - no one is certain if Billy is in the grave that has his name on it and no one really knows where his mother is buried. It seems the grave that supposedly held Billy, and it was not certain that it did, was one of many that rose to the surface when the cemetery was flooded. The caskets were all over the place and there was no way to sort them out. So they were re-buried, but who knows who went where? Mercifully that one died out.

Lee Harvey Oswald was dug up, too and sure enough, it was Lee and still the people who insisted it wasn't him still say it wasn't him even after his wife and mother identified him (again).

Anyway, on another subject, if anyone is interested in something a whole lot closer to the truth about the Galileo case than is usually tossed around, I strongly recommend the book Galileo, Science, and the Church by Jerome Langford

http://www.amazon.com/Galileo-Science-C ... 0472065106

The book is short, interesting and pretty persuasive that there was lots of blame to go around and it all wasn't on the Church. If you go to ABE books you can find copies cheap, but FYI, Langford published 3 editions each one after more information on the case had been discovered. The last one was in 1992 and it was republished in hardcover in 1998.

Stop the digging.

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Dear Tom,
Tom wrote: Anyway, on another subject, if anyone is interested in something a whole lot closer to the truth about the Galileo case than is usually tossed around, I strongly recommend the book Galileo, Science, and the Church by Jerome Langford

http://www.amazon.com/Galileo-Science-C ... 0472065106

The book is short, interesting and pretty persuasive that there was lots of blame to go around and it all wasn't on the Church.
surely Galileo was a pest, who put his nose inside the Church doctrine, not just into the solar system. In his same time monks and priests were devoted to astrology (here I saw a wonderful exhibition of astrological books Astrologia Gallica included coming from the Jesuit headquartiers) and the Jesuit Atanasius Kircher was writing his book about Noah's Ark where he anticipated a sort of evolutionism explaining that in the Ark there was no room for all the animals and many derived for crossing different breed, they were not created directly by God.

But I believe Galileo temperament - people from Tuscany are famous to have fizzy manners- is not a good reason to force an old and blind man to abjure and close him in a villa. Remember that the the ghost of Giordano Bruno burned in Campo de Fiori in 1600 haunted Rome and Europe all...
Campanella for much less should fly in Paris,

Anyway differently from Copernic was buried in Santa Croce with all the honor he deserved.

margherita
Traditional astrology at
http://heavenastrolabe.wordpress.com

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Anyway, on another subject, if anyone is interested in something a whole lot closer to the truth about the Galileo case than is usually tossed around, I strongly recommend the book Galileo, Science, and the Church by Jerome Langford
Thanks Tom,

Its looks an interesting read. In our increasingly science centered culture it seems figures like these are often 'air brushed' to fit the modern secular desire for unblemished heroes fighting medieval superstition and prejudice. Its the same with Kepler where his neo-Pythagoreanism and interest in astrology are presented by many modern writers as irrelevent idiosyncracies that are totally disconnected from his astronomical discoveries.

Mark
As thou conversest with the heavens, so instruct and inform thy minde according to the image of Divinity William Lilly

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Hi Margherita,

Langford's point is that the whole story is not well known and that no one in the whole affair is blameless and some of what happened is very understandable given the time at which it occurred. Mark is on the money when he says:

In our increasingly science centered culture it seems figures like these are often 'air brushed' to fit the modern secular desire for unblemished heroes fighting medieval superstition and prejudice.
The story does not take place in one short time frame but rather over a period of about 16 years. Most of that time Galileo was teaching heliocentrism with the knowledge and approval of the Church. The Church did not suddenly discover Galileo teaching heliocentrism and mount their chargers and throw the full weight of their authority and power against him. He was permitted to teach it, but he could only teach it as an alternative, not as a fact, unless and until he could prove it. He could not.

He had supporters in the Church. One theologian put it beautifully when he said "The Bible tells us how to get to heaven, not how the heavens work."

In fact the "Church" as that word is commonly understood, didn't go after him at all until the Jesuits, the academics, presented a very distorted version of what it was he was doing and saying, and no one bothered to check to see if they were accurate. But he was tactless in his approach and did not seem to fully grasp the diplomacy required to do something like this. He believed it, and that was the only thing that mattered. You have to watch those Pisces with Leo rising.

The Pope signed off on his punishment only after being given a distorted report of Galileo's defense and the proceedings. In short the whole affair was a mess.

Galileo contributed to his own downfall by misinterpreting some actions by the Church and making some serious diplomatic gaffes when he wrote his Dialogue. But to make matters worse, his actions were misrepresented to the Pope who once encouraged Galileo to continue his studies as did a previous Pope. His book, as was the custom of the day, had to be approved by a Church censor. The censor had problems with it, may have missed some of the things that got Galileo in trouble, but he also had political pressure applied to him to approve the work and he did. This allowed Galileo to argue, correctly, that if his book was heretical, why did the Church allow him to publish it? That is a fair question. None of this squares with the story as it is related to students in the US.

But what got him into the most trouble, the way I understand it is exactly what you said:

surely Galileo was a pest, who put his nose inside the Church doctrine, not just into the solar system.
Some churchmen, notably Jesuits, a teaching order, were particularly offended that Galileo was, in their view teaching theology or the reversal of accepted theology and that was their field of expertise not his. This is so relevant as this is precisely the same argument made by man made global warming advocates who, as members of the "church" of modern science, resent outsiders disagreeing with them. Like Galileo's critics, they use political means to promote their position all the while acting like sanctimonious protectors of the one truth.

I think this is a fascinating story that is well worth learning about and learning from.

Now Margherita, if you are interested in reading this same story but in more detail and in Italian, there is a book written in 1983 by Pietro Redondi. In English the book is titled Galileo Heretic. It may have the same title in Italian.

Langford's first edition was published in 1966. This book comes after that and after more documents on the case were released. Enjoy.

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Tom wrote: I think this is a fascinating story that is well worth learning about and learning from.
Now Margherita, if you are interested in reading this same story but in more detail and in Italian, there is a book written in 1983 by Pietro Redondi. In English the book is titled Galileo Heretic. It may have the same title in Italian.

Langford's first edition was published in 1966. This book comes after that and after more documents on the case were released. Enjoy. [/color]
yes, it's a very fascinating story.

This is Dominican convent, Insula sapientae, where Galileo abjured. The video is in Italian, but you can see the location.

http://www.klubsite.com/video/RCOEc328kHs/watch.html

margherita
Traditional astrology at
http://heavenastrolabe.wordpress.com