My old pastor Msgr. Richard Schuler used to trot out this limerick on this Feast of St. Richard.
There was an old Bishop of Chichester,
Who said thrice (the Latin for which is ‘ter’),
“Avaunt and defiance,
Foul spirit called Science,
And quit Mother Church, thou bewitchest her.”
Of course the Church is not anti-science, unless it is HACK-science. At least in sane times the Church is against HACK-science. Sane times, mind you.
On this topic of the Church and Science I recommend the book, Galileo in Rome: The Rise and Fall of a Troublesome Genius by William R. Shea and Mariano Artigas and Dava Sobel’s A More Perfect Heaven: How Copernicus Revolutionized the Cosmos (UK edition HERE). In addition, there is Heilbron’s The Sun In The Church and Galileo by the same.
BTW… St. Richard called for a Crusade against the Saracens. Bless him.
Happy feast of St. Richard!
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. . . and was it not St. Richard of Chichester who also composed a prayer which in modernized form became an important song in the musical Godspell — and thus a bane to all Catholics (of a certain age) unlucky enough to have to go to the “guitar Mass” when they were younger!
Some Science Truth: Galileo WAS NOT tossed for saying that the Earth wasn’t the center of the universe. He got prosecuted for saying that God WAS NOT the center of OUR universe. Big difference…
I’m visiting Chichester Cathedral in Sussex, England in June. I shall go and say a prayer or two at St Richard’s tomb.
When I was a child, growing up in the Episcopal Church, our Sunday School had a little service for children which I attended from about age 3 or 4 until junior high. Every Sunday we sang Richard of Chichester’s Day by Day. Hence I can never forget it and this has done me so much good.
Regarding Galileo, his theory predicted there was only one high tide per day, which was not true. Of course the tides are extremely complicated. But he made this prediction, which sunk his case. (Apparently in the Mediterranean Sea there appears to be only one high tide per day?)
I honestly don’t know in what capacity we can even call Galileo a “genius,” if we are to compare him to his contemporaries. The 17th century is an age replete with brilliant thinkers, almost all of whom have been forgotten by most. Even his immediate circle of friends (such as Fortunio Liceti and Bonaventura Cavalieri) is incredible.
… I’m guessing his “secular canonization” has more to do with politics than merit. Troglodytes demanding more shadow puppets.
Justasinner,
My understansing is that he had a problem with Scripture saying that the sun stopped.
Cosmology of his time was much concerned with positing a static center of the universe. The argument then was the choice between sun or the earth.
Following Einstein, both the sun and earth are considered to be in motion, and there is not.much if any effort to find the center of the universe.
Nb: The concept of the Big Bang does not necessitate a symmetric universe.