[ffusco]

By canon I mean the official party line of the Church- that The Earth is the center of the solar system. Your right, Galileo comes across as a smart-ass!

...............though they do move. (wasn't that the caviat of his re-cant?)

[RobbyS]

Part of it was that Catholics were engaged in a war to the deathe death with the Protestants (Remember that the Galileo thing took place during the 30-years war.) The Church didn't want to be thought less respectful of the Bible than the Protestants. The irony is that until the Reformation the Church never felt herself confined to a literal interpretation of the Bible. But, as the saying goes, in wartimes one tends to become more like one's enemy.

[Antoninus]

By canon I mean the official party line of the Church- that The Earth is the center of the solar system.

Why, then, didn't Copernicus have the same problem as the G-man?