Bellarmine was a brilliant intellectual and a patron of Galileo, who was interested in his work and encouraged it. I seem to remember he had died by the time the Galileo affair achieved critical mass. But that's not to say that he would have been in a position to come to Galileo's defense, were he then living. The Roman Church is not a democracy: the Pope -- who stands in the place of Christ on earth -- is sole authority. The College of Cardinals may propose, but only the Pope may "dispose."
Plus you neglect to discuss the historical context of l'affaire Galileo: This was during a time when the Roman Church was asserting its authority against the encroachments of Reformed Christianity, the great achievement of Luther and Calvin. Interestingly enough, the Reformed Church has strong democratic elements. But I digress.
Bottom line, the Galileo trial was, at least in part, a political exercise, and not so much a resolution of an intellectual dispute. It seems that Galileo was (unfortunately) a pawn used in the Church's counter-reformation strategy.
You must remember that religion and church institutions are not the same thing, and ought not to be conflated. All church institutions are human institutions, and are thus prone to error. There have been some exacrable popes. There have been charlatans in many religious confessions. But then there have been magnificent, faithful popes, such as the late John-Paul II, who have suffered genuinely to take up Christ's Cross for the good of their fellow members in the Body of Christ.
As my dear friend hosepipe has said, Christ did not come to establish a religion; He came to establish a family under God.
It remains to be said that the American Founding was specifically Calvinist in philosophy, not Catholic. Indeed, Catholics in America were held in deep suspicion, right up to quite recent times. Indeed, JFK's Catholicism was a burning issue in the Presidential Campaign of 1960. Many Americans of Reformed persuasion felt that he could not be trusted as president, because of his supposed primary allegience to the Pope (who is the sovereign of a sovereign nation, the Vatican). But he squeaked out an election victory all the same (thanks to voter fraud in Chicago and Texas :^) ); and anti-Catholic sentiment began to die down from that time forward.
The last thing I'd like to point out is one doesn't have to be Catholic to be a faithful Christian. Or even "churched," necessarily.
FWIW. Thanks ever so much for writing, Patrick!
Lovely display; loving, factual, tolerant, yet not wishy washy.. A marvelous example to follow or even lead with..
Thank you so much for the excellent essay-post putting everything in historical and most especially, Spiritual, context!
Reading your footprints bump!