BEFORE Galileo popped up with the “false” notion that the earth revolves around the sun, the planet was in a far better state, with the Catholic Church in a position of absolute authority over worldly affairs.
That’s the view of a bunch of barmy Catholics in the US who are determined to turn the clock back centuries to a time when geocentrism – the belief that the earth was the centre of the universe – lay at the core of Catholic doctrine.
According to this report, those promoting geocentrism argue that heliocentrism – or the centuries-old consensus among scientists that Earth revolves around the sun – is a conspiracy to squelch the church’s influence.
Class-A lunatic Robert A Sungenis
Robert A Sungenis is the leader of a budding movement to get scientists to reconsider. He insists:
Heliocentrism becomes dangerous if it is being propped up as the true system when, in fact, it is a false system.
False information leads to false ideas, and false ideas lead to illicit and immoral actions – thus the state of the world today .… Prior to Galileo, the church was in full command of the world, and governments and academia were subservient to her.
Sungenis, a convert to Catholicism, is the founder of Bellarmine Theological Forum, renamed from Catholic Apologetics International in August 2007. Sungenis has been described by the Southern Poverty Law Centre as:
One of the most rabid and open anti-Semites in the entire radical traditionalist movement.
The SPLC has included him in its “Dirty Dozen” list after he published an article which repeated “a series of ancient anti-Semitic canards” on the subject of Jewish conversion. He has also made public statements questioning the facts of the Holocaust.
Earlier this year a Catholic conference in London, at which Sungenis was to speak, was cancelled at the last moment.
Another proponent of geocentrism is James Phillips, who attends Our Lady Immaculate Catholic Church in Oak Park, Illinois., a parish run by the Society of St. Pius X, which rejects most of the modernising reforms made by the Vatican II council from 1962 to 1965.
He admits that the modern Church sees the movement as stark staring bonkers.
This subject is, as far as I can see, an embarrassment to the modern church because the world more or less looks upon geocentrism, or someone who believes it, in the same boat as the flat Earth.
Said Brother Guy Consolmagno, curator of meteorites and spokesman for the Vatican Observatory:
I have no idea who these people are. Are they sincere, or is this a clever bit of theatre?
Last autumn the group organised a conference near the University of Notre Dame campus in South Bend, Indiana titled Galileo Was Wrong. The Church Was Right.
Astrophysicists at Notre Dame didn’t appreciate the group hitching its wagon to America’s flagship Catholic university and resurrecting a concept that’s extinct for a reason.
Astrophysics professor Peter Garnavich said:
It’s an idea whose time has come and gone. There are some people who want to move the world back to the 1950s when it seemed like a better time. These are people who want to move the world back to the 1250s.
But supporters contend there is scientific evidence to support geocentrism, just as there is evidence to support the six-day story of creation in Genesis.
Sungenis says that there are many biblical verses which support this notion, and cites Joshua 10:12-14 as definitive proof:
And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, while the nation took vengeance on its foe. … The sun halted in the middle of the sky; not for a whole day did it resume its swift course.
Hat tip: Paul Skiles
To me, Dr. Sungenis looks like a double agent. He’ll be interesting to watch.