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All Truth Agrees with Common Sense

In 1600, a man named Giordano Bruno (1548-1600) was convicted of being a heretic for believing that the earth moved about the Sun, and that there were many plants throughout the universe where life--living creations of God--existed.  Burno was burnt to death.

Galileo Galilei believed that the Bible could never be wrong.  However, he said, the interpreters of the Bible could make mistakes.  At that time, only Church priests were allowed to interpret the Bible, or to define God's intentions. It was absolutely unthinkable for a mere member of the public to do so.

Some of the Church clergy started accusing him of heresy. These accusations went to the Inquisition, the Church court, that investigated charges of heresy, and formally accused Galileo Galilei. This was a very serious matter. However, Galileo was found innocent of all charges, and cautioned not to teach the  that the sun is the center of the solar system, with the planets, (including the earth), orbiting around it.  
 

 Galileo Galilei understood that; All truth agrees with common sense.
 Galileo Galilei

Galileo Galilei an Italian-born astronomer and physicist. In 1592 He "enjoyed increased fame and notoriety as the greatest experimental physicist in all of Europe" and also "gained a reputation as the foremost astronomer, mathematician and philosopher of his day"
   << Galileo's Telescope
In 1610, Galileo invented the sector, discovered the four moons of Jupiter, the ring of Saturn, and Sun spots.
   << Galileo, Telescope and others at Venice
Galileo began to strongly assert "that the earth and the other planets traveled around the sun which was called the Copernican theory." Almost all people and religious leaders of his day believed that the planets and the sun traveled around the earth.

In early 1616, Galileo was summoned [by the Roman Catholic Church] to Rome for a determination on the orthodoxy of his views that the earth rotated around the sun. Although he was cleared of charges of heresy, he was ordered not "to hold or defend" the idea that the earth rotated around the sun. That is, he could treat the theory hypothetically but not treat it as if it were true.

"Galileo promised submission to the church but added, "I do not feel obliged to believe that that same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use."  (World History for Latter-Day Saints Vol.II p.47-50)
"All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them." (Galileo Galilei)
 
"In 1632, Galileo published a statement that the theory of the earth rotating around the sun was "logically superior".
Once again Galileo was summoned to Rome, this time to answer to the charge of willfully disobeying the order not, "to hold or defend" such a theory. In 1633, the Inquisition found Galileo guilty of the charge, forced him to (publicly withdraw his statement), and sentenced him to life imprisonment.
Because of Galileo's advanced age and poor health, the church allowed him to serve his imprisonment under house arrest in a villa outside Florence. There, he passed the remainder of his years in relative isolation, eventually becoming blind.
In 1979, Pope John Paul II declared that the Roman Catholic Church may have been mistaken in condemning Galileo. He instructed a church commission to study Galileo's case. In 1983, the commission concluded that Galileo should not have been condemned. In 1984, at the commission's recommendation, the church published all documents related to Galileo's trial. In 1992, Pope John Paul II publicly endorsed the commission's finding that the church had made a mistake in condemning Galileo."  (World Book Encyclopedia 1998)

"Galileo announced that the earth revolved they passed the sentence of death upon him. They thought it was too bad to kill the poor fool who thought the world revolved and was round, so they concluded to let him off if he would pledge himself not to teach this doctrine. But he could not keep the truth back and quietly taught it. So, they arranged to make him lie down in front of the church where they were worshiping God on this stationary earth and let everybody step on him to show their contempt, and when they all had stepped on him, he got up and said, `Well, it goes around just the same.'"  (World History for Latter-Day Saints Vol. II p. 47-50)  (World Book Encyclopedia 1998)  (About.com Inventore Galileo Galilei)
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"All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them."  (Galileo Galilei 1564-1642)
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