Hey FrGamble!

That might be what you think the Church is, but it is so far from the truth to be laughable if it wasn't so sad that I really think you believe it. I think you might have some personal experiences, or others who have taught you such things have had such experiences, that support what you are saying here and that I find most sad of all and not your fault at all.

Quote: FrGamble

That might be what you think the Church is, but it is so far from the truth to be laughable if it wasn't so sad

No no, you miss the point. Whats sad
is men are so desperate to be morally
in charge of others that they invent
gods and saviors to give them false
authority. And convince others to go
along with it, that's whats sad. It stops
people in their tracks from thinking
for themselves and advancing as a
society. It keeps them mired in the
muck of worrying about pleasing some
god who doesn't even exist. That's the
laughable part.

Quote: Evenbob

It stops
people in their tracks from thinking
for themselves and advancing as a
society.

This is where you lose me. What evidence do you have for this? Has society not advanced under religion, be it Jewish, Christian, Buddhist, or Islamic? Have not some of the greatest minds; philosophers, architects, artists, statesmen, and scientists been religious? Again I think you are projecting a poor understanding of religion, especially Catholicism, that is not based in reality.

Quote: FrGamble

you are projecting a poor understanding of religion,

You project a poor understanding of history. Islam
was a leader in mathematics until it was radicalized.
Aristotle is the father of modern science and is
the inventor of the scientific method, yet his
teachings were banned as heresy by the Vatican
in Catholic universities. As always, Catholics had
to be dragged kicking and screaming into the
modern age, as is still happening to this day.

Quote: Evenbob

You project a poor understanding of history.

You saying this to me is staggering.

Quote:

Islam
was a leader in mathematics until it was radicalized.

Not only in mathematics, very true.

Quote:

Aristotle is the father of modern science and is
the inventor of the scientific method, yet his
teachings were banned as heresy by the Vatican
in Catholic universities.

Absolutely false. How or why do you say this? In the famous Vatican Raphel rooms there is the famous fresco of "The School of Athens" depicting Plato and Aristotle right in the center. St. Thomas Aquinas so loved Aristotle that he simply called him, "the Philosopher". Aristotle was the father of the Scholastic tradition in the Church and was extolled and required reading by the Vatican. In my seminary there is a statue of none other than Aristotle. Here is a perfect time for you to admit you are wrong and to see the colored and corrupted lenses you view the Church. How do you come up with this stuff? seriously.

Quote:

As always, Catholics had
to be dragged kicking and screaming into the
modern age, as is still happening to this day.

You may seriously have one of the worst and most warped views of history I have ever seen. Modern cosmology, genetics, care for the worker, education of women, rejecting prejudice, the abolition movement, universities, hospitals, civil rights, the protection of the unborn, etc. - the Church is always leading or part of the developments and improvements in society.

Quote: FrGamble

Absolutely false. How or why do you say this? .

"The Condemnations... were enacted to restrict certain teachings as being heretical. These included a number of medieval theological teachings, but most importantly the physical treatises of Aristotle...Approximately sixteen lists of censured theses were issued during the 13th and 14th centuries. Most of these lists of propositions were put together into systematic collections of prohibited articles. Of these, the Condemnations of 1277 are considered particularly important by those historians who consider that they had a side effect of encouraging scholars to question the tenets of Aristotelian science."

In other words, by the Church banning Aristotle, it led
to more investigation of his methods, and the Church,
as I said, was dragged kicking and screaming into
accepting his theories.

I don't think you really understand what you are talking about.

"Some historians have interpreted the condemnations of the University of Paris as antagonistic to the autonomy of philosophy, as a symbol of an “intellectual crisis” in the University and culture of the late thirteenth century and a demonstration of the conflict between faith and what would become science.5 This interpretation is partially correct, but "tension" is a more accurate word than "crisis." The refusal of the theologians and philosophers to separate the truths of faith from the truths of reason may have caused tension, but hardly a crisis, for this tension to purify Greek thought from whatever conflicted with Christian theology is tension that brought about the intellectual purification that led to the emergence of modern science. The rejection of the ancient ideas of an eternal, cycling, pantheistic, animistic world had to be refuted before a realistic physics, and thus science, could emerge in Christian Europe. This rejection is a distinction that isolates the Christian West culture from all others, a theological distinction that allows one to say, with confidence, that science indeed emerged from a reconciliation of the cosmic view with Christian faith.
There is a lesson for modern-day science in this story. If it seems like, in the century in which we live, science and faith are irreconcilable, the reason is not because they are in actual conflict, but because our knowledge is incomplete. By striving for new understanding toward reconciliation, even amid tension that appears to some as crisis, new insights to realistic breakthroughs can be made. Scientific progress needs the light of faith."

The Condemnations of 1277

Wow, talk about verbal gymnastics. Look at what they acually did, rather than arguing about whether crisis or tension is a better word to describe it.

As for the rest, I strongly disagree with "The rejection of the ancient ideas of an eternal, cycling, pantheistic, animistic world had to be refuted before a realistic physics, and thus science, could emerge in Christian Europe. "

Right there they are saying they were on a mission to destroy science until they could get people to believe in their non-scientific world view, and then attempted to build science on this new "reality"

Quote: FrGamble

I don't think you really understand what you are talking about.

Did you know that Aristotle didn't believe the
universe was 'created' by some god, but that
it's been here forever? Wow, where I have I
heard that before. I wonder how the Church
'reconciled' that little tidbit of information.

Quote: Dalex64

Right there they are saying they were on a mission to destroy science until they could get people to believe in their non-scientific world view, and then attempted to build science on this new "reality"

Of course, but FrG always leaves that detail out.

Quote: Dalex64

As for the rest, I strongly disagree with "The rejection of the ancient ideas of an eternal, cycling, pantheistic, animistic world had to be refuted before a realistic physics, and thus science, could emerge in Christian Europe. "

Right there they are saying they were on a mission to destroy science until they could get people to believe in their non-scientific world view, and then attempted to build science on this new "reality"

Reality and realistic modern science and physics is not built on ancient ideas of an eternal, cyclical, pantheistic, animistic world. Think about it for a second and what that would mean for the discovery of the expanding universe and what we now know about time and relativity. The idea of an eternal world is an old one that was pre-scientific.