Madam, - Leo Clear (September 22nd) describes Christian obstruction of science as a "myth" and "really nothing more than historical make-believe".
He also cites the trial of Galileo Galilei (in 1633) as being the only example of the "imagined church antagonism to science" and says that "they [the Church authorities] were perfectly satisfied for him to teach [Copernicanism] as a hypothesis". I think the record says otherwise.
The case of Galileo is perhaps the pre-eminent example because of its importance, both to the history of science and to the post-Galilean shift from a Mediterranean scientific tradition, largely Christian, to a Northern European tradition, increasingly secular. It is not a unique example of the Church's persecution of scientific dissent.
Galileo's "Dialogue on the Great World Systems", published in 1632, resulted in his trial for heresy and conviction by the Roman Inquisition. This was the same Inquisition that had burned a contemporary scientist and philosopher, Giordano Bruno, at the stake in 1600, on similar charges. Galileo got off lightly: he was forced to recant under threat of torture; he was imprisoned, later commuted to lifetime house arrest; and his works were included on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum.
Hardly "imaginary" or benign acceptance of a "hypothesis".
If Mr Clear were to consult the same Indexhe might find some other interesting non-imaginary names: Francis Bacon, our own George Berkeley, Nicolaus Copernicus, René Descartes, Desiderius Erasmus and Blaise Pascal, to name a few. I concur with Mr Clear that we should not accept "distortions and half truths" and agree wholeheartedly that one should "approach the subject of Christianity's relationship with science in a spirit of inquiry and with an open mind". Neither should we ignore the historical record. - Is mise,
MARTIN J. KINSELLA, Luxembourg.