CONVERSATIONS IN THE PANTHEON - The Truth about God and Religion

Galileo Versus Church Dogma

Thomas: The problem faced by the major religions today is their deficient holy books, particularly when it comes to creation stories. These books were written several millennia ago. It doesn't sound like a longtime, in the context of human evolution, but it's a very long time in the context of the scientific revolution of the past few centuries. The authors of such books described the history of humankind, the earth and the universe from accumulated knowledge; and while it was not insignificant, it was lacking in the fundamentals of science.

At the start of the new era, two thousand years ago, humans had been around for a longtime and had lived in cities for at least three thousand years. They also developed writing at about the same time they became urban dwellers. The holy book authors were intelligent people who left behind monumental works that have been read ever since and have been held as sacred texts by many. Moreover, the depth of feelings aroused by holy books is so great that they have inspired wars and even crimes against humanity. Sadly, they got most of it wrong.

Mathew: That's not surprising. But can't the holy books be reconciled with modern knowledge? Many scientists still believe in God and religion.

Thomas: Reconciliation is wishful thinking for believers. They want their cake and eat it too. If the authors of the holy books were inspired by the gods, then the gods got it wrong, which causes a problem because the gods cannot be wrong about their own creations. If the gods didn't inspire them, then those religions have no divine base because the holy books were all made up. This dilemma leaves religions between a rock and a hard place!

As you know, Mathew, christian churches have always taught the faithful that the scriptures are the words of God. This is so well drummed into people's minds that they often don't think that humans actually wrote them. If one asks a devout catholic about authorship of the bible, the typical response is that it's the work of God. The church encourages the belief that God guided the hands of those who wrote it. Therefore it carries the same weight as if God had written it. Unfortunately, as intelligent and knowledgeable those authors may have been, they didn't do a good job of describing the creation of both humans and the universe, among many other things.

Mathew: I know that divine inspiration is church dogma, and all faithful believe the holy books to be the word of their respective gods, regardless of the religion one adheres to. However, how can you tell them that the gods got it wrong?

Thomas: It's not easy because most of them don't really want to know. However, for those who do want to know it's easy because it's logical. The gods could not have inspired the authors of the holy books because they're not factual: they're full of errors. As the faithful believe the gods to be the sources of infinite wisdom and knowledge, they cannot err.

According to the authors of the Old Testament, the earth was a disc, and if one got to the edge one would fall into the abyss. We still use some old verbiage, such as: they travelled to the edge/end of the world, or they travelled to the four corners of the earth. As we all know, the earth is not flat and doesn't have any edges or corners.

According to the ancient authors, the earth was the centre of the universe and all the objects in the sky revolved around it. They were right about the moon, but wrong about everything else. Today, we know that the sun is at the centre of our solar system; our solar system is near the edge of our galaxy (Milky Way); the Milky Way is one of billions of galaxies in the universe; and our universe is one of many. We have gone from being the centre of the universe to being less than a speck of dust in a multiverse. They weren't just wrong; they were immensely wrong!

According to those writers, God created people after creating the earth. They got that one right too, but it couldn't have been any other way. Humans needed the earth to survive. They also said that the gods created humans in their own image. But how would they have known? Nobody has seen God. Therefore, isn't it more likely that the authors of the holy books created the gods in their image – white and male like them?

Mathew: You're right, of course. Not having seen God, the authors of the Old Testament assumed that it was a white male because they were white males. And people in Africa assumed that it was black. But the issue of whether God is white or black, male or female, doesn't put into question god's very existence!

Mary: Today we know that humans and other animal species evolved from simpler life forms: a process that took billions of years. The theory of  evolution is scientific fact that debunks all creation stories –all of them based on supernatural powers. Today, we know the forces of nature and the universe, and under no circumstances do we have to rely on supernatural powers to account for them.

Mathew: Assuming that what you say is true, how did religions respond to such myth busters? They couldn't have taken it lying down. These were seismic shocks to their very foundations!

Mary: You're right. The Catholic Church, for example, reacted by terrorizing Galileo Galilei, in1633, for claiming that the earth revolved around the sun and not the other way around. He was forced to recant his claim to save his life, after which he was held under house arrest until his death. He wasn't even allowed to pursue his scientific studies in other fields. The pope preferred a lie to the truth. As God's vicar on earth, he could have simply asked God for the truth and spared Galileo his punishment! Why didn't he?

Galileo had contradicted the word of God, as clearly stated in the Old Testament. Either Galileo (and science) was right and the church was wrong, or Galileo was wrong and the church was right. As God and the church could not be wrong, then Galileo had to be wrong. The facts got in the way of dogma and he had to recant. It was as simple as that. An important scientific discovery was swept under the rug because the church had to save face. But the church couldn't keep it there forever. It took the church 359 years to admit that it was wrong.