The Errors of the Pope

• His pet theory of science--that perhaps God wanted to deceive us about the nature of the universe--was, in fact, dunderheaded. Only a few Biblical fundamentalists would defend that idea (e.g., God put dinosaur bones into the rocks to fool us when He created the universe 6000 years ago--but the dinosaurs were never living animals).

• The Church had the right to ask Galileo not to do exegesis and theology; it did not have the right to control Galileo’s work in science.

• Galileo had followed the rules for publishing a controversial work. His fidelity should not have been called into question.

• The pope should have asked for a debate about the status of the question instead of bullying Galileo.