7 Comments

Mike Melendez
August 29th, 2011 | 11:00 am

I read the Galileo article in the L.A. Times and commented on it there. I wish their writer would do a little more research. They didn’t even note that the St Pius X society was in schism. Even Wikipedia gets that right. Wikipedia also has a few interesting things to say about Robert Sugenis. But the Times writer, apparently, didn’t even check that. Of course, the writer may not know what schism means.

Papa Z
August 29th, 2011 | 1:59 pm

I was going to say essentially what Mr. Melendez said. The St. Pius X Society is not, in any regular sense, part of the Catholic Church; and “Dr.” Sugenis is every bit a nut as one is liable to find.

To suggest that either example represents the main body of Catholicism (read 99.9999%) is sloppy reporting at best, and blatant dishonesty at worst.

Mike Melendez
August 29th, 2011 | 3:42 pm

@Papa Z: My own guess is that it is invincible ignorance. Most in the journalistic trade are well armored against learning the reality having instead learned the cliches and outdated Protestant critiques since swallowed whole by the secularist folks and re-pointed at all Christians. (Did you know Galileo was burned at the stake?) This particular reporter (not to mention the editor) might well view “schism” as one of those Christian codewords or dog whistles noted elsewhere.

Blake
August 29th, 2011 | 4:07 pm

might well view “schism” as one of those Christian codewords or dog whistles noted elsewhere.

Gotta love how some people get to decide things mean whatever they want – or don’t want.

I wish I were one of the people who had permission to decide when words mean what they mean, when they mean something else, or when they’re “just a dog whistle”.

Bret Lythgoe
August 29th, 2011 | 11:04 pm

Certainly what happened between the Catholic Church, and Galileo, was extremely complicated, and one must interpret it, carefully. An excellent book, on it, GALILEO IN ROME: THE RISE AND FALL OF A TROUBLESOME GENIUS, by William R. Shea, and Mariano Artigas, Oxford University press, 2004, is a good place to start.http://www.us.oup.com/us/catalog/24598/subject/History/?view=usa&ci=9780195177589

David Nickol
August 30th, 2011 | 1:14 am

To suggest that either example represents the main body of Catholicism (read 99.9999%) is sloppy reporting at best, and blatant dishonesty at worst.

Papa Z,

The article refers to “a few Catholics.” It says that “proponents of a geocentric universe are challenging the very church they seek to serve and protect.” It quotes the spokesperson for the Vatican Observatory and a professor of astrophysics from Notre Dame disavowing the notions of these “few Catholics.” The quote from the Notre Dame professor is, “There are some people who want to move the world back to the 1950s when it seemed like a better time. These are people who want to move the world back to the 1250s.” I think that makes it clear that these people are crackpots.

David Nickol
August 30th, 2011 | 1:47 am

They didn’t even note that the St Pius X society was in schism.

Mike Melendez,

I agree that it was poor reporting not to make it clear what the Society of St. Pius X is, but I am not sure it is correct to say it is in schism. The statement I keep coming across is that it “has no canonical status.” Lefebvre’s ordination of bishops was a “schismatic act,” and he and the bishops he ordained were excommunicated. But Lefebvre himself is now dead, and Pope Benedict XVI lifted the excommunication of the bishops Lefebvre ordained. A handful of people in Hawaii in the 1990s were excommunicated for their involvement with SSPX, but Rome declared the excommunications invalid. So as I read the situation, nobody in SSPX is considered by the Church to be officially outside the Church (excommunicated). It is a very delicate and unusual situation, but it looks to me like Benedict is bending over backwards to avoid considering SSPX a schismatic group. If I understand it correctly, a parish sponsored by SSPX is illicit, since SSPX does not have any authority to set up a parish, but everyone involved is still Catholic. SSPX is not a schismatic group outside the Catholic Church, but rather a group of Catholics in the Church who have formed a group the Church does not recognize as an officially Catholic group.