Trinitas said:
First of all, the Church does not recognize divorce, never has, never will. You're just flat wrong on this point.
I concede the point.
Secondly, none of the things you mentioned concern a change in Church teaching. For example, the Church never taught the geocentric model of the solar system. The geocentric model was a worldview inherrited from the Greeks (Ptolomy).
The Catholic Church has made a habit out of blaming the Protestants for Galileos persecution. I don`t know how they pulled this off since it was the Catholic Church that imprisoned Galileo and struck fear into Copernicus` heart.
The Church placed Copernicus` "On the Revolution of Celestial Spheres" on it`s prohibited book list in 1616 when Galileo started using it to support a heliocentric solar system.
In 1616 the Church held a tribunal of theological scholars who decided Copernicus` theory of a heliocentric solar system contradicted Catholic faith with this statement...
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"Philosophically (i.e., scientifically) foolish and absurd, and is considered official heresy because it explicitly contradicts the meaning of Scripture in many places, in terms of the verbal significance of the words and in terms of the accepted interpretation and understanding of the Church Fathers and the Doctors of Theology."[/font]
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http://muse.tau.ac.il/museum/galileo/prohibition_helioce.html[/font]
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After this council made this determination Galileos was told by cardinal bellamine that he could no longer speak of, teach, publish , or believe in heliocentricy.[/font]
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This is the text of the document ..[/font]
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At the palace of the usual residence of the said Most Illustrious Lord Cardinal Bellarmine and in the chambers of His most Illustrious Lordship, and fully in the presence of the Reverend Father Michelangelo Segizzi of Lodi, O.P. and Commissary General of the Holy Office, having summoned the above-mentioned Galileo before himself, the same Most Illustrious Lord Cardinal warned Galileo that the above-mentioned opinion was erroneous and that he should abandon it; and thereafter, indeed immediately, before me and witnesses, the Most-Illustrious Lord Cardinal himself being also present still, the aforesaid Father Commissary, in the name of His Holiness the Pope and the whole Congregation of the Holy Office, ordered and enjoined the said Galileo, who was himself still present, to abandon completely the above-mentioned opinion that the sun stands still at the center of the world and the earth moves, and henceforth not to hold, teach, or defend in any way whatever, either orally or in writing; otherwise the Holy Office would start proceedings against him. The same Galileo acquiesced in this injunction and promised to obey.
http://muse.tau.ac.il/museum/galileo/prohibition_helioce.html
The Church did deny a heliocentric system and support geocentric system.
There is more documentation to support this conclusion
http://home.cwru.edu/~sjr16/pre20th_europe_church.html
The Bible does not teach geocentrism, but merely gives phenomenological descriptions of the world.
I`m not discussing the Bible, I`m discussing the Catholic Church.
However Joshua 10:12-14 seems to be in agreement with geocentrism.
The sun stood still, for this to be the extraordinary event the passage makes it one can only believe the sun didn`t normally stand still...Geocentrism
Thirdly, women serving at the altar is not a matter of Church teaching. It is a matter of discipline, not doctrine.
It`s a matter of discrimination.
Thats a point I have already proven.
You may continue to rationalize it as much as you like though.
You say that the Church has changed many things that are just not considered acceptable today, but I defy you to come up with even one official doctrine that has been changed.
The Church
NOW allows it`s followers to read the Bible.
They have changed that official edict.
The Church has never kept the Bible from her people. This is a common fable that has no basis in truth.
It`s no fable.
The Catholic Church placed the Bible on it`s Prohibited books list right along with Copernicus` "On the Revolution of Celestial Spheres".
Do you deny this?
The medieval Catholics couldn't read to begin with, so what good would having a Bible have done them anyway?
Thats nice, you`re too stupid to have a Bible..I like that.
It`s not altogether true however since many Catholics could indeed read or the Protestants would have been protesting nothing.
I have one Catholic telling me the Bible was banned because it was too valuable and another telling me it was banned because of fear of misinterpretation.
Which is it?
The phenomenon that average people didn't have access to the Bible was due to the fact that Bibles were rare and expensive, and that the average person was illiterate anyway. It had nothing to do with a Church conspiracy to conceal the Word of God.
Wrong the Catholic Church did indeed ban the Bible to all but the clergy or those with special exception ..this is fact.
Decree by the Council of Trent, approved by Pope Pius I
Since it is clear from experience that if the Sacred Books are permitted everywhere and without discrimination in the vernacular, there will by reason of the boldness of men arise therefrom more harm than good, the matter is in this respect left to the judgment of the bishop or
inquisitor, who may with the advice of the pastor or confessor permit the reading of the Sacred Books translated into the vernacular by Catholic authors to those who they know will derive from such reading no harm but rather an increase of faith and piety, which permission they must have in writing.
Those, however, who presume to read or possess them without such permission may not receive absolution from their sins till they have handed them over to the ordinary. Bookdealers who sell or in any other way supply
Bibles written in the vernacular to anyone who has not this permission, shall lose the price of the books, which is to be applied by the bishop to pious purposes, and in keeping with the nature of the crime they shall be subject to other penalties which are left to the judgment of the same bishop. Regulars who have not the permission of their superiors may not read or purchase them.
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/trent-booksrules.html
Your defense by Great Value doesn`t hold up so well when you read the actual wording of the 4th rule of the Council of Trent concerning prohibited books.
They were afraid people would come to their own conclusions about what the word of God really was and they sought to stop that.
Like they did with the Arians, Gnostics, Albigenses, and many others.