Where are the Catholics who believe in this 
form of the earth?

After looking into this for a long time it's what I believe.
Is this kind of a dead topic? Anyone????

Some time ago it was HUGE on this forum. Then it disappeared. A week ago you posted, no reply. No idea where they went.

Some time ago it was HUGE on this forum. Then it disappeared. A week ago you posted, no reply. No idea where they went.

I think that it gradually faded due to Flat Earth being relegated to this subforum and also being removed from the "Recent Threads" listings ... so that your average user isn't even aware of what's taking place here.  I myself had been very engaged in the Flat Earth discussions, but even for me it's be "out of sight, out of mind" for a long time now.

When it was discussed in the past on the forum, it was a very contentious topic, which more often than not became very heated and acrimonious. There were a few on the forum who stove to not allow it to be discussed. For those who are against a flat earth, the idea of believing in a flat earth is the absolute worst thing that a Catholic could ever possibly believe - right up there with Satanism. It's unfortunate that they would not allow it to be discussed; but then, too, there were some who believe in a flat earth who were too dogmatic about it.

So there it is, in my opinion.

It makes no sense to claim "they would not allow it [flat earth] to be discussed".  Who is this "they"?  The only person on this forum with the authority to allow or not allow the discussion of flat earth is Matthew, the forum owner.  He allowed the topic to be discussed.  Not only did he allow it, he set up a sub-forum for it.  Who are you saying stopped you from discussing it?

Nor does there seem any reason to claim that opponents of flat earth think that "the idea of believing in a flat earth is the absolute worst thing that a Catholic could ever possibly believe - right up there with Satanism."  I do not recall anyone ever saying  or implying that.  It is certainly not my position.  I think it is a serious doctrinal error to claim (as some on this forum have done) that Catholics must believe in flat earth and to do otherwise is heresy.  But belief in a flat earth, in itself, would not even make my top ten list of bad beliefs for Catholics to accept. At worst, it is an error of fact and in no way is it comparable to Satanism which is morally evil.

I used to think flat earth was crazy too until someone asked me to look into it. I believed all the brainwashing that's out there and that was my automatic default position.

Do you think that St. Bede and St. Thomas Aquinas taught that the earth is a sphere because they were brainwashed?  Their explanations make sense to me.

Yes, there are so many lies about history, and the shape of the earth. What NASA and the science books teach us is not the reality of God's flat earth. NASA has no religious views, and it does not care about God and his Creation. Far from it. Neither do most of the science books. They care only about humanism.

Catholics had reached a consensus that the earth is a sphere by the time that St. Bede taught it around 700 AD.  This was taught and believed by Saints, Popes, and Doctors of the Church for more than a millennium. These were people with strong religious views and who cared very much about God and His Creation.  Catholics knew about spherical earth centuries before the development of humanism or secularism.  This was the consensus among Catholics throughout the period of the Church's greatest power and influence.  The science books were written by devout Catholics and there was no NASA.

Spherical earth is the traditional view of Catholics and was not introduced by humanism.

"Do you think that St. Bede and St. Thomas Aquinas taught that the earth is a sphere because they were brainwashed?  Their explanations make sense to me."

How did they come to this conclusion or explanation? How is it determined catholics reached this consensus?

In the earliest centuries of Christianity, there was disagreement on the role of pagan science.  Some of the Fathers thought that Catholics should not use such science, while others thought that it was legitimate for Catholics to use parts of it that are consistent with our Faith.  The latter of these views eventually came to be accepted.  

St. Augustine and St. Basil of Caesarea both taught that Scripture is silent on the shape of the earth.  By the end of the Patristic period, this was accepted by all. We know this because Catholics who did write about the subject did so in terms of science, not by making claims that it was taught in Scripture.  They all accepted the science, going back to Aristotle and Ptolemy, which said that the earth is a sphere.  There are no examples of Catholics arguing against it, while there are countless examples of Catholics who believed in spherical earth.  St. Bede, for example, taught that the sphericity of the earth is shown by the fact that different constellations are visible from different locations and that there are variations in length of sundial shadows and in length of days according to latitude.  

The papal encyclical Providentissimus Deus quotes St Augustine's passage in which he taught that Scripture was silent on the shape of the earth, applying it even more broadly.  This means that the idea originated with the Fathers, was accepted for many centuries and was eventually incorporated into magisterial teaching.  It is fair to say that "Scripture is silent on the shape of the earth" is a Catholic teaching that we are obliged to accept.

This does not preclude Catholics from making a case from science for flat earth.  Unfortunately, we have seen several posters here claim that Scripture teaches flat earth and therefore Catholics are obliged to accept it.  There have even been posters who claimed that those of us who think the earth is a sphere were guilty of heresy.

The Fathers of the Church taught the earth was flat. One can safely assume it is part of Church teaching based on this alone.

A few, but not all, Fathers of the Church taught that the earth was flat.  When there is no consensus among them, like in this case, one does not assume that it is a part of Church teaching.  One needs to look at later teaching.  

Church teaching (going back to St. Augustine, a Father and Doctor of the Church) is that Scripture is silent on the shape of the earth, it is a matter for science, and that Christians may hold any belief that is in accord with reason.