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Author Topic: St. Albert the Great "Not A Flat-Earther"  (Read 1735 times)

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St. Albert the Great "Not A Flat-Earther"
« on: November 19, 2022, 12:27:16 PM »
 

Offline Meg

Re: St. Albert the Great "Not A Flat-Earther"
« Reply #1 on: November 19, 2022, 12:32:04 PM »


True, St. Albert did not believe in FE. That may be why St. Thomas didn't either, since St. Albert was his teacher/mentor. That doesn't mean that they were correct. Saints can be wrong, especially about things the Church doesn't have a doctrine on, such as the shape of the earth. 


Offline Ladislaus

  • Supporter
Re: St. Albert the Great "Not A Flat-Earther"
« Reply #2 on: November 19, 2022, 01:02:28 PM »
Great.  Do you want to start a thread for every person who didn't believe in Flat Earth?

I could start a thread, "St. Thomas Aquinas:  NOT a believer in the Immaculate Conception."

For that matter, I could start a thread (for Father Hewko):  "Ambrose Moran:  NOT a Bishop."

Offline Ladislaus

  • Supporter
Re: St. Albert the Great "Not A Flat-Earther"
« Reply #3 on: November 19, 2022, 01:51:01 PM »
So this 20-minute talk include a 30-second aside on Flat Earth is yet is entitled "St. Albert: Not a Flat Earther"?

I haven't read St. Albert's "proofs" for the globe earth, but I did read St. Thomas' ... where he basically reitereated those of Aristotle.  They consisted of 1) ships disappearing bottom up over the horizon and 2) circular shadows on the moon.

#1 fails beause using modern optics, which they lacked, we can simply zoom in on an object that APPEARS to have disappeared over the horizon ... and in St. Albert's and St. Thomas' time, they were basically relying on the limits of their eyesight.  We know from modern optical science and due to the laws of perspective, that after a time, the object starts to converge with the horizion simply because the resolution becomes too small.

#2 fails on multiple counts, first that it relies on an assumption that moon phases are caused by the earth's shadow and second because, as it turns out, experimentation demonstrates that spherical objects when casting shadows on other spherical objects actually result in a straigh-line shadow, as the two sphericities actually cancel one another out

You'll notice that neither of these is giving any kind of theological proof for FE, just scientific ones.

I recall having a conversation at STAS with Father Hewko (who was then a deacon), where I disagreed with some opinion of St. Thomas, and Father Hewko was shocked and almost scandalized.  This was not a matter of faith or doctrine.  And so I asked Rev. Mr. Hewko what his objection was, and he basically said that St. Thomas, being a Doctor of the Church, was infallible (in so many words).  I disagreed with St. Thomas' argument that when the Holy Ghost descended upon Our Lord at His Baptism, that the dove seen was an actual real, physical dove.  I felt that it would have been incongruous for the Holy Ghost to basically become "incarnate" as a dove.  So this is a pretty trivial question, not defined by the Church, and so open to a variety of opinions.  But Father had the impression that we had to accept St. Thomas' opinion on even trivial disputed questions like this.

Re: St. Albert the Great "Not A Flat-Earther"
« Reply #4 on: November 19, 2022, 07:18:57 PM »
So this 20-minute talk include a 30-second aside on Flat Earth is yet is entitled "St. Albert: Not a Flat Earther"?

I haven't read St. Albert's "proofs" for the globe earth, but I did read St. Thomas' ... where he basically reitereated those of Aristotle.  They consisted of 1) ships disappearing bottom up over the horizon and 2) circular shadows on the moon.

#1 fails beause using modern optics, which they lacked, we can simply zoom in on an object that APPEARS to have disappeared over the horizon ... and in St. Albert's and St. Thomas' time, they were basically relying on the limits of their eyesight.  We know from modern optical science and due to the laws of perspective, that after a time, the object starts to converge with the horizion simply because the resolution becomes too small.

#2 fails on multiple counts, first that it relies on an assumption that moon phases are caused by the earth's shadow and second because, as it turns out, experimentation demonstrates that spherical objects when casting shadows on other spherical objects actually result in a straigh-line shadow, as the two sphericities actually cancel one another out

You'll notice that neither of these is giving any kind of theological proof for FE, just scientific ones.

I recall having a conversation at STAS with Father Hewko (who was then a deacon), where I disagreed with some opinion of St. Thomas, and Father Hewko was shocked and almost scandalized.  This was not a matter of faith or doctrine.  And so I asked Rev. Mr. Hewko what his objection was, and he basically said that St. Thomas, being a Doctor of the Church, was infallible (in so many words).  I disagreed with St. Thomas' argument that when the Holy Ghost descended upon Our Lord at His Baptism, that the dove seen was an actual real, physical dove.  I felt that it would have been incongruous for the Holy Ghost to basically become "incarnate" as a dove.  So this is a pretty trivial question, not defined by the Church, and so open to a variety of opinions.  But Father had the impression that we had to accept St. Thomas' opinion on even trivial disputed questions like this.

I’m curious, do you really hold that those of us who don’t believe the Earth is flat actually believe that the phases of the moon are caused by shadows from the Earth?