This-essay is a9906082.htm which is available at the web-site www.essayz.com. See more notes at the bottom. Previous-Essay <== This-Essay ==> Following-Essay By-Months By-Years By-Words Webs of Like-&-Un-Like ESSAYS <==> Like-&-UN-Like This-One ========================================================== %ULTIMATELY RELIABLE EVIDENCE TRUTH CONCERN VALUE+990608 %RELIGIOUS AUTHORITY INTEGRITY EXPERIMENT SCIENCE+990608 %GALILEO SCRIPTURE INTERPRETATION INFALLIBILITY SIN 990608 The historic conflict between Galileo and the Roman Catholic Church highlights the dilemma of those people who seek to be certain about ultimate truths. Church leaders had put ultimate trust and faith in ancient scriptural texts --- and in the traditions of the historic church regarding the interpretations of those scriptural texts. Galileo could not honestly deny the truths which his God-given sense of sight supplied to him --- relying on God-given light from unimaginably distant objects. The Roman Catholic Church silenced Galileo's perceptions of reality --- because those perceptions threatened to expose the imperfections in the Church's conceptions of reality. It took the Roman Catholic Church hundreds of years to acknowledge that it had made a terrible error in silencing Galileo's efforts to make known truths about how the objects in the solar system move relative to each other in nearly empty space. How are religious leaders who are vested with great power to avoid the corrupting effects of unrestrained power? How can religious leaders achieve a coherent balance between taking seriously the spiritual truths pointed to by their favorite scriptural texts --- and the diverse existential truths pointed to by diverse people's own personal perceptions and experiences? What is to be done when different people's perceptions and experiences point to differing complementary truths --- which seem to contradict each other in paradoxical ways --- which have not yet been reconciled with each other. Are the apparent contradictions to be resolved through the exercise of superior coercive power --- as in the case of Galileo versus the Church during the last years of his life? Does the integrity of the church depend upon premature resolutions of conflicts between paradoxical truths? Some influential church leaders seem to think so. Church leaders need to meditate upon the exemplary ways of the Prince of Peace who is the head of the Church. (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in www.essayz.com Search for Integrity and Honesty (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy) ==========================================================
Lines beginning with a percent sign are KEYWORDS for use in ESSAY-System Searches. Their terminal digits are dates of writing in the format @yymmdd#, where @ = a means 99, @ = b means 20, and # = is a within-date essay-count. Links to date-adjacent essays are near page top & bottom.
Find the following links by clicking on CENTER when CENTER near the top or bottom of a web page of essayz.com 1. Go to HOME PAGE of essayz.com 2. Find brief-essays via keywords 3. Find brief-essay about ADDICTION 4. Search-Helps related to ABOVE-LINK 5. GoTo Action & Information Center 6. Find Regular-Essays via Year/Month 7. Find Regular-Essays via Word-Starts 8. Find Regular-Essay about LOVE
This-essay is a9906082.htm which is available at the web-site www.essayz.com. These 5 lines echo top lines. Previous-Essay <== This-Essay ==> Following-Essay By-Months By-Years By-Words Webs of Like-&-Un-Like ESSAYS <==> Like-&-UN-Like This-One