Danes feel Obama is greater than Jesus

[kandrathe]

This sentence is a truly staggering example of No True Scotsman. I'm reminded, in an ironic sense, of that old saying for absolute certainty - "Is the Pope Catholic?"

That saying is renown for a reason. People have been asking that question rhetorically for a millennium. A better question would be, "Is the Pope a Christian?". I would hold up Mother Teresa as an example of someone who correctly walked the talk.

On the issue of Monarchs, the point is, their authority is constrained by their borders - they are Sovereigns, not links to the Divine. The Pope is not constrained in any such way, and his spiritual authority extends far beyond the borders of the Vatican state.

Hence the term "Papal Monarchy".

Back to Galileo... I would concede that the actions against Galileo had a chilling effect on those who were advancing the Copernican system. This was also the time of Martin Luther. For the next century, scholars secretly traded his works amongst others that were on the index of prohibited books, publishers and authors. I think that list (which ironically began in Amsterdam in the 1500's) was one main reason that certain "profane" scholarship diverged from Catholicism. By the 17th century, the feud between Protestants and Catholics was more important to universities than to adopt teaching new advances in sciences. In that way also, this distraction in arguing philosophy held back progress in natural sciences.