Dave – [quoting JM] So the upshot of all this is, charity must prevail, but the church teaching on the moving earth has been condemned as heresy. This is the current position and faithful Catholics must give their assent. . . . Dave, I very much appreciate your apologetic works, but on this issue of geocentrism you are not well versed. That’s not a condemnation of your abilities in any way. . . . You are a first rate Catholic apologist who has a void in his knowledge on the matter of geo, particularly pertaining to the scientific evidence. . . . I still think you are a champion man Dave . . . a real champion. [Robert Sungenis Opts for Personal Attack Because I Refuse to Wrangle With Him Over Geocentrism and a Supposedly 10,000-Year-Old, Non-Rotating Earth ]
Dave – [quoting JM] It only shows me the anti geos have nothing to say on the topic so they attack the author. {about post 433}
JM - Dave has placed two of my quotes next to each other. The first quote is made in the context of the previous paragraph, which said -
“I am well aware of the objective and subjective distinction concerning the proclamation of a statement by the church and the subsequent adoption of a doctrine by individual Catholics. Then again, educated Catholics now have the information at hand from church history, dogmatic theology, ecclesiology and science to delve deeply into the issue. Once all the issues are covered, the geo position is soundly vindicated. So in the end the Catholic geo accounts for the modern Catholic mind and the modern confusion, but the Catholic geo also knows the church has spoken and the faithful Catholic must submit to the church. There is only one way out of this – the Catholic helio must show the Catholic geo where the church has officially overturned the previous statements condemning the moving earth. Of course the church has not done this because it is protect by the HS.
So the upshot of all this is, charity must prevail, but the church teaching on the moving earth has been condemned as heresy. This is the current position and faithful Catholics must give their assent. . . . {about post 394}
The second quote is taken from about post 433, which was made in response to 18 sequential posts made by Mark, largely taken from the theologyweb discussion board. In these posts, Mark made statements about my character through insinuation and quoting a dialogue in theologyweb. These statements were later found to be empty or resolved within theologyweb, when I answered Dave’s questions concerning my identity, based upon the information given in Mark’s posts. Clearly the context of my first and second quote presented by Dave is different and therefore must be taken into account when attempting to associate me with Dave’s comments made in his second paragraph –
“I am detesting atrocious, ridiculous, unethical personal attacks of the sort that he and his friends are now launching against those who dare to disagree with them, including yours truly. “
Dave has written these statements in sequence, probably as a psychological ploy to associate my comments with him detesting unethical personal attacks on him. Yet my comments are the exact reverse of what Dave is associating me with. My first statement clearly says “charity must prevail, but the church teaching on the moving earth has been condemned as heresy.” made in the context of the objective and subjective distinction between a church’s statement and a persons understanding of that statement. In my statements, I have nowhere attacked anyone personally.
In my second statement “It only shows me the anti-geos have nothing to say on the topic so they attack the author.” made after Mark’s 18 posts, I was referring to the personal attacks made upon me by Mark and those in theologyweb discussion who were attacking me. This is the context of the statement made by me in Dave’s combox, where I said –
“Whatever happened on another thread years ago is history. There's nothing that can be done about it.
It only shows me the anti geos have nothing to say on the topic so they attack the author.
In fact anyone who is interested in geo can read the geo threads over there. I put a lot of work into many posts and I believe I defended geo quite well over a long time period in a quite hostile environment.”
Clearly I was referring predominantly to the thgeologyweb thread, when I used the words “another thread” and “geo threads over there” and “hostile environment”, all of which referred to the theolgoyweb thread. By inference I was also stating Mark was trying to malign my character, by posting an irrelevant issue that had been resolved some time ago on theologyweb.
In short, it seems to me, Dave has placed two of my quotes together and then made statements of his own in the context of my quotes, inferring I had attacked his person, or somebody else’s person, when clearly I had not. If Dave has not done this, I request that he explain why he has place two of my quotes together and then said –
“What I am fighting for (as I have for years) is for normal discourse between opposing positions, and I am detesting atrocious, ridiculous, unethical personal attacks of the sort that he and his friends are now launching against those who dare to disagree with them, including yours truly.”
Inferring that I am guilty of sinning against another mans character, when the context of the quotes shows it was Mark, who was acting against my character.
Later Dave said this –
“Sungenis associate "johnmartin" immediately put up seven fairly lengthy replies. In and of itself that was fine, but there is a history here of Sungeniscomboxes in a trolling effort to overwhelm any opposition (with frequent use of strong personal attacks, which is forbidden by the rules of my blog).”
Dave has linked my name with the past actions of “Sungenis cronies” who make a “trolling effort to overwhelm any opposition”. According to Webster’s dictionary, a crony is “a close friend of someone ; especially : a friend of someone powerful (such as a politician) who is unfairly given special treatment or favors” http://www.learnersdictionary.com/search/crony. And troll means - “a person who tries to cause problems on an Internet message board by posting messages that cause other people to argue, become angry, etc.” http://www.learnersdictionary.com/search/troll.
I request Dave demonstrate that Johnmartin (me) is a close friend of Robert Sungenis to vindicate his statement, whereby he associated me with the word “crony”. I also request Dave demonstrate that Johnmartin (me) was trying to cause problems on his combox and thereby I can validly be associated with the word “troll”, as derived from Dave’s words “trolling effort”. To do this, Dave must demonstrate I have repeatedly made statements to cause problems and make people angry through those problems. I insist I have not been trolling, I insist I have been engaging the argument of the anti-geo camp directly, clearly and objectively. This is in no way meant to cause problems or anger, but to show the truth of the geo position as adopted by the Catholic Church. Therefore I categorically deny I have been trolling.
Dave said –
“And he had made, total, by then, 167 comments out of 400, or 42% of all comments. 45 further comments were made by other geocentrists, for a total of 212 out of 400, or 53% of all comments made]”
I challenge Dave to find say 10% (17 comments) of my 167 comments that are directed against the personal character of another who participated on that combox discussion. If Dave cannot find 10%, let’s see Dave find 5%, (8 posts out of 167) if not 5%, then how about 2% (3 posts out of 167).
Dave - In other words, they had had their say. I allowed all that, but they were not to push the privilege too far, that I accorded to them. Nevertheless, the geocentrists started in again in the new combox for the paper, Geocentrism: Not at All an Infallible Dogma of the Catholic Church. It got up to 33 before I disabled comments (which I do only extremely rarely on my blog, and I have over 2600 posts). johnmartin had made 25 out of the 33 comments (76%). I wrote:
JM – 25 comments isn’t much Dave. After all, the comment box’s only allow a small amount of text, so 25 comments probably adds up to a little more than a few A4 pages. This is nothing to worry about is it.
Dave - So with this background, we go back to The Folly of Geocentrism (Links Page) and its combox. johnmartin quickly put in seven comments in one day (12-17-10). I then wrote:
JM – My comments were against the content found in the anti-geo links placed in Dave’s article. I thought Dave, being the truth seeking man that he is, would want my comments to be posted on his thread, so we could go through the issues one by one. In this way I hoped that both of us would come to acknowledge the pros and cons of the arguments proposed.
Dave - I warned about not doing a geocentric dump, so I will be deleting most of johnmartin's comments. Free speech is one thing: taking over someone's blog with an opposed (and I think, quite absurd) viewpoint, with fanatical, obsessive amounts of comments is quite another. Go make your own blog to do that or do it on one of the famous geocentric sites that are up.
JM – You can delete any comments anytime because it is your blog. However please do not think for one minute that geo’s such as myself believe you are deleting the posts solely for the reasons given. Geo’s such as myself believe you are deleting my posts because neither you, nor the pages you link to, nor the other anti-geos have any solid case against geocentrism.
You are apparently very weak on the matters of physics and geocentrism. Furthermore, those with PhD’s in physics who are against geo also fair not much better either when their anti-geo arguments are so easily answered. This only confirms the anti-geo position is based upon ignorance, confusion or outright prejudice.
Dave - Now the fun really began and the geocentric fangs (that we saw indications of all along) quickly came out. First, johnmartin made a complete fool of himself (my bolding):
(JM quote) - Lets pull all these arguments apart and expose the anti geo camp as being anti historical, anti scientific and anti revelation. They have nothing to go on, so their position is one of prejudice. Remember we should always act with charity, yet be clear in our own argumentation and admit when we have erred. But you know what, it really doesn't matter if we make mistakes from time to time, because the bottom line is, we have the truth and the opposition does not. We can see this in the way the anti geos behave. The anti geo Catholic apologist (AGCA)is normally quite systematic in his assessment of others, who are against other Catholic doctrines, yet when it comes to the question of geo, the AGCA is anything but systematic. We have seen such examples with the behavior of others on the other recent geo thread. They make some poorly thought out arguments, then end up running away with excuses, or don't even bother to directly engage the geo arguments. Apparently anything goes with the anti geos. They can make false claims, make excuses, run away and post links to websites with rubbish arguments and then delete geo comments. Yet this doesn't seem to bother them that their anti geo position and consequent behavior betrays an anti intellectualism which is antithetical to the Catholic faith. (12-22-10)
JM – I stand by these comments. After reading Robert’s book and then several anti-geo websites, and then being involved in discussions on Dave’s combox and very long discussions on theologyweb on the subject of geocentrism, I can safely say the anti-geo arguments are quite vacuous. The Catholic anti-geo has to deal with the facts of church history, including the unanimous consent of the church fathers in favor of geo, Papal decrees in favor of geo and the literal sense of the scriptural texts, which are also in favor of geo. They must also deal with the facts of science, which confirm the stationary Earth. As the anti-geo’s cannot deal with these facts head on, their position is –
1. Against the deposit of faith in regard to the truth of geo having been revealed by God,
2. Against science, which has solid evidence in favor of a stationary Earth
3. Against reason, because they cannot mount any reasoned argument against the geo position.
4. Against church history, because they cannot account for the church fathers unanimous consent, nor the Papal statements in favor of geo.
5. Against scripture, because they cannot account for the literal sense of the text as understood by the fathers and Popes.
After my discussion on Dave’s combox, which only confirmed my experiences over at theologyweb, I have arrived at these conclusions. Yet Dave’s response to my statements made above is –
“Thanks for exposing your bigoted mentality.”
JM – More on this later.
Dave - I condemn it wholeheartedly, and I do not return the insult at all. I detest and condemn unequivocally the lying and attacks in these latest utterances from Bob and his friend johnmartin. Since I am the target, I can say with certainty that they are lies; not true at all. I'm the recipient of the attacks, and I condemn them. I don't return them in kind at all, because they are wrong.
JM – The immediate context of Dave saying I have lied and attacked Dave is “Bob's critical paper about my [Dave’s] views on Galileo”. Yet Dave has not quoted me anywhere as lying or attacking him in Bob’s paper. Nor has Dave shown anywhere that I have directly attacked him at any time. I request Dave clarify his statements concerning “the lying and attacks” of Johnmartin against Dave Armstrong. If Dave makes a case against me, I will give it due attention. If however, Dave has no evidence for his claim, why did he write such a blatant lie about me? I currently believe Dave has no evidence for his statement.
Dave – “I detest and condemn unequivocally the lying and attacks in these latest utterances from Bob and his friend johnmartin. Since I am the target, I can say with certainty that they are lies; not true at all. I'm the recipient of the attacks, and I condemn them. I don't return them in kind at all, because they are wrong.”
JM – Dave has clearly stated “I'm the recipient of the attacks” and “I don't return them in kind at all, because they are wrong.”, yet if Dave cannot show us clear evidence from the immediate context of Bob’s statements, that I have attacked and lied a bout him, then he has lied about me and then lied about him not returning lies to others. I’m willing to give Dave the benefit of the doubt about this matter. He should have his opportunity to defend his own statements about me. However, if he cannot defend his statements about me attacking him and stating lies about him in the immediate context of Bob’s statements, I’m willing to let him retract his false statements about me with an apology and I will leave the matter as closed.
Dave – “Let them keep this up if they insist. Nothing will do more damage to their Big Cause of Geocentrism as Catholic Dogma than this kind of treatment towards those of us who disagree with them and who prefer to agree with popes and ecumenical councils. We're not Catholics, we're fundamentally dishonest, against history, science, and revelation, because we have a disagreement on this issue? And these guys wonder why we think they are fanatical about and hyper-obsessed with geocentrism, with them now going around making out that a heliocentrist can hardly be a Catholic at all?”
JM – Dave has inferred as a geocentrist, I am against Popes and ecumenical Councils, where he uses the words “Let them keep this up if they insist.” Dave has therefore stated geocentrism and therefore Catholics who believe the church has taught geocentrism are actually against the church, because in fact the church is against geo as a catholic dogma.
Let’s pull Dave’s argument apart logically.
Dave - “Geocentrism as Catholic Dogma”
Logic - Egocentrism’s believe geocentrism is Catholic dogma.
Dave - those of us who disagree with them
Logic - Those who disagree with the Catholic egocentrism’s believe the church has not taught geocentrism is Catholic dogma.
Dave - who prefer to agree with popes and ecumenical councils.
Logic - Non geocentrists agree with popes and ecumenical councils that geocentrism is not Catholic Dogma.
Historical fact 1 – No Pope or Ecumenical council has ever stated geocentrism is not Catholic Dogma.
Historical fact 2 – The church fathers unanimously taught a stationary earth as the correct cosmology. This understanding by the church fathers can only be derived from the deposit of the faith if the fathers are truly fathers of the church.
Historical fact 3 – The scriptures state the earth is stationary and that’s the way the Popes at the time of Galileo understood those texts.
Historical fact 4 – committees set up by Popes condemned the notion of a moving earth as against the faith.
Historical fact 5 – Leo XIII bound Catholics to the unanimous consent of the fathers, thereby binding them to a revealed truth of a stationary earth.
Historical fact 6 – the decisions of Popes, committees and the teaching of the church fathers on the matter of geocentrism has never been formally reversed, therefore the official position of the church on cosmology is the earth is stationary, as revealed by God.
Conclusion – Dave’s statement that the Catholic non geocentrists are acting with Popes and Ecumenical Councils is without foundation in history.
Dave - johnmartin replied to my remarks on his own blog when his comments were deleted: A partial response to Dave Armstrong's article - "The Folly of Geocentrism (Link Page)". Here are some humorous (but sad) highlights. Rather that retract the insults, he denies that he made them, and digs in and reaffirms them, and merely projects his faults onto the one who points them out:
JM – There is nothing humorous or sad about my statements concerning the anti-geo position being anti-science, anti-historical, anti-intellectual and so on. These are merely conclusions I have arrived at after much discussion, reading and thought on the matter. We shall see Dave’s answers do nothing to expose my conclusions as that of a bigot.
Dave1- Very lovely, johnmartin. Thanks for exposing your bigoted mentality.
JM1 -Unless Dave establishes that I have a bigoted mentality, he has sinned against my character.
Dave 1 - Henceforth I will delete all of your comments, since this is the rank bigotry and idiotic first premises that they start with, and we engage in intelligent discussions here, not mere bigoted rantings and personal attacks.
[Dave: I later reversed this decision, as announced and explained further in the combox below]
JM2 – Good. I assume you will not delete my posts on this thread either.
JM1 -Punishment given due to the alleged bigotry not yet proven.
Dave 1- You expressed it yourself and it is now documented on my blog. Thanks!
JM2- Dave’s answer is not an answer at all. Dave has merely asserted bigotry on my behalf, and then merely asserts I have confirmed it when I make my statement above.
JM1- Expressed what? That I should act with charity and clarity, then I accurately expressed the anti geo position. How is that bigoted? It is simply not bigoted at all.
Dave 1 – Rarely have I seen such a transparent admission of the bigotry that underlies a person's position.
JM1 -Take a good long hard look at yourself Dave. Who is acting as the bigot now? You merely assert I have a bigoted mentality and yet you are acting with a bigoted mentality.
Dave 1- Usually it is covered up, but I guess my removal of your garbage made you angry enough to reveal your true stripes.
JM 2- No I’m genuine as always Dave. My statements about anti-geos being anti intellectual, anti-science, anti-historical and so on are based upon long interactions with them. Your recent behavior only confirms my conclusion. You think you can make baseless statements against me and get away with it. Bully for you Dave. I prefer to think you must make a solid case for your slanderous comments.
JM1- Poor old Dave is more exposed than ever. He is so keen on labeling me with a bigoted mentality the he fails to see his own.
Dave 1- Dave - Let's summarize again for the record: to disagree with you, is to be:
1) "anti historical"
It is a historical fact that the church fathers taught geo as found in the scriptures. This is the same interpretation as the Popes gave to scripture when they initiated the investigation into Galileo. Both the Popes and the committees empowered by the Popes said the same thing – the doctrine of the moving earth is against the faith. Therefore the anti geo position is anti-historical.
2) "anti scientific"
I have answered the science papers posted on Dave’s thread, therefore the anti geo position is simply against modern science such as relativity.
JM2- I notice Dave hasn’t made any comments about the anti-geo position being anti historical and anti scientific. Maybe he thinks his no show will be overlooked. Dave thinks he can call me a bigot and then have nothing to say in response to the anti-geo claims being anti-historical and anti-scientific. I’ll let the readers make up their own minds about the vacuous nature of Dave’s position.
Dave 1- 3) "anti revelation"
The anti geo position must ignore the unanimous consent of the fathers, Papal statements and condemnation by the church of a moving earth. So yes, the anti geo position is anti-revelation.
[um, fathers, popes, and councils, are not "revelation" in the first place; that is Holy Scripture.
JM2 – Hey Dave, I didn’t say “fathers, popes, and councils”, I said “unanimous consent of the fathers, Papal statements and condemnation by the church”. See the BIG differences Dave? Sure you do.
Bye the way, I’m sure you know revelation comes through scripture and tradition as taught by the church magesterium. What the heck, you have plenty of articles about the three legged stool of Catholicism. You know scripture is only one source of revelation, with tradition and the magesterium being the other two sources. Even so, scripture is clear on the matter of a stationary earth and that’s the way the fathers and the Popes thought the text meant. In short, God has revealed a stationary earth cosmology through the ordinary magesterium and there’s nothing you, nor anyone else has said to overturn this historical fact.
Dave 1 - Thus, johnmartin gets his fundamental categories wrong,
JM2 - Dave, do you see the hypocrisy in your statements. You’ve switched categories and then claimed I did the switch.
Dave 1 - . . . even in his wanton, wild insults,
JM2- What wanton insults Dave. I have made a case that your claims that I have acted as a bigot are without merit. Your response is to ignore two of my responses, then make a category switch. My initial complaint against anti-geo’s included the claims that they can make just about any statement they want, then make false statements about geos. I have noticed Dave has done just that here. The statements “wild insults” is currently without merit and therefore false.
Dave 1 - which is part of the problem in this debate: the geocentrists are raising the Catholic magesterium beyond even the claims that it makes for itself.
JM2 - Dave’s statement is disconnected from what geo’s have been saying about the church statements on the stationary earth and from the immediate context of this discussion. Dave’s quote below provides no evidence for his statement that is consistent with what geo’s have been saying about church authority and revelation in regard to geocentrism.
Dave 1- Thus, for example, The Catholic Encyclopedia ("Revelation") states:
It will be seen that Revelation as thus explained differs clearly . . . from the Divine assistance by which the pope when acting as the supreme teacher of the Church, is preserved from all error as to faith or morals. The function of this assistance is purely negative: it need not carry with it any positive gift of light to the mind. Much of the confusion in which the discussion of Revelation in non-Catholic works is involved arises from the neglect to distinguish it from one or other of these.]
JM2- I agree with the above statement from the Encyclopedia, but do you know what . . . it doesn’t matter a whit in regard to the geo position, because Dave has not made any connection between the Encyclopedia’s statement and the geo position. It’s as simple as that.
Even so, the church has taught through the ordinary magesterium of the church that a stationary earth has been revealed by God. Popes have taught that a moving earth is against scripture and a Papally appointed committee has taught a moving earth is against the faith. Again, this is a historical fact.
JM1 - 4) "nothing to go on, so their position is one of prejudice."
Prejudice automatically follows when the anti geo position is against historical facts, science facts and the truths of the faith. What else could it be when the issues have been discussed?
Dave 1- [Having denounced in no uncertain terms my assertion of his obvious bigotry
JM 2- I sure have denounced you claims of bigotry.
Dave 1- -- as seen in these ridiculously sweeping statements
JM 2- These so called “ridiculously sweeping statements” don’t require answers by Dave as shown above and when he bothers to make a counter statement his answers are found to be fallacious.
Dave 1- he now reaffirms what ha had already asserted: that the "anti geo" {sic} position is "prejudice"; indeed "automatically" so; thus compounding his own hypocrisy and viciously inconsistent thought]
JM2- My position is logical. If the arguments of the anti-geo camp are found to be without merit scientifically, logically, historically and theologically, then if the anti-geos continue in their position, it is based only on prejudice. This is simple 101 logic. Bye the way, Dave’s answer is not logical. Dave states “he now reaffirms”, inferring I am reaffirming my position without having made any case for such a conclusion. Yet my position as reaffirmed was made only after a long dialogue on Dave’s combox, much reading, a long dialogue on theologyweb and then an explanation for my conclusion. Evidently Dave has ignored or doesn’t believe I have adequately defended this conclusion of the anti-geo position.
JM 1- 5) "anti intellectualism which is antithetical to the Catholic faith"
consequently the anti geo position must be anti-intellectual.
The real reason Dave is so hostile to me is probably because I have demonstrated he has a double standard when it comes to criticism of geocentrism. I placed a post on his thread on 22 December, 2010, which has been deleted by Dave.
Dave 1- [sorry to disappoint jm, but I did not delete it; it was placed automatically in the spam folder by Blogger. When I found it in there I restored it, hence it is now back in the thread, as anyone can see. If I had deleted it, I wouldn't have been able to post it with its original author and date and time with it. Some other comments I did indeed delete (with full justification), and they cannot be restored, because they aren't stored anywhere, having been deleted]
JM2- Good for you Dave. But I note my criticism stills stands. You have posted a picture of geocentrism which is not consistent with the modified Tychonian model. You were told about this some time ago and you have persisted in keeping the false picture on your thread. Again, it is your thread, but I am duty bound to inform you of your straw man position on geocentrism. Why do you persist in showing a false picture of what modern geo’s hold to? Modern Geos do NOT hold to planets orbiting in epicycles around nothing but empty space. To show a picture on your thread which is not held by modern geo’s is not from the man I’ve known. This is not the Dave Armstrong who is known for his intelligence and integrity.
I suggest you have a look at the modified Tychonian model and then either remove the picture or explain your position on the matter.
JM1- In that post I made a clear case for his double standards –
Dave 1 - [Me] Free speech is one thing: taking over someone's blog with an opposed (and I think, quite absurd) viewpoint, with fanatical, obsessive amounts of comments is quite another.
JM2- I was merely responding to those who took the opposite view point. Why not call those who hold to the opposite view fanatical Dave? Your statements seem to be somewhat arbitrary.
JM1- You can do what you want on your blog Dave. It’s ok by me.
Dave 1 - [it ain't okay for Bob Sungenis. He has convinced that I prove I am dishonest or perhaps not a Catholic at all when I delete any comments by geocentrists: no matter how outrageous, insulting, or ridiculous]
JM 2- Again, I have been careful not to attack anyone in person.
JM1- Dave could have been man enough to answer the serious flaw in his method, yet he chose the low path of ad hominem attack and censoring my posts. It’s his blog, but then again, as a matter of integrity I have to expose his attitude on geocentrism as anti-intellectual and now without integrity. It’s a sad day for Dave Armstrong when he has chosen to take such action against legitimate opposition to his anti-geo claims.
However, on other matters concerning Catholic apologetics, I highly recommend him to anyone investigating the truth claims of the Catholic faith. I’ve bought his books and read most of them. The one’s I’ve read are intellectually solid.
If Dave wants to retract his comments about me and allow me to freely post on his combox, then we can negotiate a truce about this current situation. Until then, my comments stay on the net for all to see.
Dave 1- [Your bigotry and misguided, wrongheaded dogmatism in this matter and ready willingness to misrepresent and lie about the positions of other Catholics
JM2- Dave hasn’t provided any evidence for any of his assertions above.
Dave 1- (as Bob Sungenis is doing as well in his personal attacks, seen in the combox below), also remains for all to see, and now again on my blog. I will not retract my comments about your bigotry and ad hominem tactics until you renounce and retract the bigoted statements above that provided full justification and warrant for the charge.
JM 2- I believe I have shown the conclusions I have stated concerning the anti-geo position is intellectually solid. I have also established your statements about me being a bigot and liar are without foundation.
Dave 1- And even then it would not be a case of my having misrepresented anything, but of you changing your mind, in which case, I would acknowledge that and thank you for doing the right thing and denouncing the bigotry and sheer stupidity of description of those who disagree with you, that you are now foolishly asserting]
JM2- I have established that the anti-geo arguments as stated in your combox are without merit. I have also shown that the stationary earth was revealed by God through the ordinary magesterium, therefore the matter of a stationary earth is not merely my opinion, as you claim, but the teaching of the church.
I will not change my mind on the matter of a stationary earth being revealed by God until convincing arguments are forthcoming from the anti-geos to demonstrate the scriptural statements, church father’s statements, Papal statements and scientific evidence are against the stationary earth. From my reading and dialogues on the matter, the evidence is thoroughly in favor of a stationary earth.
Finally I note that Dave has entitled this article as “How Geocentrists "Argue": Bob Sungenis & His Cronies Question My Catholic Faith Because I Objected to My Blog Being Overrun By Geocentrist Fanaticism”. This title is clearly at odds with the subject matter discussed in the article. The content of the article in no way makes any solid link to me or anyone else other than Robert Sungenis concerning the questioning of your Catholic faith. It is simply a false title to group geos such as Rick and myself into the category of cronies, without any solid evidence.
I find this to be the work of a man who has lost touch with the goals of his apologetic ministry. Your ministry is to seek the truth wherever it exists and to rigorously investigate arguments on both sides of issues. By placing this heading at the start of your article demonstrates you are not interested in the truth in this instance. You simply have made geos out to be cronies, who think you may not have the catholic faith because of your position on the matter of geocentrism.
Summary points –
1. I have demonstrated Dave’s statements about me being a bigot and a liar are clearly without foundation.
2. I have shown Dave has not made a serious attempt to answer my conclusions concerning the anti-geo position as being anti-scientific, anti-historical and anti-intellectual.
3. I have shown Dave has repeatedly associated me with claims of lying and personal attacks, without any clear evidence to establish such claims.
4. I have highlighted several problems with Dave's statements in response to my statements.
5. I have highlighted a case of a straw man position concerning the geocentric picture shown on one of his threads, that does not accurately represent the modified Tycho Brehe model.
6. I have highlighted a case of Dave making a statement in his article title, which is not consistent with the content of his article.
JM
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