GALILEO, SCIENCE AND THE CHURCH by...

GALILEO, SCIENCE AND THE CHURCH by Jerome J. Langford (University of Michigan Press/Ann Arbor Paperbacks: $13.95; 225 pp . , illustrated). Langford, a member of the Dominican order, examines the trial of Galileo Galilei in 1633 and attempts to counter what he feels is the undeservedly negative image it earned the Catholic Church. He carefully presents the events leading to the trial, correctly noting that Galileo’s hypothesis contradicted Aristotle’s cosmology, rather than the Scriptures. But Langford’s considerable erudition is ultimately confounded by the unpleasant facts of the case: The Church used its spiritual and temporal resources, including the threat of torture (a threat the author ingenuously discounts), to persecute a man whose only “crime” was presenting a description of the solar system based on observation. Earlier this year, a commission appointed by Pope John Paul II concluded that the Church had erred in its condemnation; regardless of both judgments, the Earth still moves--as Galileo allegedly muttered after being forced to recant.