Was There Really A Star of Bethlehem?
In this fascinating video from CNS, Jesuit Brother Guy Consolmagno of the Vatican Observatory talks about the possibility that the Star of Bethlehem was a real astronomical event.
Real Life Catholics on BBC TV defend Church Teaching on Contraception.
This morning on BBC TV Sunday Morning Live there was a good debate inspired by Melinda Gates (who identifies as Catholic) comments about the pope potentially changing doctrine on contraception. The Catholic contributors were Fr Paddy McCafferty, Clare Short and Obianuju Ekeocha. I think they did really well. Uju's direction is very interesting and easily wrong foots those who want to impose western ideas of morality on Africans in an imperialistic way. Interesting that the presenter agrees with her on this. Fr Paddy gave a great account of his experience as a priest. He was compassionate, realistic and honest, while upholding the value and importance of the doctrine. Clare said she had experience of both ways and the Catholic way is better by far. I thought that was awesome! I especially liked her focus on equality and bringing the responsibility of both husband & wife into the discussion. Watch out for the bit where the other lady says "Pope Francis has ind...
It was a real ASTROLOGICAL event. The Magi had their own astrological system, which, being the source of their livelihood, was a trade secret and not written down. We do know that Mesopotamian astrologers did not limit themselves to objects outside our atmosphere; in some of their texts, they even refer to a ring around the moon as a "star". Precisely NOTHING in astronomy -- certainly none of the events mentioned here -- could act as the "star" is described as acting -- particularly when it comes to resting over where the Child lay. That just means that a modern astronomer has no special insight into a 2000 year old extinct astrological tradition, which is no surprise at all. (To say that the whole story is cooked up as a lie concealing the truth of the divinity of Christ is still to make it a lie, though. Jesuits once knew better.)
ReplyDeletePlease see also this: http://newtheologicalmovement.blogspot.com/2012/01/it-is-mistake-to-try-to-discover-which.html.
Ever seen this Howard?
Deletehttp://youtu.be/zPHKg0M3mEo
No, and I am not willing to spend an hour trying to find out what your point is. The intro makes it look like the kind of well-meaning but hopelessly naive Protestant production I grew up with -- the sort of thing that believes that "Joshua's long day" was discovered somehow by NASA computers (it was probably a local miracle only, like the Miracle of the Sun at Fatima). If you want me to watch that video, I'll need to know it's worth my time, so could you tell me what I would be watching? (After all, I didn't just point you at BABYLONIAN STAR LORE by Gavin White and tell you to read the book before answering.) Otherwise, I'll stick with Catholic tradition and say that the Star of Bethlehem, which is after all described in a way incompatible with astronomy, was not astronomical.
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