c. 2006 Religion News Service
(UNDATED) The Earth is at the center of Robert Sungenis’ universe. Literally.
Yours too, he says.
Sungenis is a geocentrist. He contends the sun orbits the Earth instead of vice versa. He says physics and the Bible show that the vastness of space revolves around us; that we’re at the center of everything, on a planet that does not rotate.
He has just completed a 1,000-page tome, “Galileo Was Wrong,” the first in a pair of books he hopes will persuade readers to “give Scripture its due place, and show that science is not all it’s cracked up to be.”
Geocentrism is a less known cousin of the intelligent design, or anti-evolution, movement. Both question society’s trust in science, instead using religion to explain how we got here _ and, in geocentrism’s case, just where “here” is.
Mention geocentrism and physicist Lawrence Krauss sighs. He is director of the Center for Education and Research in Cosmology and Astrophysics at Case Western Reserve University and author of several books including “Fear of Physics: A Guide for the Perplexed.”
“What works? Science works. Geocentrism doesn’t. End of story,” Krauss said from Cleveland. “I’ve learned over time that it’s hard to convince people who believe otherwise, independent of evidence.”
To Sungenis, of Greencastle, Pa., evidence is the rub.
For several years the Web site of his Catholic Apologetics International (http://www.catholicintl.com) offered a $1,000 reward to anyone who could disprove geocentrism and prove heliocentrism (a sun-centered solar system).
There were numerous attempts, Sungenis said, “some serious, some caustic,” but no one did it to his satisfaction. “Most admitted it can’t be proven.”
There’s also no proof that the Earth rotates, he said.
But what about Foucault’s famous pendulum? Its plane of oscillation revolves every 24 hours, showing the rotation of the planet. If the Earth didn’t rotate, it wouldn’t oscillate.
Nope, Sungenis said: There just may be some other force propelling it, such as the pull of stars.
What Foucault’s pendulum does prove to Sungenis is that science is full of things that cannot be proven. And in the absence of proof, the Bible has answers.
“If you see the Earth as just a humdrum planet among stars circling in a vast universe, then we’re not significant, we’re just part of a crowd,” Sungenis said. “But if you believe everything revolves around Earth, it gives another picture _ of purpose, a meaning of life.”
Sungenis’ background is in both theology and science. He said he was a physics major at George Washington University but received his bachelor’s degree in religious studies from GW, and a master’s in the same from Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. His religious studies doctorate came this year from Calamus International University, which identifies itself on its Web site as a “non-traditional institution.”
About four years ago Sungenis read “Geocentricity,” by physicist Gerardus Bouw.
“That put me hot on the trail,” Sungenis said.
He came to rethink the work of Nicolaus Copernicus, the 15th-century Polish astronomer who advanced heliocentrism over the Ptolemaic, or Earth-centered, system.
“Einstein told us there is no center, that any point in the universe can serve as the center,” Sungenis said. “If that’s the case, Einstein has undermined Copernicus. You can’t prove either one.”
However, several biblical passages including Joshua 10:13 (In which the sun, at the Lord’s command, temporarily “stood still in the midst of heaven”) mention the sun, not the Earth, as the body that is normally in motion.
There are no statistics on numbers of geocentrists. Sungenis said he thinks it’s “definitely growing, both nationally and internationally.”
Marshall Hall is one. He’s been researching it since 1980, and posted his Web site, http://www.fixedearth.com, in 1997.
Hall realizes it’s a tough sell.
“Normally the reaction is, `You’ve got to be crazy,”’ he said from his home in Cornelia, Ga.
So sometimes he uses this illustration story:
You want to travel from Washington, D.C., to San Francisco. If the Earth is turning, why not just hover in a helicopter? Wait a few hours above the East Coast and eventually the West Coast will be underneath you.
It doesn’t work that way, said astrophysicist and biblical scholar Robert C. Newman: The helicopter is moving eastward along with the Earth’s atmosphere at hundreds of miles per hour. So the helicopter actually needs to move hundreds of miles per hour westward to compensate.
“If it does, then … San Francisco will show up in several hours,” Newman said.
Newman calls geocentrism “crackpot science.”
He has a Cornell University doctorate in theoretical astrophysics and a master’s in the Old Testament from Biblical Theological Seminary in Hatfield, Pa., where he teaches and directs the Interdisciplinary Biblical Research Institute.
To Newman, science reveals itself through equations. Take gravity.
“Galileo was realizing it in a rather vague way; Newton worked out the equations for it,” Newman said. “Those equations are what all space travel is based upon. They have been proven as much as science can prove anything.”
There are different opinions among scientists on many topics, Newman said. For instance, he favors intelligent design over evolution.
Meanwhile, Sungenis wants to make sure “people don’t classify geocentrists with Flat Earthers. We don’t believe that at all.”
British physicist and writer Alec MacAndrew is certain of one thing _ the Earth orbiting the sun and revolving on its axis “has been resolved as far as professional scientists are concerned.”
Furthermore, MacAndrew said, “The Bible has no part in scientific discussion _ none whatsoever.”
Or, as Galileo famously quoted 16th century Cardinal Caesar Baronius, “The Bible was written to show us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go.”
MO/RB/JL END SEFTON
Editors: To obtain a photo of Robert Sungenis, as well as a graphic showing how geocentrism fits into creationist thought, go to the RNS Web site at https://religionnews.com. On the lower right, click on “photos,” then search by subject or slug.
