In the story Galileo himself has to choose between life and his work when he published a book saying that the earth was not the center of the universe. In fact he stated that the earth was orbiting around the sun. His belief was known as Heliocentric. His ideas opposed what the church had originally said about the universe. This infuriated the church and they quickly tried to cover up Galileo’s work. In Galileo’s life span this new “discovery” he’d made was a huge deal. I mean in the 17th Century was trying to prove the church was wrong. During that time it was widely known, the church made sure of it, that the universe was based on the Geocentric System. Geocentrism meant that the earth was the center of the universe and everything else was revolving around it. Galileo was trying to prove that the universe was based on a heliocentric system but there were many obstacles in his way.

One huge thing that stood his way was the church itself. During the 17th century church and state were very closely related so the church had a lot of power. When Galileo began publishing his theories and discoveries they were all very closely watched by the church. In 1632 he published a book Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems where he showed his observations and stated that he believed the sun was the center of the universe and the earth was orbiting around it. The church quickly denied his idea of heliocentrism. They accused him of everything possible from being crazy to painting what he save onto the lens of the telescope. The church had an irrational fear that if Galileo was by some chance right that they would lose the trust of the people and therefore would lose their power.

Another big obstacle for him was getting people on his side. During the 17th Century there were three main estates. The first estate was the church, the second was nobility and the third was everyone else. A huge part of the third class was peasants who were greatly influenced by the church. They were living their lives in fear. Fear of death, hunger and many other problems they had. They were promised by the church that even though they were poor if they stay good and faithful their whole life then the afterlife will be great for them. They believed this having nothing else to look forward for and being about 80% of the population Galileo had little support from the third class. In general society was reluctant to change, and in this case a huge part of society was the church and the peasants.

Basically every problem Galileo had every obstacle he had to overcome was tied back to the church. He was put on trial by the church, the peasant that wouldn’t support him was controlled by the church and the church itself was lying in order to cover up what Galileo had discovered. So you think maybe it wasn’t just that society worked this way or that the church was always right. Maybe the church was the real problem and the church was so nearsighted. The church was the real culprit here. Obviously they like being in power and like being in control so they didn’t want change and tried everything to stop it from happening.

Galileo was one of those people in history that would develop new ideas. These people would question the basis of authority in their society… They asserted the power of knowledge and reason (over faith and religion) at basis for building and expanding societies.

In conclusion even though Galileo was forced to recant it is obvious he didn’t mean it. In the years prior to his death he was on house arrest and managed to sneak two more books out of it before he died. To think had the church believed and accepted what Galileo had said could our technology and our knowledge about the universe now could be where it will be at in at least 10 to 20 years. What else could Galileo have discovered had he gotten full freedom? I guess now we’ll never know but what we do know is that He was one of the greatest thinkers of our time and will always be remembered.