Dark hour of history

 

 

“Pope Leo urged Catholics to reject comfort, power and domination and instead embrace a mission rooted in self-giving love, even when it requires risk, vulnerability and suffering”.

 

Taken from:

'In this dark hour of history,' do not shy away from your mission, pope says - Detroit Catholic

 

‘In this dark hour of history’, do not shy away from your mission, pope says

 

Carol Glatz and Josephine Peterson

Apr 2, 2026

….

 

ROME (CNS) -- God doesn't exist to grant victories or to be useful by providing wealth or power, Pope Leo XIV said.

 

Through Jesus, he serves humanity by offering himself in a way that transforms human hearts so that they may then be inspired to love others unconditionally, in turn, he said in his homily during Mass of the Lord's Supper in the Basilica of St. John Lateran.

 

"Jesus purifies not only our image of God -- from the idolatry and blasphemy that have distorted it -- but also our image of humanity," he said April 2, Holy Thursday. "For we tend to consider ourselves powerful when we dominate, victorious when we destroy our equals, great when we are feared."

 

However, he said, "Christ offers us the example of self-giving, service and love" so that humankind can learn how to love according to what true love is.

In fact, he said, learning to act like Jesus "is the work of a lifetime."

 

The Lord loves not because those he reaches out to are good or pure, Pope Leo said, but simply because "he loves us first."

"His love is not a reward for our acceptance of his mercy; instead, he loves us, and therefore cleanses us, thereby enabling us to respond to his love," he said. "He does not ask us to repay him, but to share his gift among ourselves."

"In him, God has given us an example -- not of how to dominate, but of how to liberate; not of how to destroy life, but of how to give it," Pope Leo said.

"As humanity is brought to its knees by so many acts of brutality, let us too kneel down as brothers and sisters alongside the oppressed," he said. "In this way, we seek to follow the Lord's example."

 

Pope Leo XIV washes the foot of a priest during the Mass of the Lord's Supper at the

Basilica of St. John Lateran in Rome April 2, 2026. The foot-washing ritual reflects the call

to imitate Christ by serving one another. (CNS photo/Vatican Media)

 

The pope's words came during a Mass that commemorates Jesus' institution of the Eucharist and the priesthood, and includes the traditional foot-washing ritual, which reflects the call to imitate Christ by serving one another.

 

Pope Leo returned to an earlier practice of washing the feet of 12 priests from the Diocese of Rome in the Basilica of St. John Lateran, which is the cathedral of the Diocese of Rome. The pope poured water from a golden pitcher onto the foot of each priest, wiped each foot dry with a towel and then gently kissed each foot.

 

Pope Francis had departed from the norm after his election in 2013 by celebrating the Mass in one of Rome's "peripheries," such as prisons or nursing homes, and by washing the feet of men, women and their infants, Muslims or people of no faith, as a sign of his dedication to serve everyone unconditionally.

 

Pope Francis' predecessors had always chosen either 12 priests, laymen or boys from the diocese for the ritual held either in the Basilicas of St. John Lateran or of St. Peter.

By choosing 12 priests, 11 of whom he ordained last year, Pope Leo highlighted the Mass' commemoration of the institution of the Eucharist and of holy orders.

"The intrinsic bond between these two sacraments reveals the perfect self-gift of Jesus, the high Priest and living, eternal Eucharist," he said in his homily.

"Beloved brothers in the priesthood, we are called to serve the people of God with our whole lives," he said.

 

Jesus' disciples were astonished by their master's gesture and, like Peter, "we too must 'learn repeatedly that God's greatness is different from our idea of greatness … because we systematically desire a God of success and not of the Passion,'" he said, quoting Pope Benedict XVI.

"We are always tempted to seek a God who 'serves' us, who grants us victory, who proves useful like wealth or power. Yet we fail to perceive that God does indeed serve us through the gratuitous and humble gesture of washing feet," he said. "This is the true omnipotence of God."

 

Earlier in the day, Pope Leo urged Catholics to reject comfort, power and domination and instead embrace a mission rooted in self-giving love, even when it requires risk, vulnerability and suffering.

 

During the chrism Mass in St. Peter's Basilica, he called on the faithful in his homily to overcome fear and a sense of powerlessness in responding to the world’s crises.

"In this dark hour of history, it has pleased God to send us to spread the fragrance of Christ where the stench of death reigns," he said. "Let us renew our 'yes' to this mission that calls for unity and brings peace."

While grounding his remarks in the teaching of his predecessors, saints and clergy, the pope in this homily placed particular emphasis on the Church’s mission through his own eyes as a missionary.

The first step of accepting the Christian mission, he said, is to risk leaving behind what is familiar and certain, in order to venture into something new.

"Every mission begins with that kind of self-emptying in which everything is reborn," he said.

It is through this self-emptying that Christians encounter the love of Christ, the pope said.

 

Pope Leo XIV celebrates the Mass of the Lord's Supper at the Basilica of St. John Lateran

in Rome April 2, 2026. (CNS photo/Vatican Media)

 

At the heart of his first Holy Thursday homily as pope, he reflected on the nature of Christian love, saying it is rooted not in power, but in self-giving.

"Jesus' journey reveals to us that the willingness to lose oneself, to empty oneself, is not an end in itself, but a condition for encounter and intimacy," Pope Leo said. "Love is true only when it is unguarded."

 

He said true peace is not found in remaining comfortable, but in embracing the risk and detachment that mission requires. Calling it a "fundamental secret of mission," the pope said "everything is restored and multiplied if it is first let go, without fear,” a process repeated “in every new beginning, in every new sending forth."

 

God calls upon the faithful to take risks, so "no place becomes a prison, no identity a hiding place," he said. Every mission requires reconciliation with the past, with the "gifts and limitations of the upbringing we have received," the pope said.

 

Once the faithful are able to detach from what is familiar and comfortable, Pope Leo said they must then "encounter" the other through selfless service and the sharing of life. This detachment, he said, creates the conditions for authentic encounter rather than control.

He emphasized that it is a priority that "neither in the pastoral sphere nor in the social and political spheres can good come from abuse of power."

 

He pointed to the example of missionaries, a role he held as an Augustinian in Peru, whose work must be rooted in service, dialogue and respect.

 

Rather than seeking to "reconquer" increasingly secular societies, the pope said Catholics must approach as guests, not to impose, but to listen and accompany.

 

The Church's mission, the pope said, is guided by the Holy Spirit, and the faithful must not try to control it but instead follow its lead, entering each culture with humility and "respecting the mystery that every person and every community carries within them."

 

In his third point, the pope explained that this mission is not a "heroic adventure" reserved only for a few, but rather the "living witness of a Body with many members," and every mission includes rejection and suffering.

 

He recalled that the people of Nazareth were filled with rage when they heard Jesus' words and drove him out of the town. Every Christian must "pass through" a trial just as Jesus did, the pope said.

 

"The cross is part of the mission: the sending becomes more bitter and frightening, but also more freeing and transformative," he said.

 

A successful mission is not about the results, but rather about the disciple's faithfulness and hope in God. Jesus embarked on a journey "in a world torn apart by the powers that ravage it," Pope Leo said.

"Within it arises a new people, not of victims, but of witnesses," he said.

 

 

Jesus does not listen to the prayers of the warmongers

 

“[Jesus] does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them, saying: ‘Even though you make many prayers, I will not listen:

our hands are full of blood’,” he said, citing a passage from the Bible.

Pope Leo XIV

 

Pope says God rejects prayers of those who wage wars

 

Joshua McElwee
Mar 30, 2026 ….

 

Source: Al Jazeera

 

Pope Leo says God rejects the prayers of leaders ‌who start wars and have “hands full of blood” in in unusually forceful remarks as the Iran war enters ‌its second month.

 

Addressing tens of thousands of people in St Peter’s Square on Palm Sunday, the celebration that opens the holiest week of the year in the lead-up to Easter for the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics, the pontiff said Jesus could not be used to justify any wars.

“This is ‌our God: Jesus, ‌King of ⁠Peace, who rejects war, whom no one can use to justify ​war,” the first US Pope told crowds in brilliant sunshine on Sunday (local time).

 

Palm Sunday begins the holiest week of the year for 1.4 billion Catholics

ahead of Easter. Photo: AAP

 

“[Jesus] does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them, saying: ‘Even though you make many prayers, I will not listen: Your hands are full of blood’,” he said, citing a passage from the Bible.

Leo did not specifically ⁠name any world leaders, but he has stepped up ​criticism of the Iran war in recent weeks.

During an appeal at the end ‌of Sunday’s ​celebration, the Pope lamented that Christians in the Middle East “are suffering the consequences of an atrocious conflict” and ​might not be ‌able to celebrate Easter.

 

The Pope, who is known for choosing his ​words carefully, has repeatedly ‌called for an immediate ceasefire in the conflict and said on Monday military ​air strikes were indiscriminate and should be banned.

 

Some US officials have invoked Christian language to justify the joint US-Israeli strikes on Iran on February 28 that initiated the expanding war.

 

US Defence ​Secretary ​Pete Hegseth, who has started leading Christian ​prayer services at the Pentagon, prayed at ‌a service on Wednesday for “overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy”.

 

In his homily on Sunday, Leo referenced a Bible passage in which Jesus, about to be arrested ahead of his crucifixion, rebuked one of his followers for striking the person arresting him with a sword.

“[Jesus] did not arm himself, or ​defend himself, or fight any war,” Leo said.

“He revealed the gentle face of God, who always ​rejects violence. Rather than ⁠saving himself, he allowed himself to be nailed to the cross.”

 

—AAP

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mary’s ‘Yes’ at the Annunciation was the turning point of history

 

 

Today is the feast-day of the Annunciation

(25^th March, 2026)

  

“Our affection for Mary of Nazareth leads us to join her in becoming disciples of Jesus. Jesus invites us to be part of his Kingdom, just as he asked Mary for her ‘yes,’ which,

once given, was renewed every day”.

Pope Leo XIV

  

From Rome to the Holy Land: Annunciation of Mary

 

From Rome to the Holy Land: Annunciation of Mary

 

• Rudolf Gehrig

 

The place of the Incarnation. Credit: EWTN Vatican

 

It is a familiar scene in Rome. Every Sunday at noon, the Pope appears at the window of his apartment overlooking St. Peter’s Square to greet the faithful gathered below and those watching around the world.

“Cari fratelli e sorelle, buona domenica!” Pope Leo XIV calls out, beginning a tradition that has endured for generations.

 

At the heart of this weekly encounter is the Angelus—a prayer recited by Catholics worldwide, rooted in one of the most decisive moments in human history: the Annunciation.

 

“The Angel of the Lord declared unto Mary, and she conceived of the Holy Spirit. Hail Mary, full of grace…” the Pope prays, echoing words that have been repeated for centuries.

 

The “Yes” That Changed History

 

The Angelus centers on Mary’s response to God’s plan—her “yes” to becoming the Mother of Christ. This moment, often described as the turning point of salvation history, continues to shape the Church’s life today.

 

During the Jubilee dedicated to Marian spirituality in October 2025, Pope Leo XIV reflected on the enduring significance of Mary’s response.

 

“Brothers and sisters, Marian spirituality is at the service of the Gospel: it reveals its simplicity,” he said. “Our affection for Mary of Nazareth leads us to join her in becoming disciples of Jesus. Jesus invites us to be part of his Kingdom, just as he asked Mary for her ‘yes,’ which, once given, was renewed every day.”

 

Mary’s fiat was not a single act confined to the past—it became a model of daily fidelity, a path of discipleship that continues to inspire believers. ….

 

 

 

Claim that Copernicus knew of Aristarchus

 

 

“… with some reading and piecing together of some related bits of evidence,

and thinking about context, I’m now completely convinced Copernicus

did know of Aristarchus’s hypothesis, and that he deliberately withheld acknowledgement of the fact”.

 cosmiCave.org

  

Taken from: Setting the Record Straight: How Copernicus Concealed His Debt to Aristarchus—and Claimed an Intellectual Priority He Knew Wasn’t His – cosmiCave.org

 

Setting the Record Straight: How Copernicus Concealed His Debt to Aristarchus—and Claimed an Intellectual Priority He Knew Wasn’t His

 

There’s a prevailing myth in the history of science that Copernicus rediscovered heliocentrism independently—and that he had no real connection to Aristarchus, whose own theory was vague, obscure, and uninfluential. This essay dismantles that myth.

 

While researching this previous essay, trying to get all my facts straight with reference to primary sources, I found several interconnected things that are badly misunderstood at the present—things I previously thought were true, but which closer inspection showed to be false.

 

I used to think, as it’s the common consensus, that it was unclear whether Nicolaus Copernicus had known Aristarchus of Samos proposed a heliocentric (Sun-centred) model similar to his in the third century BCE—and that he probably didn’t since he never mentioned it. But with some reading and piecing together of some related bits of evidence, and thinking about context, I’m now completely convinced Copernicus did know of Aristarchus’s hypothesis, and that he deliberately withheld acknowledgement of the fact.

 

Another thing I’ve always understood to be true, which is written all over the place, is that one of the main obstacles that stood against Aristarchus’s theory being accepted in his time was the fact that we don’t see any stellar parallax in nearby stars as Earth orbits the Sun. But this, too, turns out to be an anachronistic myth—and one that’s pretty clear to see when all the relevant information is pulled together. It’s also linked to a lot of inaccuracy related to interpreting Copernicus and Aristarchus, and in a way I think it has indirectly influenced the false consensus that Copernicus likely wasn’t aware of Aristarchus’s hypothesis.

 

Consequently, while this essay’s primary purpose is to explain that Copernicus was, without a doubt, aware of Aristarchus’s heliocentric theory—in fact, he was every bit as aware of its details as anyone today is—it will also clarify some other things that people seem to commonly misunderstand, such as the anachronistic parallax myth.

 

I want to be clear: I’m not claiming Copernicus originally got the heliocentric idea directly from Aristarchus. That is too strong a claim, and I don’t think we can ever know one way or the other. Aristarchus likely became known to Copernicus at some influential point during his studies in Italy, but whether that was before or after Copernicus had thought of the basic concept, and realised for himself that e.g. retrograde motion could be explained through parallax rather than by actual backwards motion as the planets looped around a fixed Earth, we cannot know. It is reasonable to think that Copernicus realised the latter on his own, though he did not keep a detailed diary as he worked through his ideas, so we can’t confirm this.

 

So we can’t know precisely when in his early years Copernicus became aware of Aristarchus, nor how influential the Ancient Greek had been in shaping Copernicus’s theory.

 

In fact, very little is even known of the details of Aristarchus’s model, so it really can’t have been too influential. Copernicus must have come to realise much of what makes the concept so compelling on his own.

 

But still, this does not change the fact that Copernicus did Aristarchus dirty.

 

He knew Aristarchus had proposed a heliocentric theory in the third century BCE. He knew Aristarchus was a serious astronomer, e.g. the first to estimate the Sun’s distance through careful measurement and detailed geometric reasoning. And Copernicus deliberately withheld that information from both Commentariolus and De revolutionibus orbium coelestium—as he was absolutely aware of his predecessor’s theory already when he wrote his early draft.

 

This much is true. And it is also true that Copernicus made this omission so he could claim priority to the idea that the Earth orbits the Sun.

 

While he did not explicitly say this—how could he, as he omitted his knowledge of Aristarchus entirely?—he did so implicitly, by excluding Aristarchus from the broader group of Ancient geokineticists he listed in support of his proposal that the Earth moves, which he followed by explicitly claiming that he had come to the idea that Earth is orbiting the Sun on his own, “by long and intense study.”

 

Leaving Aristarchus out of that sequence worked well rhetorically, as he could cite precedent for the proposal that the Earth spins daily, or that it moves about a central fire in an abstract, metaphorical sense. And from there, Copernicus could frame himself as taking those ideas to the next level with a novel hypothesis that this moving Earth actually orbits the Sun. 

 

The omission of Aristarchus provided a clean and compelling narrative within the opening argument for his life’s work, and it’s understandable that he did it.

 

The alternative would be to frame the whole theory as something that had basically been thought of and explored in Ancient times, and eventually rejected by those who Copernicus and everyone around him thought of as intellectual authorities, leaving him to argue that while they’d eventually abandoned the idea he nevertheless proposed circling back to.

 

This more honest approach would have placed Copernicus at a much greater disadvantage, making him far more easily dismissed on superficial grounds, which he needed to avoid. “Check out my theory! Someone already thought of it 1800 years ago and the astronomers at the time eventually dismissed it as an abstract peculiarity that’s nevertheless absurd. But for the past several decades I’ve worked through the details anyway and I think I can make it work, never minding the absurdity which you’re likely to find insane.”

 

Copernicus actually acknowledged in De revolutionibus, that the idea that Earth was rapidly spinning and orbiting as he proposed seemed “absurd,” “insane,” and “almost against common sense.” To admit this, and to also say that people had nevertheless already considered the hypothesis and discarded it would have considerably heightened his disadvantage.

 

So, instead, he omitted the detail and framed the idea as novel: 

 

“For a long time, then, I reflected on this confusion in the astronomical traditions concerning the derivation of the motions of the universe’s spheres … having obtained the opportunity from these sources, I too began to consider the mobility of the earth. And even though the idea seemed absurd, nevertheless I knew that others before me had been granted the freedom to imagine any circles whatever for the purpose of explaining the heavenly phenomena.

 

Hence I thought that I too would be readily permitted to ascertain whether explanations sounder than those of my predecessors could be found for the revolution of the celestial spheres on the assumption of some motion of the earth … [and] by long and intense study I finally found that if the motions of the other planets are correlated with the orbiting of the earth …”.

 

So you see: this narrative does not work if Copernicus acknowledges that Aristarchus had actually beaten him to the claim, and that Copernicus was reviving something that had been rejected almost two thousand years ago, by those who had the full original manuscript to work with. Omitting Aristarchus allowed Copernicus to cast himself as the innovator rather than revivalist—to frame heliocentrism as a novel hypothesis rather than a return to an abandoned theory.

 

Copernicus’s source on Aristrarchus’s theory—Archimedes’ Sand-Reckoner—was also not widely known when De revolutionibus was published in 1543. It was first printed (purely coincidentally?) in a Latin edition of Archimedes’ works in 1544. Copernicus was therefore not compelled to cite his source, as his knowledge of the former work was relatively private and not expected.

 

Anyway, the above explains roughly why I think Copernicus cut Aristarchus out.

 

This is my reasoning based on Copernicus’s rhetorical framing of his proposal, and a suspicion that he was not acting purely in bad faith. Not necessarily because he wanted all the glory to himself, though there may have been some of that, but mainly because it would have been a disadvantage to do so.

 

But this essay is not about my own, personal speculative opinion. And I will not go so far as to demonstrate why Copernicus did what he did, nor how large a debt Copernicus owed to Aristarchus nor how much of his realisation about the compelling aspects of heliocentrism was original insight. I don’t think we’ll ever find more direct evidence to help in ascertaining these things.

 

What I will show, as I said above, is that Copernicus clearly, unquestionably did read Archimedes’ Sand-Reckoner sometime before 1514, when he circulated Commentariolus to his friends and colleagues—and that he therefore knew Aristarchus proposed a heliocentric theory before him. That he therefore deliberately withheld the reference in De revolutionibus. And that twentieth century Copernicus historians wrongly concluded he did not.

 

In the process, I’ll also set the record straight on a related point—a common anachronistic reading of the evidence that was held against heliocentrism, both in Ancient times and in Copernicus’s day. The idea that the Ancients cited an apparent asbsence of parallax shift in the nearest stars due to Earth’s hypothesised orbit about the Sun, that they favoured geocentrism in part because of this, and that Copernicus hedged against this criticism, is a complete falsehood that is almost universally accepted at present.

 

This anachronistic parallax argument against heliocentrism was not noted until after Copernicus died—and in fact it was not even applicable to either his theory or Aristarchus’s. The fact that it is commonly thought to have concerned Copernicus and Aristarchus’s contemporaries is unfortunate for several reasons: 

 

• it represents a fundamental misunderstanding of an Ancient worldview that persisted unchallenged until nearly the end of the sixteenth century, which Copernicus never dreamed of questioning; 
• it therefore obscures the debt we all owe to one of the most influential innovations in the history of cosmology, to a person (Thomas Digges) whose name is hardly ever even mentioned in the history books—and certainly not as a key player in the Scientific Revolution—who frankly deserves to be celebrated as the father of modern cosmology, finally given his rightful place alongside Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler, and Newton;
• it leads to anachronistic misreadings of both Ptolemy and Copernicus, when we fail to realise the notion of a parallax shift in nearby stars relative to those further away never could have crossed their minds; and,
• it obscures a key piece of evidence that renders Copernicus’s obvious plagiarism of Archimedes unmistakable, along with the deliberateness of his omission of Aristarchus as his predecessor.

 

It’s an interesting and deeply illuminating historiographic reset, and I hope you enjoy reading. It’s far more than just a detail about intellectual credit. These false narratives that have been propagating for more than a century warp our entire understanding of cosmological progress, Ancient science’s sophistication, and even modern assumptions about scientific reasoning.

 

Given everything I’ve said above, I’ll work through the actual demonstration of claims as follows. I’m going to start with a recap of previous arguments that incorrectly concluded Copernicus was unaware of Aristarchus’s heliocentric theory, clarifying on their own terms how weak and flawed they are. I’ll then explain the anachronistic parallax argument, clarifying why it is an anachronism. With that context, we can then immediately clarify Archimedes’ reference to Aristarchus in the Sand-Reckoner—both, what his concerns were and what they were not. I’ll then also discuss both Ptolemy’s argument in Almagest Book I, Chapter 6 and Copernicus’s argument in De revolutionibus Book I, Chapter 6 (Copernicus deliberately paralleled the structure of Almagest as a rhetorical device in his work, so these chapters are similar), clearly establishing that neither was aware of the anachronistic parallax idea. Thus, we’ll clarify both, that Ptolemy was not arguing against heliocentrism on that ground—in fact, there is no evidence he entertained the heliocentric hypothesis at all in Almagest, as he never addressed it—and that Copernicus was not hedging against the anachronistic parallax argument in De revolutionibus—and again, there’s no evidence he ever even dreamed it was a problem he’d need to guard against—and in fact when we consider his actual worldview it’s clear the problem should never have crossed his mind. 

 

We’ll then loop back to the Sand-Reckoner, specifically focusing on Archimedes’ application of Aristarchus’s theory, what that application says and what it explicitly does not imply about the Ancient reasons it failed to attract a wider following. In my previous essay, I gave three reasons why Aristarchus’s theory faded into obscurity until it was revived by Copernicus, and this diagnosis clarifies that the anachronistic parallax argument was never one of them—that it was never even dreamed of until after 1576, when Digges proposed his radically different cosmological worldview, which we’ve all come to accept implicitly, and tend to project onto earlier thinkers.

 

Finally, having all these pieces in place, this analysis will close with the evidence that Copernicus lifted his fourth proposition in Commentariolus directly from Archimedes—that there is no other explanation for the specific formulation he chose, as he never would have come to that specific formulation on his own, he did not require it, he never made specific use of it, and in the end, in De revolutionibus he reverted to the less specific, mathematically imprecise argument that paralleled Ptolemy’s reasoning in the Almagest.

 

Previous Accounts by Science Historians

 

Copernicus’s Commentariolus was lost for more than 350 years. While he had shared copies privately with several friends and colleagues in 1514, those languished in private libraries. This first articulation of Copernicus’s heliocentric hypothesis was only rediscovered in 1878, by the historian Maximilian Curtze in Vienna. And it was first translated into English by Edward Rosen in 1939.

 

In 1942, Rudolf von Erhardt and Erika von Erhardt-Siebold published a sprawling article in the History of Science journal Isis, closing with a claim about “the almost certain acquaintance of Copernicus with the Sand-Reckoner.” In the article, this claim was buried at the end, and even there it was not well explained: The section is two paragraphs long, the point is made (without proper context) that Copernicus’s fourth postulate in Commentariolus is conspicuously similar in its construction to a passage from the Sand-Reckoner, and then the authors proceed to speculate—incorrectly!—that with this postulate Copernicus may have been guarding against the non-observability of stellar parallax due to Earth’s orbit. ….

 

 

 

In the context of all of this, and regarding the actual historicity of some of these famous astronomers and scientists, see my (Damien Mackey’s) articles:

 

Did the Greeks derive their Archimedes from Sargon II’s Akhimiti?

 

(8) Did the Greeks derive their Archimedes from Sargon II's Akhimiti?

 

Machiavelli in the name Achitophel, Galileo Galilei in the name Gamaliel

 

(8) Machiavelli in the name Achitophel, Galileo Galilei in the name Gamaliel