YouTube is a vehicle in which all can make their views known to the whole world; much of it helpful, much harmful, for watching untruth does great harm to our ability to judge matters of life when seen as true.
Not long ago he was talking to his colleagues about a YouTube group asserting that talk of a round earth was a lie and publishing this on YouTube. The professor a curious person, knew it was a waste of time, but curiosity was so strong he went to the video and quickly went through the video at a quick pace. Despite knowing all the facts and all the voyages in space they maintained the earth was flat. What is more of a surprise is to see the followers that the YouTube presentation received, and the many positive comments?
When he was a child he remembers reading an article where a priest using a forked branch from a tree to look for underground water, wrote about learning this from a French foreign missioner. In the summer months, we have long dry spells this was an effort to alleviate the problem.
This method, dowsing, was in use in Europe. The person using the forked branch and responding to the surrounding environment searched for underground water. Since the farmers saw this being done they were awestruck and the method continued to spread. The writer tells the readers that in Korea anywhere you dig the chances of finding water are good. Although in Korea dowsing has been shown not to be scientifically based, it continues.
A similar bogus 'quantum resonance system' using the same reasoning is sold with a high price tag. They add a fancy scientific name and even though they don't understand they are impressed with the scientific name.
A priest in one of the parishes in which the professor lived in a sermon said the stars do not give their light but reflect the light of the sun. He was mixing up the stars with the moon which reflects the light of the sun and extending it to the stars which like the sun with nuclear fusion give off their own light.
In the past, the planets: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn were considered stars but since they are giving off reflected light they are called planets. The professor was concerned that when the children heard the sermon and knew what they had been taught in school would have less concern for their faith.
Our ancestors for the most part, understood the earth to be flat and the sun and moon to move around the earth and this was the thinking of the many writers of the Scripture. But the Scriptures are not teaching science but a way of life and adapting the teaching to the thinking of the readers of that time.
Jesus tells us to be children but this is in a spiritual sense. St. Paul tells us the relationship our faith should have with reason. "Surely I should pray not only with the spirit but with the mind as well" (I Cor. 14:15). "I would rather say five words that mean something than ten thousand words in a tongue. Brothers, you are not to be childish in your outlook. You can be babies as far as wickedness is concerned, but mentally you must be adult" (ICor.14: 19-20).
Jesus was not happy with those who were looking for miracles. Are we looking today for things that are not reasonable and desiring to see miracles? It is well to remember that God works also in nature and through our reason.
