The Triumph of Christianity: How the Jesus Movement Became the World's Largest Religion

by Rodney Stark

This record of systematic progress is why the distinguished historian of science I. Bernard Cohen (1914–2003) noted that “the idea that a Copernican revolution in science occurred goes counter to the evidence... and is the invention of later historians.”10 Most of Cohen’s sophisticated colleagues agree.11 Copernicus added a small step forward in a long process of normal science, albeit one having immense polemical and philosophical implications. It should be noted, too, that the scholars involved in this long process were not rebel secularists. Not only were they devout Christians; they were clergy—most of them were bishops and there even was a cardinal among them. And one more thing, they all were embedded in the great Scholastic universities.