@Miles - Christi And people wonder: Why they make such a big effort to lie? And the reason is that they want us to believe that God doesn't love us as much as we are told. Because it is very different to really believe that you where carefully designed to habitate in this incredibly special place (and this predilection can be seen in reality since earth is the center of all creation), so special that the God of Heaven wanted to incarnate Himself here. And so special because we, humans, are his most dear creation, and because His dearest creature His mother was going to live in this place. Now on the other hand we are forced to believe that we are a product of randomness of insignificant energy marbles (atoms) who aimlessly collide with one another and after an unimaginable amount of time of trial and error a bunch of atoms formed a protein and then a cell etc. until they arrive to man, and that our earth is just a rock floating aimlessly in space, doing circles around a giant hot gas. And that we are not that special since "by probability" there must be an infinitude number of other rocks with the same conditions as ours. And that there is no absolute frame of reference, any frame of reference is valid. And since people do not distinguish between the physical reality (the reality in which models, quantities, equations, exist) and the corporeal reality (on which you and I exist) They mix them so they do not distinguish between a model of a phenomena and the phenomena itself. ""Matthew 24:24
For there shall arise false Christs and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders, insomuch as to deceive (if possible) even the elect.
"

@Miles - Christi I share your sentiment, but be careful with concluding like that (because flat earth vs round earth is very tricky to conclude and with enough mental gymnastics you can explain the water not bending issue, one possible reason is to say that your bath-tube is nowhere near the size of the earth so you cannot conclude with just that experiment). In my humble opinion it is more important to teach Catholics and everybody the FACT that the earth doesn't move and that it is the center of the universe (which make sense since God wanted to have his incarnation on this place). This Fact that the earth is still and not moving has been thoroughly proven. Each experiment to measure the movement of the earth has failed to detect any, and in fact Einstein had his motivation to invent his theory in part because he disliked the idea of an unmovable earth, he disliked the outcome of the Michelson Morley experiment, which said that the earth velocity was 0. So he thought; "hmmm, how can we explain that this experiment tells us that the earth has no velocity and at the same time to be able to say that the earth moves?"; and he came up with part of his theory to try to explain this "inconsistency", at the end of the day he wanted to solve a problem that was not there because he disliked reality. So he invented some schizoid theory in which time dilates and contracts and space change size and some other ideas that have no use (if you dig deep, because everybody who hears this statement immediately say: "but what about the GPS?" doesn't it needs to be corrected using Einstein theory to be right? and the answer I have came across is that at the end it doesn't (Check the work of Wolfgang Smith, he explains this in one of his books). People keep defending their own abusers (like Einstein, Darwin and Galileo) who have worked tirelessly to destroy the true cosmology, the Christian Cosmology. But we have been conditioned since early childhood to admire these traitors to truth, in a more subtle way that we have been conditioned to admire Hollywood stars, or singers. But it is difficult to people that think they are smart, that have been fooled in most of what they believe with respect to science. And it is hard for them because they forgot that we are on this earth to fight for souls, first, and not to make "scientific" discoveries, which can and has been used to destroy souls (And these people do not even make legitimate science). The ternary that has destroyed Christian cosmology in my opinion is, Copernican-ism, evolution, and relativity. And the more you know the more you realize that at the end of the day you are forced to have a blind faith if you want these "theories" to work because reality doesn't support them as people believe. But with respect to the shape of the earth I cannot conclude, and I haven't found any definitive proof of either model. Read the book "Galileo was wrong the Church was right" It is a 2000 page book that carefully proves that you have to believe on an stationary earth, because of science and because of faith.

@Strong and Steadfast Controlled opposition was born to produce the effect that you are warning people to avoid. We tend to go from one extreme to the other, and virtue is in the middle as some smart guy said. Mainstream flat earth was created to attract people disillusioned with mainstream science. But mainstream flat earth is flawed and I think this is on purpose, to make people, who believe in flat earth, look like fools and to push them from one extreme (to believe mainstream cosmology) to the other (to believe in a flawed flat earth model). But both model have flaws, like both parties have flaws it is always this dialectic methodology to control opinions.

@Strong and Steadfast Another thing; The mainstream flat earth model has been debunked specially the motion of the Sun and Moon. This has been debunked with raw data, (data observed on the spot, not coming from a model) So, yes the mainstream flat earth model is wrong. But this doesn't mean immediately that there might be a better flat earth model. I personally do not know the shape of the earth because I'm not commanded by any authority to relive in a specific shape and because I cannot verify the shape with my eyes.

@Strong and Steadfast I have no idea about the effects of the sun and moon. But each of these models carry tons of other questions. I'm just saying that it is not dumb to believe one or the other, the problem is much more complicated than we usually believe. I would love to be able to lunch a rocket to the space and see the shape by myself. But I'm not able to do that and my trust on mainstream science is each day going down so I trust more what I can see with my eyes than to blindly trust some unknown person's model.

I do not know enough about the technical details to come up with an analogous explanation with a flat earth as a premise. But I'm sure it can be done. Maybye you will be navigating in a new map who doesn't need corrections? I do not know. The same way that some old astronomers, who believed the planets moved in circles, tried to aproximate an ellipse with sum of circles (Epicycles are just data analysis (Fourier series)). There must be a way we can came up with a function that transfroms a flat earth to a round earth and viceversa (whatever the shape is in reality) And then we apply that same function to all the calculations and we can go from one solution to the other given our assumptions. Now the difference may be that it can add complexity to the calculations if the premise is far from reality, but it can be done.

@Darby D Dillion Science never tells you more than the model. And the model is INVENTED by man. Of course a good model will try to correspond as much as possible with reality otherwise nobody will use it since it wont be able to predict. For instance the model that says that the earth is still and the center of the universe can do exactly the same predictions as a model with the sun or whatever other location at its center, to use either of those models is up to the person, and the reason to chose one or the other may depend on how convenient it is to make some calculations (or some other reason). The "geo stationary" satellites can be as easily explained in a model with the earth at its center. Science is like the following: You find that the grass in your backyard is wet: and you know rain produce this effect, also watering the plants produce this effect, and an infinitude of other reason may cause your grass to be wet. Now you do science and you build a simple model that says that any time there is rain then your grass will be wet. So far so good, now the problem nowadays is that people who knows little about the process of science will fall into the erroneous believe that only rain can make the grass wet, forcing their senses to accommodate to this model, and even if there is somebody watering the plants then later they will say that somehow it rained in between. It sound dumb but ultimately this is the error that most people fall with respect to science. So it is very possible that the pilot used a model with the premise that the earth is round and made some calculations that made sense, but this doesn't mean that the same explanations cannot be given with the assumption that the earth is flat. In summary it is not conclusive, because of the nature of science. It is not dumb to believe in a flat earth, because of the size of the earth our senses are not enough to conclude (although I have seen more proof that the earth is at least bigger than what they tell us because of the length you can zoom on the sea and see objects that should be hidden behind the curve, that proof is way more powerful than most globers use). But in summary, it is not dumb to believe either position. If the people at NASA were trustworthy we wouldn't be having this conversation.

Because your life cannot have meaning in a meaningless world. That is why Galileo was one of the worst revolutionaries, worst than Marx, he destroyed Christian cosmology, and with this he put in doubt all the Bible. Saint Bellarmine and the Church were right. Galileo repented of what he did at the end of his life. But who nowadays knows that Galileo was wrong in every way? Very few! and if you show people the scientific proof that the earth doesn't move and it is the center of the universe you are seen as crazy (Although whether the earth is flat or round I cannot tell). Despite the fact that all Church fathers support this truth (this interpretation of the bible) Thus, making it certain. This means that if you are against a motionless earth at the center of the universe you are a heretic. Because when all Church Fathers agree on some interpretation you have to believe it. BUT NOBODY CARES! Because people do not understand how important is to know these truths.

As father Hesse said, the burden of proof is on the one who accuses. As far as I know (which is little, but relying on sources like father Hesse, Malachi Martin, Father Luigi Villa, Brother Bugnolo) we can't demonstrate they are not popes so it is safer for oneself to say that despite the way they are, they are still popes. With exception of Bergoglio who is demonstrably not a Pope since Benedict never resigned validly.