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Actually, he faced two trials for heresy and, finally, after a personal and private visit by Cardinal Robert Bellarmine, he recanted and was spared punishment. Even then he was always suspect and posthumously sort of chastised by being allowed to be buried in the Fromburk Cathedral in Poland but only in an unmarked grave.

Well, on today’s date of May 22 in 2010, history set the score aright. Copernicus’ remains were reburied in the same location with honors befitting not only his contributions to science but his ethical fortitude for standing up for truth. But the focus here today is not about science or history. The scenario eventually ending in his justice being realized brings to my mind the greater issue of question: Do we live in a moral universe?

Probably my favorite college professor, and I had a bunch of them, was Dr. Dale Kimsey, an authority on the Old Testament. He was fond of frequently reminding us ministerial students, “We live in a moral universe.” The idea of a “moral universe” is simply defined as the inherent moral truths that exist independently of human opinions as opposed to morality that is of human construct.

Some people believe there are certain moral precepts such as not harming others that are objectively and universally valid independent of human consciousness. Others, like adherents to the Buddhist faith, believe in a moral universe that does not necessarily involve God. Hindus hold that there is a higher power (Karma) that underpins all our actions which consequentially have certain ultimate consequences.

The philosopher Nietzsche felt that the universe was absolutely physical with no divinity, which led him to write those infamous three words, “God is dead.”

Dostoyevsky took this concept a step further and declared, “If God does not exist, then everything is permitted.” Some people believe in a moral universe out of a personal need for some universal justice system; as a very experienced social worker friend once shared with me, “I have witnessed so many abused, neglected and injured babies and small children in my work, I have to believe there is going to be a Judgment Day.”

And child psychology teaches that as we experience pleasant and vexatious interactions in the world, our maturing minds try to organize a sense of right and wrong, eventually arriving at an understanding between our actions and either rewards or punishment that we understand to be a universal morality.

Jesus made the point that those who are not motivated to love others so that they feed the hungry, clothe the naked, do justice to the oppressed, etc., condemn themselves in the hereafter.

Martin L. King is often quoted as having observed, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” (Actually he was succinctly restating Theodore Parker’s deeply spiritual observance, “You see a continual and progressive triumph of the right. I do not pretend to understand the moral universe, the arc of the moral universe is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways. I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; I can only divine it by conscience. But from what I see I am sure that it bends toward justice.”)

I like that explanation. Perhaps I, like the child psychologists put forth, am still trying to make sense of a world that has so much room in which to improve toward the admonition of “Love thy neighbor.”

But I am elated that Copernicus finally got his just recognition. It re-energizes my faith in mankind that there is hope we will one day practice the “Do unto others as you would that they do unto you” eternal truth.