It is very easy to lens history from the modern/post modern standpoint. It is to err to impose current perspectives and philosophies on a time they did not exist. Consider for example the influence of Erasmus, described by some as the father of humanism: It is difficult to imagine a time when the life of any peasant had no value--when death was such a small thing. Reminds me of the jihadists of today who deem the women and children they bomb to be insignificant. Today's Western value of human life did not exist in the early middle ages.
The next critical aspect of the Galileo age, relates to the philosophy of science itself. Today's science is so based on empiricism that when we ask why a tree grows, we answer in a way related to cellular biology, which is a post empiricist perspective. Prior to Galileo, the reason a tree grows did not deal with process, it dealt with purpose. Galileo and Copernicus's work was to refute the tombs of "scientists" who predicted the position of the stars and planets for the purpose of astrological prediction. Since no king would go to war if the stars were aligned against them, they paid handsomely for the advice and prediction of astrologer whose livelihood Galileo put at risk.. The church was outwitted by these charlatans and is guilty of inquisition because they were duped/bribed to take a position it paid very little attention to before-hand. It was Galileo's contemporaries/scientists who were the majority of popular science of the day--who were really his enemies. Even today to stand against the press of popular scientific opinion can mean a scientist must weather an inquisition of his own. In that regard modernity and the dark ages aren't so far apart.
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