The Reason Why the Earth is at the Center of the Universe

I'm reading Galileo at Work: His Scientific Biography by Stillman Drake. Galileo had literary interests as well as scientific. When he was younger (before he had even adopted the Copernican system) he was invited to lecture on Dante's Inferno. "Galileo expounded on God's reasons for having placed [the earth] at the center of the universe --- namely, to have it as far as possible from the sight of the blessed residents of Heaven, least they be offended by its grossness."
'In the midway of this our mortal life, I found me in a gloomy wood, astray'