This was a good read. Here’s a wild idea I’ve had for a long time. Like in the movie Thor ragnarok, “Asgard is not a place, it’s a people.” What if God’s people, Adam and Eve, were not born on earth. What if they were ‘born’ in the garden of eden not of earth but of Mars? During the fall of man, Adam and Eve found themselves on earth never to see their garden again? What if we are the ‘aliens’?
I’m not Christian, but this topic is one I’ve always found fascinating. My knowledge of the specifics might be lacking, but when approaching the topic of the crucifixion as a universal event I imagine the event on each planet/for each species as being a manifestation of an archetypal event. Christ as a universal would appear at different locations, times, and forms, as suits the specific beings to which he descends. The one saving event would be distilled into numerous events across the universe. On my side of the religious pond there are other characters and events that might be considered universal, but I reckon the framework would be similar.
One other thing that came to mind when reading this is the idea that God’s revelations to humanity were brought by human beings, and always in the language (both literal and symbolic) of the people to whom it was brought. It stands to reason that the same goes the aliens out there. It then stands to reason that even the most bizarre (from our limited perspective) models of alien intelligence would receive the fingerprints of God in a form intelligible to them—even if unintelligible to us. Makes me wish we could hurry up and make first contact, if only so that we can open up the field of xeno-comparative religious studies (or whatever it might be called)!
Hi Blueshift, thanks so much for your detailed response! First off, I take it as a great compliment that you enjoyed the essay without subscribing to the Christian faith. I very much would like these discourses to be accessible to people of no faith, other faith, deconstructing faith, or whatever else - or just those who are generally curious. So, thanks again!
With regard to your comments, I am in agreement with you. If we take that the crucifixion and resurrection were cosmic events - and in light of intelligent aliens, I think we have to, else we create a de facto hierarchical structure where humans occupy some 'privileged' space that the aliens do not, which does not seem particularly loving or fair (and we have to believe that the God of Christianity is both of these things) - then we would haver to imagine that this event was made intelligible to the aliens in some way, shape or form unique to them. Any efforts as Christians to communicate our understandings of who Christ was would likely 'line up' in some way or other with whatever the alien faith system imagines.
And this is where I get to my favorite part of your comment - the idea of 'xeno-comparative religious studies'. What a fantastic science fiction notion! You should write a book about it. I suppose, given time, that's exactly what our Christian missionaries would end up doing as we forge cultural, economic and political links with these aliens (hopefully peacefully). As we seek to convey our religious understandings to them, no doubt they would attempt the same to us, and likely a common thread might be plucked and followed back to...The Source of It All.
A final point: the diversity of Christian expressions WITHIN modern Christianity I think demonstrates this well. As Christianity went global, it morphed and transformed wherever it went. Look at the unique characteristics that define how Nigerian Christians express their faith - compare that to the churches of South Korea, or Catholic practitioners in Mexico. Or the differences between deconstructing Christians and conservative ones. Or the Orthodox, Protestant and Catholic Churches. We can compare and compare and compare until the cows come home. And I think, if we take the proper approach, we will find that no single one is wholly 'correct' - faith only ever makes sense in a unique place and time, within a unique context, to a unique person.
“…perhaps also contradicts the assumption that all intelligent beings would be dealt with equally…”
Yes, we’ve been assuming that our intelligent aliens occupy the same kind of ‘moral fallenness’ or disconnect from God as ourselves. But an interesting (if wild) possibility could be that our aliens are not actually fallen at all - I think CS Lewis had some postulations about this. Could aliens be then something like angels, in the sense that they occupy a spiritual dimension we ourselves do not? Maybe they have physical forms (as angels often appear to do) but are spiritually perfect in some way? Perhaps then the cosmic act of the crucifixion really was only for us?
But we’re spinning further and further off into the dangerous seas of the unknown. What seems most evident is that people as individuals (rather than as a species) chart their own course toward God, however they might go about it. On this point, I think we can be quite firm.
Delightful discussion with yourself, Blueshift. It would be great to have more in the future - perhaps you’d consider subscribing so as to not miss any further essays? I promise I won’t flood your inbox - new discourses biweekly. It would be great to have you as #40 on the list!
Looking forward to more posts and future discussions! I thought I’d subscribed, but turns out I’d just followed (still getting the hang of Substack)—fixing that now!
Such a thoughtful reply—first haha yes I do plan on writing something along the lines of xeno-comparative religious studies! I’ve committed to a larger project for the time being (though it still involves some r theology and religion), but this will certainly be percolating in the meantime…
I think you’re absolutely right, if we assumed that the crucifixion is unique to humanity it would belie the assumption that we are special, which is both an arrogant and dangerous path to tread. I think the key is in the fact that while in a metaphysical sense it is the same across all intelligent species, the actual manifestation could differ wildly in order to suit the nature of the species at hand. I can’t imagine what that would look like.
Then again, I also have to wonder if it’s possible for an intelligence to be so foreign to us that no structure, cosmic or otherwise, could apply to both humanity and their species. With such a different path to Him, it would unrecognizable to us. I think that’s getting into the realm of intelligent oceans, and perhaps also contradicts the assumption that all intelligent beings would be dealt with equally, but if He contains within Himself all possibilities, it seems only reasonable that there are infinitely varying paths to Him, some of which might follow other cosmic structures that ultimately serve the same purpose.
And to your final point—you put it beautifully. There is no single, wholly correct way. In that sense, there are as many paths to the Lord as there are people. I’ve seen this idea in the context of comparative religion as well—many paths leading to the same summit.
As in, First Contact happens and we discover the aliens have crucifixes and shrines to St. Peter and icthys bumper stickers? I heard of a sci-fi novel working under that premise called ‘Pilgrims’ by ME Leonard. No idea if it’s good, but it’s on my reading list.
To answer your question more directly, I think that’s essentially what this essay is all about: if God is God (as in, the highest authority by which one can derive their existential purpose), then He must also be God of other created beings. For their part, the aliens - whom we assume have some kind of spiritual awareness or expression - it might be said that this ‘seed’ of belief has its origin in the same God as Christian (and others) worship here. This reasoning is based on the idea that we, corporeal beings made of matter, possess some kind of transcendent quality that we can’t quite understand or explain. After all, why should matter conceive or anything more than the material world in which it is situated? It can’t, for argument’s sake: this ‘seed’ or ‘sense’ or ‘fingerprint’ or whatever you want to call it comes from the behind, connecting us like a tether. So, aliens we’ve imagined would, in a sense, ‘worship the same god,’ as you’ve said.
To put it another way, if God is love, can you love someone without God? Does God disavow an act of love and say, ‘that’s not my love, so that’s not love’? If the aliens ‘love’, in any sense, I think it can be argued that God must be in action in some way.
Hey Cam, fascinating, wide ranging topic. There are many potential points of engagement within this essay ... why not start at this one: "Life happens by the right combination of chemicals and 'eons and eons' of time" -- But that claim doesn't stand up well to rigorous examination. Abiogenesis has never been proven. That's a big problem. Even Darwin's theory of evolution is facing growing doubt about key details. This arises from many quarters (i.e. it's not just a 'right wing 'christian' thing' .. but a science thing). For example - are you familiar with the issues posited by the scholars in this interview? (link below). Thanks for sharing your essay.
btw I no longer consider it my responsibility to "convert" anyone - let alone aliens ;-) But then, many of my Christian friends probably think I'm just a heretic - or worse - a 'liberal Christian' - gasp!! Cheers, Grant.
Warm salutations to you, after so long! I am so glad that you’ve taken an interest in what I’m doing here.
I am in total agreement that abiogenesis poses huge problems for science (as in, a coherent, purely scientific worldview with no room for metaphysical reality) - I think it’s fascinating! How can non-living matter suddenly become living? It might come up again in a future post.
In my experiment here, I took for granted that the theoretical microbial lifeforms on Europa would eventually evolve into intelligent beings, but of course it’s not so simple. It’s not even clear that we should assume ‘intelligence’ is the defining feature of humanity, in terms of what our spiritual purpose/destiny is. After all, if we invent intelligent robots - more intelligent than ourselves - we wouldn’t necessarily consider them to be God’s children’ in the way that we are supposed to be, right? Is it our souls that define us, then? What even are souls? Does all this mean we could have scenario where we discover alien life that is equal if not more intelligent than ourselves but, as they are without ‘souls’, they are not part of the great Christian redemptive work taking place in humanity/the universe? A fellow Substack author (Patrick Abbot) commented here about CS Lewis’s idea that maybe aliens wouldn’t even be ‘fallen’ in the way that we are. An intriguing possibility!
So, there’s tons more interesting stuff to say about this subject, but there just wasn’t space in the essay. Perhaps there will need to be a Part 2 at some point in the future.
(Not sure if I've 'double replied' ... still working this out - thanks for your patience)
That video I linked to, above, discusses growing scientific evidence undermining Darwin’s conclusions. For example - there is no way Darwin could possibly have understood how, as we 'drill down' into living cells, they become more and more complex - not less so. Had Darwin realized this he would have seen the mathematical impossibilities himself.
These scholars also make some startling statements. i.e. the nasty pathogens that plague us are 'invariably' the result of missing/lost/damaged(?) information in the replication (evolutionary) process. .. what!? Now that is a hugely fascinating thought with theological/philosophical implications which the host catches onto immediately.
It's an intriguing discussion and I'm sure it will help you explore this thesis you’re working on - maybe even require some re-thinks… (which, as you mention in your essay - are always a good thing! Right?) - Cheers, Grant
Thanks for the recommendations, I will certainly check them out! Trying to build a library of sci-fi that examines these themes. Currently reading Roger Zelazny’s ‘Lord of Light’ and really enjoying it.
As Pope Francis said, they'd have to ask for baptism. C.S. Lewis thought it *could* be possible they weren't even fallen. Who knows what God decided on so many questions. Until then, I'll gladly volunteer for the Franciscan Space Corps.
This was a good read. Here’s a wild idea I’ve had for a long time. Like in the movie Thor ragnarok, “Asgard is not a place, it’s a people.” What if God’s people, Adam and Eve, were not born on earth. What if they were ‘born’ in the garden of eden not of earth but of Mars? During the fall of man, Adam and Eve found themselves on earth never to see their garden again? What if we are the ‘aliens’?
I’m not Christian, but this topic is one I’ve always found fascinating. My knowledge of the specifics might be lacking, but when approaching the topic of the crucifixion as a universal event I imagine the event on each planet/for each species as being a manifestation of an archetypal event. Christ as a universal would appear at different locations, times, and forms, as suits the specific beings to which he descends. The one saving event would be distilled into numerous events across the universe. On my side of the religious pond there are other characters and events that might be considered universal, but I reckon the framework would be similar.
One other thing that came to mind when reading this is the idea that God’s revelations to humanity were brought by human beings, and always in the language (both literal and symbolic) of the people to whom it was brought. It stands to reason that the same goes the aliens out there. It then stands to reason that even the most bizarre (from our limited perspective) models of alien intelligence would receive the fingerprints of God in a form intelligible to them—even if unintelligible to us. Makes me wish we could hurry up and make first contact, if only so that we can open up the field of xeno-comparative religious studies (or whatever it might be called)!
Hi Blueshift, thanks so much for your detailed response! First off, I take it as a great compliment that you enjoyed the essay without subscribing to the Christian faith. I very much would like these discourses to be accessible to people of no faith, other faith, deconstructing faith, or whatever else - or just those who are generally curious. So, thanks again!
With regard to your comments, I am in agreement with you. If we take that the crucifixion and resurrection were cosmic events - and in light of intelligent aliens, I think we have to, else we create a de facto hierarchical structure where humans occupy some 'privileged' space that the aliens do not, which does not seem particularly loving or fair (and we have to believe that the God of Christianity is both of these things) - then we would haver to imagine that this event was made intelligible to the aliens in some way, shape or form unique to them. Any efforts as Christians to communicate our understandings of who Christ was would likely 'line up' in some way or other with whatever the alien faith system imagines.
And this is where I get to my favorite part of your comment - the idea of 'xeno-comparative religious studies'. What a fantastic science fiction notion! You should write a book about it. I suppose, given time, that's exactly what our Christian missionaries would end up doing as we forge cultural, economic and political links with these aliens (hopefully peacefully). As we seek to convey our religious understandings to them, no doubt they would attempt the same to us, and likely a common thread might be plucked and followed back to...The Source of It All.
A final point: the diversity of Christian expressions WITHIN modern Christianity I think demonstrates this well. As Christianity went global, it morphed and transformed wherever it went. Look at the unique characteristics that define how Nigerian Christians express their faith - compare that to the churches of South Korea, or Catholic practitioners in Mexico. Or the differences between deconstructing Christians and conservative ones. Or the Orthodox, Protestant and Catholic Churches. We can compare and compare and compare until the cows come home. And I think, if we take the proper approach, we will find that no single one is wholly 'correct' - faith only ever makes sense in a unique place and time, within a unique context, to a unique person.
“…perhaps also contradicts the assumption that all intelligent beings would be dealt with equally…”
Yes, we’ve been assuming that our intelligent aliens occupy the same kind of ‘moral fallenness’ or disconnect from God as ourselves. But an interesting (if wild) possibility could be that our aliens are not actually fallen at all - I think CS Lewis had some postulations about this. Could aliens be then something like angels, in the sense that they occupy a spiritual dimension we ourselves do not? Maybe they have physical forms (as angels often appear to do) but are spiritually perfect in some way? Perhaps then the cosmic act of the crucifixion really was only for us?
But we’re spinning further and further off into the dangerous seas of the unknown. What seems most evident is that people as individuals (rather than as a species) chart their own course toward God, however they might go about it. On this point, I think we can be quite firm.
Delightful discussion with yourself, Blueshift. It would be great to have more in the future - perhaps you’d consider subscribing so as to not miss any further essays? I promise I won’t flood your inbox - new discourses biweekly. It would be great to have you as #40 on the list!
Looking forward to more posts and future discussions! I thought I’d subscribed, but turns out I’d just followed (still getting the hang of Substack)—fixing that now!
Such a thoughtful reply—first haha yes I do plan on writing something along the lines of xeno-comparative religious studies! I’ve committed to a larger project for the time being (though it still involves some r theology and religion), but this will certainly be percolating in the meantime…
I think you’re absolutely right, if we assumed that the crucifixion is unique to humanity it would belie the assumption that we are special, which is both an arrogant and dangerous path to tread. I think the key is in the fact that while in a metaphysical sense it is the same across all intelligent species, the actual manifestation could differ wildly in order to suit the nature of the species at hand. I can’t imagine what that would look like.
Then again, I also have to wonder if it’s possible for an intelligence to be so foreign to us that no structure, cosmic or otherwise, could apply to both humanity and their species. With such a different path to Him, it would unrecognizable to us. I think that’s getting into the realm of intelligent oceans, and perhaps also contradicts the assumption that all intelligent beings would be dealt with equally, but if He contains within Himself all possibilities, it seems only reasonable that there are infinitely varying paths to Him, some of which might follow other cosmic structures that ultimately serve the same purpose.
And to your final point—you put it beautifully. There is no single, wholly correct way. In that sense, there are as many paths to the Lord as there are people. I’ve seen this idea in the context of comparative religion as well—many paths leading to the same summit.
What if the aliens already worship the same god
As in, First Contact happens and we discover the aliens have crucifixes and shrines to St. Peter and icthys bumper stickers? I heard of a sci-fi novel working under that premise called ‘Pilgrims’ by ME Leonard. No idea if it’s good, but it’s on my reading list.
To answer your question more directly, I think that’s essentially what this essay is all about: if God is God (as in, the highest authority by which one can derive their existential purpose), then He must also be God of other created beings. For their part, the aliens - whom we assume have some kind of spiritual awareness or expression - it might be said that this ‘seed’ of belief has its origin in the same God as Christian (and others) worship here. This reasoning is based on the idea that we, corporeal beings made of matter, possess some kind of transcendent quality that we can’t quite understand or explain. After all, why should matter conceive or anything more than the material world in which it is situated? It can’t, for argument’s sake: this ‘seed’ or ‘sense’ or ‘fingerprint’ or whatever you want to call it comes from the behind, connecting us like a tether. So, aliens we’ve imagined would, in a sense, ‘worship the same god,’ as you’ve said.
To put it another way, if God is love, can you love someone without God? Does God disavow an act of love and say, ‘that’s not my love, so that’s not love’? If the aliens ‘love’, in any sense, I think it can be argued that God must be in action in some way.
Hey Cam, fascinating, wide ranging topic. There are many potential points of engagement within this essay ... why not start at this one: "Life happens by the right combination of chemicals and 'eons and eons' of time" -- But that claim doesn't stand up well to rigorous examination. Abiogenesis has never been proven. That's a big problem. Even Darwin's theory of evolution is facing growing doubt about key details. This arises from many quarters (i.e. it's not just a 'right wing 'christian' thing' .. but a science thing). For example - are you familiar with the issues posited by the scholars in this interview? (link below). Thanks for sharing your essay.
btw I no longer consider it my responsibility to "convert" anyone - let alone aliens ;-) But then, many of my Christian friends probably think I'm just a heretic - or worse - a 'liberal Christian' - gasp!! Cheers, Grant.
https://youtu.be/noj4phMT9OE
Warm salutations to you, after so long! I am so glad that you’ve taken an interest in what I’m doing here.
I am in total agreement that abiogenesis poses huge problems for science (as in, a coherent, purely scientific worldview with no room for metaphysical reality) - I think it’s fascinating! How can non-living matter suddenly become living? It might come up again in a future post.
In my experiment here, I took for granted that the theoretical microbial lifeforms on Europa would eventually evolve into intelligent beings, but of course it’s not so simple. It’s not even clear that we should assume ‘intelligence’ is the defining feature of humanity, in terms of what our spiritual purpose/destiny is. After all, if we invent intelligent robots - more intelligent than ourselves - we wouldn’t necessarily consider them to be God’s children’ in the way that we are supposed to be, right? Is it our souls that define us, then? What even are souls? Does all this mean we could have scenario where we discover alien life that is equal if not more intelligent than ourselves but, as they are without ‘souls’, they are not part of the great Christian redemptive work taking place in humanity/the universe? A fellow Substack author (Patrick Abbot) commented here about CS Lewis’s idea that maybe aliens wouldn’t even be ‘fallen’ in the way that we are. An intriguing possibility!
So, there’s tons more interesting stuff to say about this subject, but there just wasn’t space in the essay. Perhaps there will need to be a Part 2 at some point in the future.
In the meantime, stay tuned!
(Not sure if I've 'double replied' ... still working this out - thanks for your patience)
That video I linked to, above, discusses growing scientific evidence undermining Darwin’s conclusions. For example - there is no way Darwin could possibly have understood how, as we 'drill down' into living cells, they become more and more complex - not less so. Had Darwin realized this he would have seen the mathematical impossibilities himself.
These scholars also make some startling statements. i.e. the nasty pathogens that plague us are 'invariably' the result of missing/lost/damaged(?) information in the replication (evolutionary) process. .. what!? Now that is a hugely fascinating thought with theological/philosophical implications which the host catches onto immediately.
It's an intriguing discussion and I'm sure it will help you explore this thesis you’re working on - maybe even require some re-thinks… (which, as you mention in your essay - are always a good thing! Right?) - Cheers, Grant
Love the line, "God's secret, other family." (:
A great sci-fi novel exploring some of these aspects is “The Sparrow” and its sequel “The Children of God” by Mary Doria Russell. Well worth reading.
Thanks for the recommendations, I will certainly check them out! Trying to build a library of sci-fi that examines these themes. Currently reading Roger Zelazny’s ‘Lord of Light’ and really enjoying it.
Another is “The Book of Strange New Things” by Michel Faber
As Pope Francis said, they'd have to ask for baptism. C.S. Lewis thought it *could* be possible they weren't even fallen. Who knows what God decided on so many questions. Until then, I'll gladly volunteer for the Franciscan Space Corps.