Posted on 01/24/2011 8:55:57 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
[snip]
Aliens vs. religion?
One impact that extraterrestrials might have on society is in the sector of religion, said theologian Ted Peters at the Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary in Berkeley, Calif. For instance, aliens might lead religions to question whether a second genesis of life elsewhere belongs within the biblical understanding of creation. Might Jesus Christ have appeared more than once in the universe? [10 Alien Encounters Debunked]
"It's been argued for a couple of centuries now whether one incarnation of God as Jesus Christ for the entirety of creation is sufficient, with some thinking that God would do so multiple times as appropriate for the capacity of any individual species to comprehend," Peters told SPACE.com.
To see what effects the discovery of extraterrestrial intelligence might have on religion, Peters and his colleagues surveyed more than 1,300 individuals worldwide from multiple religious traditions, -- including Roman Catholics, evangelical Protestants, mainline Protestants, Orthodox Christians, Mormons, Jews, Buddhists and non-religious groups.
They found the vast majority of religious believers — regardless of religion — were overwhelmingly confident that they wouldn’t suffer a collapse in faith in the face of evidence of extraterrestrial intelligence. In addition, roughly one-third of religious people thought that the faith of other religions would be threatened, while two-thirds of nonreligious people thought that aliens would sway the faith of the religious as a whole.
Can space change religious beliefs?
There are many open questions as to how people on Earth might view beliefs from space. Could advances that alien civilizations could bring be perceived much like a secular form of salvation? Might advanced civilizations and their perhaps equally advanced philosophies make our religions feel primitive?.......
(Excerpt) Read more at space.com ...
HERE’S A HIDEOUS EXAMPLE VIA SADDLEBACK.
GOD HAVE MERCY ON US:
http://ponderingsfrompatmos.blogspot.com/2011/01/saddleback-health-fitness-seminar.html
Replace “aliens” with “ghosts” or “leprechauns” and see how intelligent this speculation sounds.
The Faith of Carl Sagan lives on.
I’ll ask you the same thing I asked him...You say it’s true, can you prove either exist? Can you supply proof that would convince anyone, anywhere? Can the proof be repeated? Is it just a matter of what one believes?
“Might as well ask “would monkeys flying out of your butt sway your religious beliefs”.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCf_t9aRgXc
*snicker*
I have an authoritative work from Someone Who knows.
You have your own “experience”.
Well there is the theory that they have already been here, got what they needed, wanted and left. To boring, not $$$ feasible, off the main trade routes who knows.
I've had one Christian fundamentalist Freeper tell me that he would consider any aliens landing as being demons from Hell in disguise.
Does you authoritative work require a belief that it is an authoritative work? Can this proof be displayed in some manner other than words in a book? I have no experience with either magic, demons, fairies, leprachauns, dragons, angels or aliens. If there were any way to experience any of these in the flesh, then that would certainly be proof.
“Non religious people always criticize the faithful for believing without proof. These same folks will except the existence of extraterrestrial beings without proof.”
I guess eyewitness accounts of the ministry of Jesus are not proof enough?
I once heard this discussed on a sci-fi TV series years ago and the response was something akin to, “It just proves that God is even greater than we previously imagined.”
If aliens exist and they can cross the vast distances of space to reach us, who is to say they aren’t making a pilgrimage to Earth where God sent his only Son, Jesus Christ, to save us?
Right now, the show “V” has an interesting plotline going on regarding the soul and one of the aliens asked the Catholic priest if he (the alien) had a soul and the response was if you are asking the question then yes, you do.
But it does say quite a bit about spiritual "life."
When you break it down, there are three (and only 3) kinds of spirt beings mentioned in the Bible: God, angels, and human beings. That's it. I believe the Bible gives us enough information that we can be prepared for any spiritual questions that might arise.
Given that, if space aliens one day appear, we can start by scratching a few things off.
(1) They aren't God.
(2) They aren't human beings.
That leaves as possibilites:
(1) They are physical beings that have no spirt component.
(2) The are not alive (given advances in robotics, special effects, etc... it might be possible to create a device or illusion that would seem to be alive to the casual (or maybe not so casual) observer.
(3) The are angels of some type masqurading as space aliens.
Shhh.
The Good People don't like to be talked about, and they're nothing to fool with.
They just might turn out to be human beings. The Bible does not prohibit the Cosmos being populated by more of us. I think this would be the case even if they don’t look like us. After all, there are many races of us just here on the earth.
I think that would bring up too many logical inconsistencies with what the Bible says.
(1) All humans are sinners (hence all need salvation--including alien humans).
(2) Jesus died once (precludes Jesus incarnating as an alien human on another planet and being sacrificed again)for all (all would include alien humans if they existed).
(3) The Bible states that salvation is though Jesus alone.
(4) God desires all be saved.
Jesus' sacrifice took place on Earth, and the good news of the gospel of salvation is only known on Earth. So any alien humans on another planet would have not access to the gospel and no way to be saved through Christ--which clearly conflicts with point #4 above.
The idea that you could have an entire planet full of humans (or multiple planets for that matter) that had no chance of salvation seems to conflict too much with what the Bible says about salvation to make it a possibility.
Agreed they’re nothing to fool with,
but they are not “good people”...
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