The Church is open to the possibility of extraterrestrial life.
I'd like to thank my son Richard who came up with the concept and contributed to the development of this post.
In May 2008, Fr. José Gabriel Funes, the Director of the Vatican Observatory, granted an interview on the relationship between astronomy and faith. According to Fr. Funes, it is possible to believe in God and in extraterrestrials. The existence of other worlds and other life, even more evolved than ours, can be accepted without this interfering in the discussion the faith of creation, the incarnation, the redemption.
Please note that the opinions of Fr. Funes are his own and do not represent an official statement of the Magesterium of the Catholic Church.
Fr. Funes said, “Astronomers contend that the universe is made up of a hundred billion galaxies, each of which is composed of hundreds of billions of stars. Many of these, or almost all of them, could have planets. How can you exclude that life has developed somewhere else?”
There are many scientists who state that there may be intelligent extraterrestrial life, but due to the distances between stars, it is unlikely that there will ever be any contact with them. Nonetheless the possibility of extraterrestrial life raises a number of interesting questions including:
· Would extraterrestrials have original sin?
· Could extraterrestrials have souls?
· If contact was possible, could we proselytize them?
· If they didn’t have souls would it be sinful to exploit them?
According to Fr. Funes, “As there exist many creatures on earth, so there could be other beings, also intelligent, created by God. This doesn’t contradict our faith because we cannot put limits on the creative freedom of God. To say it as St. Francis [of Assisi], if we consider some earthly creatures as ‘brother’ and ‘sister,’ why couldn’t we also talk of an ‘extraterrestrial brother’? He would also belong to creation.”
If extraterrestrials have souls, it would be possible that they would have been born without original sin. Fr. Funes discussed this possibility and referred to the Gospel parable of the lost sheep. Aliens, he speculated, could already be redeemed because they could have remained in full friendship with God, while the human race “could be precisely the lost sheep, the sinners that need the shepherd.”
Original Sin
Catechism of the Catholic Church
The Catechism describes plainly the nature of original sin. For the purposes of this post it is necessary to include more paragraphs than I do in other posts.
396 God created man in his image and established him in his friendship. A spiritual creature, man can live this friendship only in free submission to God. The prohibition against eating "of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" spells this out: "for in the day that you eat of it, you shall die." The "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" symbolically evokes the insurmountable limits that man, being a creature, must freely recognize and respect with trust. Man is dependent on his Creator, and subject to the laws of creation and to the moral norms that govern the use of freedom.
397 Man, tempted by the devil, let his trust in his Creator die in his heart and, abusing his freedom, disobeyed God's command. This is what man's first sin consisted of. All subsequent sin would be disobedience toward God and lack of trust in his goodness.
398 In that sin man preferred himself to God and by that very act scorned him. He chose himself over and against God, against the requirements of his creaturely status and therefore against his own good. Constituted in a state of holiness, man was destined to be fully "divinized" by God in glory. Seduced by the devil, he wanted to "be like God", but "without God, before God, and not in accordance with God".
399 Scripture portrays the tragic consequences of this first disobedience. Adam and Eve immediately lose the grace of original holiness. They become afraid of the God of whom they have conceived a distorted image - that of a God jealous of his prerogatives.
400 The harmony in which they had found themselves, thanks to original justice, is now destroyed: the control of the soul's spiritual faculties over the body is shattered; the union of man and woman becomes subject to tensions, their relations henceforth marked by lust and domination. Harmony with creation is broken: visible creation has become alien and hostile to man. Because of man, creation is now subject "to its bondage to decay". Finally, the consequence explicitly foretold for this disobedience will come true: man will "return to the ground," for out of it he was taken. Death makes its entrance into human history.
401 After that first sin, the world is virtually inundated by sin. There is Cain's murder of his brother Abel and the universal corruption which follows in the wake of sin. Likewise, sin frequently manifests itself in the history of Israel, especially as infidelity to the God of the Covenant and as transgression of the Law of Moses. And even after Christ's atonement, sin raises its head in countless ways among Christians. Scripture and the Church's Tradition continually recall the presence and universality of sin in man's history:
402 All men are implicated in Adam's sin, as St. Paul affirms: "By one man's disobedience many (that is, all men) were made sinners": "sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all men sinned." The Apostle contrasts the universality of sin and death with the universality of salvation in Christ. "Then as one man's trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one man's act of righteousness leads to acquittal and life for all men."
403 Following St. Paul, the Church has always taught that the overwhelming misery which oppresses men and their inclination towards evil and death cannot be understood apart from their connection with Adam's sin and the fact that he has transmitted to us a sin with which we are all born afflicted, a sin which is the "death of the soul". Because of this certainty of faith, the Church baptizes for the remission of sins even tiny infants who have not committed personal sin.
404 How did the sin of Adam become the sin of all his descendants? The whole human race is in Adam "as one body of one man". By this "unity of the human race" all men are implicated in Adam's sin, as all are implicated in Christ's justice. Still, the transmission of original sin is a mystery that we cannot fully understand. But we do know by Revelation that Adam had received original holiness and justice not for himself alone, but for all human nature. By yielding to the tempter, Adam and Eve committed a personal sin, but this sin affected the human nature that they would then transmit in a fallen state. It is a sin which will be transmitted by propagation to all mankind, that is, by the transmission of a human nature deprived of original holiness and justice. And that is why original sin is called "sin" only in an analogical sense: it is a sin "contracted" and not "committed" - a state and not an act.
406 The Church's teaching on the transmission of original sin was articulated more precisely in the fifth century, especially under the impulse of St. Augustine's reflections against Pelagianism, and in the sixteenth century, in opposition to the Protestant Reformation. Pelagius held that man could, by the natural power of free will and without the necessary help of God's grace, lead a morally good life; he thus reduced the influence of Adam's fault to bad example. The first Protestant reformers, on the contrary, taught that original sin has radically perverted man and destroyed his freedom; they identified the sin inherited by each man with the tendency to evil (concupiscentia), which would be insurmountable. The Church pronounced on the meaning of the data of Revelation on original sin especially at the second Council of Orange (529) and at the Council of Trent (1546).
So what do these paragraphs from the Catechism tell us?
1. As a consequence of the sin of Adam and Eve creation is now subject to its bondage to decay (would that pertain to all of creation, including other worlds?);
2. Original sin is transmitted to us and we are all born afflicted;
3. Even after Christ's atonement, sin raises its head in countless ways among Christians;
4. By this "unity of the human race" all men are implicated in Adam's sin; and
5. The transmission of original sin is a mystery that we cannot fully understand.
There are multiple manners in which we can imagine original sin is transmitted. Could it be transferred to our progeny through the act of sexual intercourse? Perhaps it is in some way a part of our DNA. It is also possible that original sin is transmitted from human to human, through contact – akin to a disease.
In 2005, Jesuit Brother Guy Consolmagno wrote a booklet called Intelligent Life in the Universe? Catholic Belief and the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligent Life. Brother Consolmagno speculated that if new forms of life were to be discovered or highly advanced beings from outer space were to touch down on planet Earth, it would not mean “everything we believe in is wrong,” rather, “we're going to find out that everything is truer in ways we couldn't even yet have imagined.”
Brother Consolmango added, “The limitless universe might even include other planets with other beings created by that same loving God The idea of there being other races and other intelligences is not contrary to traditional Christian thought. There is nothing in Holy Scripture that could confirm or contradict the possibility of intelligent life elsewhere in the universe.”
The reason I have prefaced this post with information of how original sin is transmitted is because it would be an issue if earth is ever visited by aliens who haven’t been tainted by original sin. Let’s suppose the following:
1. Somewhere in the galaxy there is a race of intelligent beings, with souls, that have not fallen in the same manner as humans.
2. The aliens do not have original sin,
3. The aliens are good, kind, and benevolent who do not know death.
4. They visit earth to help us.
Would humans transmit original sin to the aliens by contact? Could contact with humans harm the aliens?
The exposure to humans and our ideas could implant the seeds of temptation and relativism with the aliens. Their trust in the Creator could die within them as it has with many of us. For the first time they would exercise their gift of free will in defiance of God. All subsequent sin would be disobedience toward God and lack of trust in his goodness. For the first time they would know hate and death.
Would they then turn on mankind with their superior technology? Would their purpose change from a mission of mercy to one of exploitation?
Even worse. Suppose the aliens realize that they have changed after having contacted humans. Suppose that they knew that it was a bad thing. Perhaps they would destroy Earth to stop the "infection."
Mark 9:43-48
If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life maimed than with two hands to go into Gehenna, into the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life crippled than with two feet to be thrown into Gehenna. And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. Better for you to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into Gehenna, where 'their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched.'
Even worse. Suppose the aliens realize that they have changed after having contacted humans. Suppose that they knew that it was a bad thing. Perhaps they would destroy Earth to stop the "infection."
Mark 9:43-48
Would the tainted aliens return to their home world and transmit original sin to everyone else on their planet? Could they, in turn, transmit original sin throughout the galaxy?
Need for Redemption?
If the aliens have souls, once they became tainted with original sin, they would need redemption. Would Jesus come to their home world in an alien form to save them?
C.S. Lewis wrote an essay entitled Religion and Rocketry, in which he argued that the existence of intelligent extraterrestrial life would not necessarily contradict Christian theology. Lewis said that it was possible that aliens, if they exist, might have fallen from a state of grace and in that case might be redeemed through God’s mercy.
According to Fr. Funes, if aliens were sinners, just as Jesus is believed to have come to save mankind they, “in some way, would have the chance to enjoy God’s mercy.”
On the other hand, C.S. Lewis suggested that aliens might not need a separate sacrifice by Jesus for their redemption. He cited Romans 8:19-22
For creation awaits with eager expectation the revelation of the children of God; for creation was made subject to futility, not of its own accord but because of the one who subjected it, in hope that creation itself would be set free from slavery to corruption and share in the glorious freedom of the children of God. We know that all creation is groaning in labor pains even until now
Therefore, when Jesus was crucified on Earth, his ultimate sacrifice may have sufficed for all of creation – throughout the universe.
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