We’ve seen enough of UFOs online. We’ve heard enough of stories of insiders who claim to be in secret projects and in contact with extraterrestrial races, both good and evil. There is the Disclosure movement in USA and other countries…
My question is: how would the Churches authorities react if tomorrow we face an Alien reality, in terms of open manifestation of ships over cities, public contacts in front of the crowds, or may be TV appearance side by side with politicians who will announce we are not alone?
Please do not answer with short phrases like: “the great deception” but substantiate your answer whatever it is.
a useful interview - YouTube
the popes were informed of such alien contacts, starting from Pius XII. John 23 had contacts with George Adamski the famous contactee.
I have doubts of the real content of apparitions secrets, such as Fatima, do they actually deal with alien stuff. If there are secrets, theoretically everything could be inside.
The End Time watchers’ accusations of Virgin Mary to be alien deception, DO NOT answer the basic questions - are we alone among the billions of stars? Were we visited by Them? And why should all of them be fallen demons? Did God allow only demons to populate the billions of star systems, and us - the only good who have fallen in the Garden? What are the angelic accounts then, if the angels are so much material in many cases? Where did Elijah go (if you are indoctrinated you will realize he cannot go to the highest heaven, neither could he be resurrected before Jesus). What did Ezekiel saw (1 chapter of his book).
I do not try to answer these questions here. But the reaction of the main Churches will determine the position of hundreds of millions faithful. I myself wouldn’t wait for such, anyway.
Churches cannot even get their followers to agree to their basic rules for human interactions. How could an official religious leaders’ reaction to an alien visit possibly be relevant?
C’mon. Everyone knows the first thing the aliens will do is say “Take us to your leader!”
And then he’ll horribly offend the aliens, who will invade and conquer the Earth, and we’ll languish in slavery until a plucky band of misfits manages to overthrow the alien occupation. Because that’s how these things work.
Some will see them for what they are (with many different opinions on the impliications).
Some will see them as some sort of deception by “the government”, “the UN”, “scientists”, “the illuminati”, “evil corporations”, “the Kochs”, “liberals”, “atheists”, “Scientologists”, etc.
e.g. debates on whether the aliens are proper subjects of proselytism, if there were special creations in every world, if they must have their own version of the Prophet/Savior/Buddha so our variations don’t apply or if ours is The One, whether contact with them would be forbidden intercaste contact, if original sin applies to every world, etc. The arguments would go on forever.
(BTW if the aliens turn out to themselves have faith-based religious beliefs and even institutional organized religion(s), a whole bunch of people are going to feel very let down…)
The mainstream religions with deep historical roots didn’t hang around so long by accident. They know how to adapt to new circumstances and come out alive. ETs would be a bit different from what the European explorers had to deal with when they first came into the New World, but not so much so that it would topple any well established religion.
It would probably push a bunch of people into non-belief, I’d say. I know a ton of really lax Christians who pretty much never questioned their beliefs. They are Christians because they go to church every week. They ignore the pulpit unless it happens to coincide with their personal needs.
I imagine the typical of these unexamined Christians would get an opportunity to shake off religion if ETs were revealed.
But I doubt it would change the churches much. They would pound out epic loads of horseshit trying to bend holy texts to include the aliens in their cosmology, but people who need to believe will keep on believin’.
It depends.
The aliens could say “Jesus told us to visit.” Or they could say, “When is Shabbos in this place, and we’d kill for a nice piece fish.” Or they could say “belief in gods? You still do that? Oy!”
But I fully expect the religious to start getting their missionary rockets prepared. And a whole new slew of missionary in alien cooking pot jokes would arise.
It would be cool if they had a prophecy that they would come across a world with orbiting a sun with our spectral bands, and it would bring to them the new covenant for their religion. So when they get here, they look at the numbers of various religions and decide that since Catholicism has the highest number of adherents, they all convert.
It might all depend on the special powers of the E.T.
For example, if it was taken into protective custody, yet proved to be better than Harry Houdini at getting free, and reappearing out in public again. Church people might get excited about that, and ask for a spiritual explanation, as scientists would want a scientific explanation.
If religious people IMO decide that it is something to fear,
then they might hope for some drastic killing by fire.
If, on the other hand, they see it as a good sign from God,
they might decide to worship it, or make it into their spiritual leader.
Some might find biblical prophecy, that they will come to believe, fortells of the E.T. coming.
Churches and church leaders would probably have to react to the direction of their followers.
The Catholic Church & probably the bulk of moderate-liberal Protestant churches would have no problem whatsoever. The conservative Protty views are fragmented- End-Times-oriented fundamentalists & Young Earth Creationists would tend to regard it as demonic deception, perhaps paving the way for the AntiChrist. However, those of us in the Church of St. Jack of Narnia (C.S. Lewis) realize there is room in Biblical, historical Christian faith for the possibility of extraterrestrial creations.