I am wondering about the religious view of people who have been to space; more specifically, I want to know if anyone who has been to space has significantly changed their views after the experience.
Buzz Aldrin, who was (and presumably still is) a Presbyterian, took Communion on the Moon.
Cite (a few paragraphs down from the heading).
that’s interesting, thanks for that info. I wonder if any previously religious person suddenly decided that their religion was too limited or seemed too Earth-centric.
Jim Irwin, who walked on the moon during Apollo 15, became a pastor later in life and said that his time in space deepened his faith.
There have been hundreds of people up there, so it seems likely that some have experienced a conversion, but from what I’ve read, it seems like most find space travel a spiritual experience that confirms and energizes their previous beliefs.
–Cliffy
There’s also a story I’ve heard (undoubtedly a UL) that when the first [Godless communist] cosmonauts went up there, one of them said something to the effect of “Hey silly Americans - I don’t see your god up here. I guess he doesn’t exist,” to which some American responded “Turn off your oxygen and you’ll see him soon enough.”
Another famous story is about Neil Armstrong–here’s one version.
I’ve heard a few astronauts quoted as saying that being up in space was a very religious experience for them, but I couldn’t give you citations for those.
I don’t think these are exactly on-target for the OP, but FWIW it’s what I’ve got.
That link didn’t work for me - or rather, it didn’t show me that story, anyway. I’m interested because it is my understanding that most of Jerusalem has changed too much in the last 2000 years to find a place that Jesus really walked. The stairs that lead up to the Temple during Jesus’ life are definitely not there anymore. There are stairs that go up to the Temple Mount/Haram Ah-Sharif on the outside of the city walls (I once had a class taught sitting on them), but I have a feeling that they aren’t that old (although of course I could be wrong).
I am also intrigued to see that the the three languages that linked page is available in besides English are Hebrew (official language of Israel), Arabic (ditto), and…Farsi. I wish my Farsi were good enough that I could see what the Israelis want the Iranians to know.
Weird. It works fine for me. Anyway, there are several copies of the story around. I found two books on Google’s reading search with a claimed direct quotation from Armstrong: “It means more to me to stand on these steps than to stand on the moon.” So you might run a search on that phrasing. Here is another website, complete with photo of said steps. The way I’ve always heard it, it’s emphasized that spots where Jesus may have stood are not exactly all over the place, and Armstrong was asking for a place where one could be sure about it.
What silly American would he have said this to, and how?
I don’t think Russian cosmonauts were in direct radio contact with Americans while out in space.
Sounds like a made-up story to me. Have you got a cite for it?
Wikipedia on Yuri Gagarin says
There’s also a story online where the author says her Russian grandmother remembered hearing it in school, so it may have been more official Soviet propaganda than anything else. I’ve never head of the retort, and it sounds like a complete UL built onto a story that was misreported anyway.
That Armstrong story sounds odd – the man’s reputation is of being extremely reserved in religious matters, even to the point Madalyn Murray O’Hair launched a lame little campaign to try and “out” him as an atheist because he would not identify a specific religion in various forms that asked that while in the military and working for NASA (but he would not play along). Biographer James Hansen suggests this reticence to make his position on matters of faith public was out of respect for his mother, who was a VERY devout evangelical Christian, while he was not.
One would figure that the first generation of spacemen, though not immune to awe and the spiritual (e.g. Apollo 8 and the Christmas Eve reading of Genesis from Lunar Orbit) would have been in the majority men with established religious/nonreligious worldviews which their space experiences may just as well intensify as undermine.
Some of the more notable ones include: Jim Irwin, already mentioned – his experience moved him towards greater Christian devotion to the point that he entered the ministry and even led expeditions to find Noah’s Ark around the Ararat region. Ed Mitchell was interested in psi phenomena even before his flight and had a “cosmic (literally!) experience” and since has worked on psychic research and written and spoken at length on New Age topics.
Charlie Duke also became known as a Christian speaker along with his wife, but that was after their faith helped save their marriage, after he left NASA, according to their own website.
Okay. Those are, in fact, the steps I mentioned earlier, that I once sat on during a lecture. I’m trying to recall the facts from that class, Historical Geography of Jerusalem (every week we took a four hour field trip somewhere in the city), and the gate they lead up to, St. Stephen’s Gate, didn’t exist in Jesus’ days. The current walls - and its gates - aren’t very old by Jerusalem standards. They were built during the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent in the 16th century, and those stairs are obviously much newer even than that. (I would assume they date only from 1967, in fact, as the retreating Jordanian army destroyed the Old City’s Jewish Quarter during the Six Day War, and those steps are right outside the Jewish Quarter.) So there’s not even any particular reason Jesus was there, either, as he could have entered the city from another angle. AFAIK. Obviously, I am not a famous archaeologist, but I suspect the dude might have just been trying to make a great explorer happy.
Anyway, I realize I’m picking nits on a hijack. I’ll stop now.
No, no cite, which is why I gave the disclaimers that it’s a vague story and undoubtedly a UL. This is just one of those things that I’ve heard herer and there, which is why I was careful enough in my post to make it clear that I wasn’t stating it as gospel.
Also, see dangermom’s post about Yuri Gagarin.
It may be a totally made-up story, for all I know; I have never met Neil Armstrong to ask him about it. If so, it’s a pretty old and well-documented one, since it’s in a few books as well. But certainly that’s not much of a reason to trust it. I can’t find any refutation of it online anywhere, so if anyone knows of one I would like to see it too.