Vatican Acknowledges Possibility Of Extraterrestrial Alien Life

In an article titled "The extraterrestrial is my brother" during an interview for the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, Vatican astronomer, Jesuit Father Jose Funes, director of the Vatican Observatory acknowledged the possibility that alien life exists in the universe.

Father Funes states that such a belief does not contradict faith because any form of extraterrestrial life would be considered God's creature as well. He goes on to state that biomarkers are now being used in spectrum analysis of other stars and planets in the search for extraterrestrial life. The Vatican astronomer said that "astronomy was a science that can open people's minds and hearts and bring them closer to God. The idea that astronomy leads to an atheistic view of the universe is a myth."

Wow.

I don't know if you are as astonished by this as me, but I must say that I'm surprised. Not because it doesn't seem perfectly logical to assume that other life forms exist out there - to me it does - but because this is a big step for the church in my opinion. And it's been a long time coming.

The discussion became even more surprising to me when Father Funes was quoted as saying, "As an astronomer, I can say that from the observation of stars and galaxies there emerges a clear evolutionary process." It is Father Funes' belief that the Big Bang Theory is the most plausible explanation for the origin of the universe.


For those of you who may not know, Galileo Galilei was tried in 1633 as a heretic and forced to recant his theory that the Earth revolves around the sun because teachings at that time placed the Earth at the center of our universe. Pope John Paul corrected this in 1992 when he declared that the ruling against Galileo was an error resulting from a "tragic mutual incomprehension."

So it seems the church may now be attempting to rectify old wrongs and the Vatican Observatory is now a leader in it's efforts to bridge the gap between science and religion. Its meteorite collection is actually considered one of the world's finest.

Now granted, there is a difference between the Vatican's chief astronomer and the Vatican itself, but nonetheless. . .this is quite interesting isn't it?

Another reason that I find this interesting? With the year 2012 looming in the near future and all the discussion about whether it's literally the end of our world or simply the end of our world as we know it. . .it occurs to me that the timing for this is rather interesting.

I don't necessarily believe that any one dramatic event will take place in the year 2012. Personally, I believe that during the years preceding and following the year 2012 we will begin to "shift" as a society and our views and priorities as a race will be changing accordingly.

I believe we are moving into a spiritual age. An age when people will realize there are more important things in life besides technology, progress, money and industry. We will begin to focus on our spirituality, our divinity, advances in quantum physics, possibly the discovery of something bigger than ourselves, our environment - and the importance of caring for your fellow man. Something that I think man has forgotten there is great joy and satisfaction in.

It almost seems to me like this recent Vatican event could be viewed as one of many steps in preparing mans mind for the acceptance of such things.

Just an interesting observation on my part so for those of you prepared to bash me as some sort of paranoid schizophrenic, conspiracy theorist or whatever else you throw at me - trust me, I'm not. I don't run around like Chicken Little waiting for the sky to fall and calling these "end times." But I don't ignore certain things either. I always enjoy stepping back, taking myself out of the equation and looking at the big, big picture.

I like to ponder many things and this is one of those things I currently find myself pondering. I don't believe that these are "end times." Actually, I believe quite the opposite. I believe these are times of new beginnings and a chance for mankind to redeem itself and I look forward to what's to come. Even if it amounts to nothing at all.