ET phone Rome: Vatican hosts alien life study

Wednesday, 11 November 2009

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The Vatican has hosted a conference to study the possibility of alien life in the universe and its implication for the Catholic Church.

The study was part of events marking the UN-designated International Year of Astronomy.

"The questions of life's origins and of whether life exists elsewhere in the universe are very suitable and deserve serious consideration," said the Rev. Jose Gabriel Funes, an astronomer and director of the Vatican Observatory.

Chris Impey, an astronomy professor at the University of Arizona, said it was appropriate that the Vatican would host such a meeting.

"Both science and religion posit life as a special outcome of a vast and mostly inhospitable universe," he told a news conference Tuesday. "There is a rich middle ground for dialogue between the practitioners of astrobiology and those who seek to understand the meaning of our existence in a biological universe."

Thirty scientists, including non-Catholics, from the U.S., France, Britain, Switzerland, Italy and Chile attended the conference, called to explore among other issues "whether sentient life forms exist on other worlds."

Funes set the stage for the conference a year ago when he discussed the possibility of alien life in an interview given prominence in the Vatican's daily newspaper.

* Source: The Belfast Telegraph.

Comments

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Ecce Homo.

ron_broxted wrote:

Wednesday, 11 November 2009 at 04:05 pm (UTC)

What will the Vatican make of any findings? Christ died for human redemption but not giant lizards on Rigel VII. Or is salvation just an earth thing?

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ALIENS

zugzwang41 wrote:

Wednesday, 11 November 2009 at 04:40 pm (UTC)

Aliens do exist, the Labour cabinet is stuffed with them...

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Aliens and christinanity

lal10 wrote:

Friday, 4 December 2009 at 12:14 am (UTC)

There is much talk about aliens being 'angels', in my opinion bible stories were simply a way for people living in a simpler time attempting to make sense of the world around them. We also need to remember that the bible was not written by people who witnessed the events they were describing or even at the time of the events. If we then look at the council of nicea, when many bible texts were removed from the bible, including those written by women and those that challenged the teachings of the church at the time. Many biblical texts were also heavily edited, so how can anyone claim the bible to be in anyway the 'truth' or even close to it? If you know your history you will be well aware that the traditions of the church mirror those of many religions that predated christianity such as the Egyptians, pagans etc, cultures and religions that have been called heretical by the church through the ages. I enjoy the teachings of Jesus, a heretic himself in the eyes of the church if he was correctly understood as the radical that he was. I could not follow catholisism because it acts against the teachings of Jesus and the bible, which it holds as supreme above all else, I do not prescribe to hypocracy. To explain, christianity teaches to be humble before god, the vatican could never be described as humble, there is only one god and it is heresy to proclaim yourself as a god or being even close, but yet the pope is gods representative on earth, all men are equal, i doubt it was meant literally but women are still not welcomed as priests, and the list could go on. As for aliens, take responsibility for your own thoughts, as Jesus taught, and believe what you want to believe, do christians really need to have their thoughts and beliefs fed to them by the vatican or can they not take responsibility for themselves and live their life in a way Jesus would have found preferable to that the vatican teaches?

PS I was brought up as a catholic, but after much research i no longer follow this path. I do belive there is life on other planets and i base all my beliefs on fact, science and personal education. Faith is necessary but faith in what the individual holds dear, not what corporate religions spoon feed us to boost their coffers and power over us.

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