Christmas is a time of the unveiling of Celestial Beings. It is a season of epiphanies and manifestations. Some would call them "Extraterrestrials". Recently we shared some thoughts of John Wesley on the subject. Other notable Christians have also expressed their views:
Billy Graham:
“Some reputable scientists deny and others assert that UFOs do appear to people from time to time. Some scientists have reached the place where they think they can prove that these are possibly visitors from outer space. Some Christian writers have speculated that UFOs could very well be a part of God's angelic host who preside over the physical affairs of universal creation. While we cannot assert such a view with certainty, many people are now seeking some type of supernatural explanation for these phenomena. Nothing can hide the fact, however, that these unexplained events are occurring with greater frequency.” - Angels God's Secret Agents, p.21
Billy Graham ministered to many US Presidents notably President Richard Nixon. President Nixon reportedly confided to some, knowledge of ET life. One of these was Jackie Gleason http://www.openminds.tv/gleason-ets/. Had President Nixon confided to the evangelist too? We may never know but Billy Graham is correct saying "these unexplained events are occurring with greater frequency". Indeed, it is said these sightings have suddenly spiked since October 2010 and could increase into 2011. This week, New Zealand was the next in a series of countries to have declassified its UFO files http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10695989. Yesterday Argentina announced the formation of a commission to investigate the UFO phenomenon http://www.examiner.com/exopolitics-in-seattle/breaking-news-argentine-air-force-announces-committee-to-study-ufo-phenomenon-1. Julian Assange of Wikileaks also indicated that among the US Diplomatic Cables now being posted. are references to UFOs http://www.examiner.com/ufo-in-canada/wikileaks-to-release-ufo-bomshell. Some are expecting more government disclosures soon.
CS Lewis:
"The dangers to be feared are not planetary but cosmic, or at least solar, and they are not temporal but eternal. More than this it would be unwise to say. ..... . . there would be indications enough in the narrative for the few readers - the very few - who at present were prepared to go further into the matter....What we need for the moment is not so much a body of belief as a body of people familiarized with certain ideas. If we could even effect in one per cent of our readers a change-over from the conception of Space to the conception of Heaven, we should have made a beginning." - Out of the Silent Planet
"The eldila are very different from any planetary creatures. Their physical organism, if organism it can be called, is quite unlike either the human or the Martian. They do not eat, breed, breathe, or suffer natural death, and to that extent resemble thinking minerals more than they resemble anything we should recognize as an animal. Though they appear on planets and may even seem to our senses to be sometimes resident in them, the precise spatial location of an eldil at any moment presents great problems. They themselves regard space (or “Deep Heaven”) as their true habitat, and the planets are to them not closed worlds but merely moving points - perhaps even interruptions - in what we know as the Solar System and they as the Field of Arbol." - Perelandra
Though Science Fiction, CS Lewis' Sci-Fi Trilogy, Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength, like his Chronicles of Narnia helps the Christian to wrestle with the theological implications of our new cosmologies and planetary life. Lewis' interest in astronomy and the "idea of other planets" began as a young boy. "The idea of other planets exercised upon me a peculiar, heady attraction, which was quite different from any other of my literary interests." (Surprised by Joy, II)
Conclusion
We live with the questions. Graham and Lewis helps us, living in the "Space Age", to reflect on such matters. Whether there will be any official disclosures in the very near future remains to be seen. At this Christmas time, however, more startling, the most astonishing of all possible disclosures, is the epiphany of the Christ child two-thousand years ago. No headline could be more amazing than that heralded by a Star to Astrologers from the East or that of a host of Celestial Beings "leaked" to Shepherds in fields watching their flocks by night. Billy Graham was correct in rebuking his close friend, President Richard Nixon, once when Nixon described the Apollo 11 mission as the "greatest week in the history of the world since Creation." It wasn't:
Let earth and Heav’n combine, Angels and men agree,
To praise in songs divine, Th’ incarnate Deity,
Our God contracted to a span, Our God contracted to a span,
Incomprehensibly made Man.
He laid His glory by, He wrapped Him in our clay;
Unmarked by human eye, The latent Godhead lay;
Infant of days He here became, Infant of days He here became,
And bore the mild Immanuel’s Name.
See in that Infant’s face, The depths of deity,
And labor while ye gaze, To sound the mystery
In vain; ye angels gaze no more, In vain; ye angels gaze no more,
But fall, and silently adore.
Unsearchable the love, That hath the Saviour brought;
The grace is far above, Of men or angels’ thought:
Suffice for us that God, we know, Suffice for us that God, we know,
Our God, is manifest below.
He deigns in flesh t’appear, Widest extremes to join;
To bring our vileness near, And make us all divine:
And we the life of God shall know, And we the life of God shall know,
For God is manifest below.
Made perfect first in love, And sanctified by grace,
We shall from earth remove, And see His glorious face:
His love shall then be fully showed, His love shall then be fully showed,
And man shall all be lost in God
- Charles Wesley
Books:
Christianity and UFOs
Walter Hooper, C.S.Lewis, A Companion & Guide
Billy Graham, Angels God's Secret Agents
©Colin G Garvie HomePage: http://www.garvies.co.za
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