Tin Foil hat question

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If aliens were real and sentient beings, including that they have a different anatomy, would they also be made in the image and likeness of God, and would the Church accept these aliens?
 
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I think it would depend if they could be determined to have rational souls.
 
theCardinalbird said:
aliens were real and sentient beings, including that they have a different anatomy, would they also be made in the image and likeness of God, and would the Church accept these aliens?
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Yes we would because God created the universe and every creature within it!
 
I figure “in God’s image” is a bit more about being in His design rather than literally looking like Him.
 
Best novella/story on this topic is:

Dyads, Ken Pick and Alan Loewen: Father Heidler’s latest assignment takes him to Cathuria, where the Catholic Church and all of Earth are blamed when a failed missionary’s desperation boils over into terrorism. With the planet in the midst of riots and the Archbishop/Ambassador to Cathuria severely injured in a retaliatory strike, Father Heidler negotiates a delicate maze of politics and religious convictions to find a way to restore peace and reconcile the two worlds.

http://karinafabian.com/infinite-space-infinite-god-ii/

(Both books are very good, I bought them for Kindle years ago)
 
I think Thomas Aquinas had writings on aliens so it might be useful.
 
On the one hand, I think it would be great to teach the Trinitarian God.

On the other, if they are rational beings, they aren’t really part of our Church, which is based on the sin of Adam, the first human nature, and the assumption of a human nature by God which all men can participate in. If these aliens aren’t descended from Adam, they have no part in that.

I’m not saying God doesn’t have a place for them. But we can’t just baptize them. The covenant of law and the covenant of grace God made with man is for humans. We don’t really have the authority, insofar as I understand it, to baptize aliens into the Church, anymore than we have the authority to ordain women as priests or dissolve a sacramental, consumated marriage. That’s not to say they can’t worship God.

In some ways, it seems like being Jewish versus being a gentile who recognizes the one true God in olden times. The covenant of the law was with Jews, but gentiles could still worship. And that’s okay. Except in this case there’s no conversion from one to the other. If God wishes to incorporate aliens-not-descended-from-Adam into his covenant of grace, or form a separate relationship with them, that is for him to do. Not something we have the authority to do. As I understand it.

In a sense, from a Thomist standpoint, whatever biological species we are, perhaps the essence of both the human and the alien would be the same: a rational animal. The other biological differences are properties or accidents which are not part of the essence itself (maybe). But that doesn’t change the fact that our Church is based on descent from Adam, his original sin, and the new Adam (Christ). Apart from that descent, that original sin from Adam, human nature, I don’t think they could belong to the sacramental life of the Church.

All that said, I’ll obviously support whatever the magisterium formally teaches, if they ever do.

(I’ve been on some long-winded ramblings this week.)
 
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And purely in speculative fiction; wouldn’t it make sense of we found them and they had their own church? Do you think such a church could be in communion with the Catholic church?
 
Alex337 said:
And purely in speculative fiction; wouldn’t it make sense of we found them and they had their own church? Do you think such a church could be in communion with the Catholic church?
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Well given it is all hypothetical, perhaps God reached out to all rational beings through a Christ like figure where he probably found something similar to a Catholic Church.
 
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If there are sentient being in other worlds we do not know what God’s plan for them might be, since that has not been revealed to us.

We know they are God’s creatures, but that’s pretty much all we would know. Anything beyond that is speculation. There are almost infinite possibilities.

Trust God to reveal what we need to know.
 
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No, communion is rooted in our covenant with Christ. Christ assumed human nature to unite our nature to his divine nature… to save that which he assumed. Communion is the expression of this union. It is between Christ and man only.
 
twf said:
No, communion is rooted in our covenant with Christ. Christ assumed human nature to unite our nature to his divine nature… to save that which he assumed. Communion is the expression of this union. It is between Christ and man only.
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What if God had sent a messenger to the aliens so they could enter a covenant with Him? Would the union be too different to allow communion between churches?
 
Yes, I think so. Communion IS the realization of OUR covenant. It’s right there in the words of institution for the chalice.
Of course we could dialogue and work together in other ways.
 
twf said:
Yes, I think so. Communion IS the realization of OUR covenant. It’s right there in the words of institution for the chalice.
Of course we could dialogue and work together in other ways.
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Wouldn’t this make for a fun book?
 
I think Father Robert Spitzer fielded this question during this past year on his EWTN show.

You might give it a google and see if anything comes up. He is a smart guy, and his answer will mirror the Catholic position.
 
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