Yes, you read that title correctly.

Now this may not be your average reflection but it’s where I ended up going this afternoon. Three of us had a wonderful long hike up and down Mt. Woodson beginning at daybreak, after which I made a good breakfast and took a nap. With nothing else on the calendar (somewhat of a rarity these days) and with Diane out and about, I had some free time.

I was sitting in quiet, gazing out the window at some butterflies, hummingbirds and various bugs flitting about in our garden, thinking about what people who believe in God and people who do not believe in God have in common. Certainly, there’s a lot.

One of the things that struck me is not new and that is nearly all people yearn. Well, I should say that all people yearn at least during some point in their lives and many people yearn all the way through. Then, I thought, “What is it that people (whether believers or not) yearn for?” Is there some commonality there?

While I could be wrong on this, it seems nearly everyone yearns not to be alone. I mean really alone. We gravitate to community in some form. Even the curmudgeonly or antisocial amongst us would probably admit that being stuck alone on a desert island permanently would not be desirable. Of course, there will always be exceptions but it’s a rare person who doesn’t want company of some kind or another.

One of the ways I reflect upon this particular yearning is when I read about the search, even obsessively so in some quarters, for extraterrestrial life. I like to read the science publications on a pretty regular basis and there are some really good (not Enquirer Magazine stuff) postulations on whether or not we’re all there is.

Now, I reflect upon this in two ways. First, I’m intrigued with the raw science. In other words, what are scientists and those who support them actually doing and what are they discovering? The second, is the why. What’s the big deal, anyway?

The raw science is rather interesting. Many of us may be at least somewhat familiar with the big project labeled SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence). It was the backdrop for famous popular astronomer Carl Sagan’s blockbuster book, Contact, and the movie by the same name starring Jodi Foster. A whole lot of very big linked antenna arrays and telescopes connected via computers scanning all corners of the universe, seeking any sign that we’re not alone. In essence, they’re looking for some pattern that is inconsistent with the normal background “noise” and would indicate a manufactured source. So far, nothing.

Another effort is to try to peer more closely for things called “exoplanets,” which are planets of various sizes that orbit other stars. With increasingly sophisticated telescopes, we are now discovering hundreds, even thousands of these, after the first discovery in 1988. Scientists are particularly keen on locating these worlds that exist in just the right kind of orbit that might, in theory, support life. We all recognize so far that Earth is the only such planet in our solar system that really hits the sweet spot. (As an aside, scientists are still trying to see if there are any life signatures on any of our other solar companions … Mars, anyone? Planetary moons, anyone?)

Then there is the math of the thing. It’s really rather impressive. When I first began considering these things, the conventional wisdom was that there are a few billion galaxies. Our own galaxy, the Milky Way, is a pretty decent size structure and I initially learned that we have a few billion stars. Well, technology is an impressive thing. We’ve ticked up the number considerably. One of the latest counts puts us at two trillion (a trillion is a thousand times a billion) galaxies in the universe, with our own galaxy home to something like 200 billion stars. For the uninitiated, that’s a whole lot of zeros that have to make any human pause to clear one’s wits.

In this line of thinking, there just HAS to be extraterrestrial life because of the plain odds of the whole thing. And, at the risk of blowing more minds, there are those scientists (astronomers, cosmologists, theoretical astrophysicists) who posit a thing called the “multiverse” concept that there are untold number of other universes besides our own. Come on now, the thinking goes, even a seemingly accidental confluence of forces that started life on our planet has to be replicated somewhere else. The numbers demand it.

So goes the thinking. I find all of this very intriguing and it’s fun to read science fiction, go to a Star Wars movie or consider any of hundreds of other fictional guesses at what it would be like to come face to face with an alien (non earth human). People make a whole lot of money teasing us with these things.

All of which brings me to the question of why this is such a big deal. Is it just curiosity or is it something more?

Aside from there being a huge market in the alien business, the issue certainly just captures the popular imagination. Now, I haven’t done any kind of informal poll and I haven’t read anything in the Psych literature about what’s behind an interest in knowing if we’re alone. But, I can hazard a guess and it’s in line with the thinking that started this ramble.

I imagine a lot of people want to believe we’re not a singular accident. For if we were, when you think about it, that’s a whole lot of lifeless space out there. Trillions of galaxies with hundreds of billions of stars and who knows how many planets and other stuff. And no life? Just particles and chemicals and the like?

The desert island deal on steroids.

Now, the people who have no problem ascribing to the scenario that “we are born, we kill and devour, we procreate and we die,” probably don’t worry about this much. But there are other people (usually who have children or who have deep affection for our species) that like to think there are life-supporting worlds out there. Worlds that could be our lifeboat if we devour our own planet via a variety of methods or worlds that might be home to other life forms, some of which might even be sentient and, hopefully, friendly. (As opposed to sentient and bent upon dominating, destroying or eating us.)

So, why is this of interest to think about and why does it have anything to do with God?

Well, I believe that our yearning is hard wired and part of that hard wiring is the need to not be alone. Now one could well argue that this yearning (if it indeed is a thing) can occur via evolutionary biology or God-made creation or both. I believe that most people would be unhappy if they were to learn that not just they (who will die anyway) but all of humanity will be snuffed out in either the near or far future and there is really nothing else alive out there at all. I mean, think about it. That’s all, folks. With no life, there can be no meaning, as life is your basic prerequisite for meaning. And, if that’s the true state of affairs even before such an endgame, then that raises the question of whether there was ever any meaning in the first place.

In this vein, I think part of the search for extraterrestrial life and life-supporting worlds is an attempt to make the universe make more sense. Which is why some would say people construct gods or a God in order to do the same thing. See, believers and non-believers are sometimes not that far apart.

On several occasions, I have been asked by both believers and non-believers what it would do to my Christian lens if we were to discover extraterrestrial life. It’s actually a great question.

I’ll answer it this way. First, I believe the overarching Christian story is the only complete story of reality that makes full rational sense. I have said this before. After many decades of looking at reality through dozens of different lenses and analyzing many of them in careful detail, I’m left with this one. Again, I find it the only logical explanation, something that will confound my atheist friends who have respect for my intellect. They are not left with many explanations for such a statement. Really, there are only three. Either I’m delusional and incapable of fully reasoning or I’m not delusional but have truly not reasoned my way through all of the evidence they have or I’m right.

So, let’s get that out of the way. Depending upon your thinking, you can evaluate my position accordingly. J

Which brings me back to the great question. If I believe the Christian story is the only possible explanation that makes sense (l want to set aside the many deviations from orthodoxy … something that will bridle some. I do this not to avoid them as I’d be happy to engage them in dialogue but because I don’t have room here to weave them in), then I am confronted with the question of whether the discovery of extraterrestrial life and the Christian explanation are mutually exclusive. In other words, poof goes the house of cards.

Well, just as Christianity nicely survived the knowledge that Galileo provided regarding which body is at the center of things, I believe it would have no trouble surviving the knowledge that we are not the only living things out there. Now, maybe some Christians would have trouble with this but I don’t.

God has been proven to me to exist beyond a reasonable doubt. Which means I’m either delusional, weak of mind, or correct. If God is who I believe he is, then his plans are not my plans and I’m way below his pay grade in understanding all of the ins and outs. Just because I can’t see things with his clarity does not mean I can’t see things clearly. A singularly incarnated God in the human context doesn’t preclude, in my mind, God’s ability or intent to broaden the playing field. Now, it raises some legitimate questions, especially with respect to biblical theology, but I don’t see any deal killers.

As I bring this thing to a close, I’ll offer two other quick thoughts, the first of which might be surprising. And it is this. Actually, I don’t really care that much. I care a lot about a lot of things but I don’t really care or worry about this particular issue. It’s more of a curiosity thing rather than a defining thing for me. My yearnings to not be alone are very satisfied here on earth in this life.

The second thought is that I believe there are all manner of beings out there, especially of the supernatural variety. I believe their numbers are massive as are the potentially inhabitable worlds and dimensions that occupy them. In other words, my reality is a very busy place indeed and we humans are just a piece, albeit a critical piece, of it. So, in fact, I’m a big fan of extraterrestrials, just not the kind pictured in the modern and popular imagination. Thank God.

In the end, most of us yearn and most of us yearn for very similar things. Not being alone is one of them. I’m really glad I’m not. Amen.