Sin, Redemption and Extraterrestrial Intelligence

Ray Bradbury

Ray Bradbury wrote a story titled The Man that can be summarized thus:

In its expansion through the galaxy, the human species encounters many extraterrestrial intelligences. The captain of an interstellar Earth ship arrives on a distant planet and hears about something recently happened there. Little by little he discovers that God has become man on that planet and has granted them Redemption, although not in a bloody way. The captain wants to meet him, get in touch with him, but it’s too late: he has left (at least, he thinks so). Then the captain decides to dedicate his life to traveling to other planets in the hope of finding Christ on one of them.

Narciso Ibáñez Serrador adapted this story for the radio, and in doing so he changed a few things: the title, which became The Triangle, and the form of Redemption: they kill the Redeemer by nailing him to a triangle, rather than a cross.

Although in Bradbury’s original version it is not clear whether the aliens are subject to original sin, in the radio adaptation it is assumed that they are. Furthermore, it is also assumed that every planet needs a Redemption, which is not valid for all of them at the same time.

The Catholic Church has not taken an official position on these issues. She doesn’t need to do it, since we don’t even know if aliens exist. But some theologians have studied the matter, and their opinions can be classified as follows:

•         Some believe that original sin is a local issue, so there could be aliens who are not subject to it. Others believe that this is a global issue, affecting all intelligent inhabitants of the cosmos.

•         Some think that each alien species subject to original sin needs to be redeemed independently of the others. Others believe that a single Redemption is valid for all, so Christ doesn’t need to be incarnated on each of these planets, as in the story by Ray Bradbury. I think this last position tends to be the majority, being based on the fact that the existence on Earth of races of human beings that remained isolated for centuries did not prevent the Redemption of Christ, which took place in the Middle East, to apply to everyone. Of course, perhaps there are several intelligent species in the galaxy, but the huge distances between stars will keep them apart forever.

Regarding original sin, the doctrine of the Catholic Church is based above all on chapter 5 of Saint Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, rather than on Genesis chapter 3. In his book In the Beginning (1996), Joseph Ratzinger (elected Pope in 2005 as Benedict XVI) says this:

The human being is relational… sin means the damaging or the destruction of relationality. Sin is a rejection of relationality because it wants to make the human being a god… Sin is always an offense that touches others, that alters the world and damages it… When the network of human relationships is damaged from the very beginning, ten every human being enters into a world that is marked by relational damage… Each of us enters into a situation in which relationality has been hurt.

In his book Benedict XVI: Defender of the Faith (2022) Joseph Pearce calls these words by Ratzinger a brilliant exposition of the practical reality and consequences of Original Sin, and adds: It is hard to imagine a better and more penetrating elucidation of the doctrine and practical presence of Original Sin. It will be noted that this text by Ratzinger, which compiles four homilies he gave in 1981, when he was archbishop of Munich, does not address any of the interpretations mentioned above and is compatible with all of them.

In summary: the question of how issues such as original sin and Redemption affect hypothetical extraterrestrials is, for the time being, a topic for science fiction, rather than a theological, philosophical or scientific problem.

The same post in Spanish

Thematic thread on Life in other Worlds: Preceding Next

Manuel Alfonseca