To infinity & beyond!

Imagine if someone were to throw science fiction and religion into the same metaphoric blenders. What would be the result? Jesus in a space suit? Martians praying the rosary? Interplanetary dioceses? The answer may not be so complicated. Imagine in the not-too-distant future, intelligent life is discovered on another planet--life that looks like humans, acts like humans, and makes moral decisions like humans. It wouldn't be long before missionaries went to learn about these extraterrestrials. This chain of events may seem unlikely to some, but this exact plotline has already played out in several science fiction books and short stories.

Not all science fiction has religious undertones, but there can be similarities between science fiction and religion. Both often examine the unanswerable.

How did we get here? What does it mean to be human?

How should we act with each other? What life should be respected? What will the future bring?

"Both science fiction and religion look at the same world and are asking the same questions," says Richard Chwedyk, a science fiction writer who is also Catholic. Chwedyk sees the difference between the two in the area of authority. "Most religions claim some, if not all, authority on spiritual matters. Science fiction claims no authority, and as such allows and invites its readers to speculate to their heart's content."

Joe Durepos, senior acquisitions director at Loyola Press, says that science fiction and spirituality both come from "the same impulse to seek beyond." But, he notes, each responds to a different "direction" in the search.

"While science fiction is the literature of the outwardly possible, spirituality is the literature of the inwardly possible," he says. "One looks outward; the other looks inward."

Good science fiction, of course, also has to tell a good story.

"First and foremost, science fiction is entertainment," says Jesuit Brother Guy Consolmagno, an astronomer at the Vatican Observatory and a science fiction reader. But he also points out that these stories are entertaining because they fulfill human desires "to explore over the horizon, to imagine the way things might be, to wonder about how the universe works."

Consolmagno says religious people may get something out of reading science fiction. "It's a relaxing way to ask 'what if' questions, and even if you disagree with the author's premises or conclusions, a good story can often make you look at familiar things from a new point of view."

Monks in space

Of course, not all science fiction directly mentions religion or looks favorably upon it.

"It is relatively rare to find work by a highly competent author who also really understands and is reasonably open-minded toward traditional religions," says science fiction reader Steve Gruenwald.

According to Gruenwald, one book that handles religious themes well is Walter M. Miller Jr.'s A Canticle for Leibowitz (EOS Books), about a group of monks who survive a nuclear war. The monks find scraps of paper that once belonged to the martyr Isaac Leibowitz, and they use the information on these scraps to rediscover technologies.

Gruenwald says that the novel confronts religion, but not to criticize it. "A Canticle for Leibowitz stands out as unequivocally fine writing, indisputably science fiction, and yet also extremely 'human,' sympathetic to religion, and accessible to readers new to the science fiction genre."

Ender's Game (Tor Science Fiction) by Orson Scott Card incorporates the religious theme of good versus evil. The novel is set in the future when aliens have attacked earth. A gifted child is trained to fight off the aliens. Without ruining the ending, Durepos says the novel brings up the idea of one person embodying twin beings--both a savior and a destroyer.

Some science fiction looks at religion more critically. Chwedyk gives the example of Behold the Man (Overlook), a controversial novella by Michael Moorcock. In it a man travels back in time to when Jesus lived. "He finds that the child of Mary and Joseph is learning-disabled--functionally an idiot," Chwedyk says. "The time traveler, in a sense, 'takes over' for the historic Jesus of Nazareth and--in some way deliberately, in another way unconsciously--becomes the man he sought."

How did we get here?

The vast universe is the main setting for many science fiction novels, but not a lot of science fiction literature actually details how the universe came to be. Religion is not always concerned with creation either.

"Like science fiction, most of religion is concerned about small immediate things, with the 'big picture' stuff in the background," Consolmagno says.

Whether or not a book addresses the "big picture" issues directly, science fiction does look at creation from a scientific perspective, Gruenwald points out. "Science fiction does not, for the most part, try to preach the gospel of the Big Bang, but it is likely to assume it," he says.

The Big Bang theory, however, does not explain what happened before the universe's beginning. Chwedyk gives "The Weapon Shops of Isher," a story by A.E. van Vogt, as an example of a story that tries to explain the Big Bang without God. It features a time travel device that swings back and forth like a pendulum from the past into the future, with each swing taking the device farther into the past and future. By the end of the story the device is going from the end of time to the beginning of time. When the pendulum has gained enough energy, it blows up, causing the Big Bang.

Some science fiction specifically focuses on the creation of human beings. In Kurt Vonnegut's The Sirens of Titan (The Dial Press), a robot ends up on Titan, a moon of Saturn, after its spaceship breaks down. It then creates human beings to fix its ship. "The whole purpose of human civilization was to build a spare part for a robot's spaceship," Chwedyk explains.

What is "human"?

Despite the prominence of robots and aliens, science fiction can also help define what it means to be human.

"The reason that science fiction is interesting is because it deals with people," says Moshe Yudkowsky, an Orthodox Jew and a science fiction reader. "Authors construct moral dilemmas but put them in galaxies far, far away."

Yudkowsky adds that even when science fiction books feature aliens as main characters, the authors write these characters from a human perspective. "How can humans write about aliens they don't know?" he asks. "Won't they write from a human point of view?"

Durepos adds that the many different life forms, planets, and societies, by way of contrast, actually spur reflection on our contemporary human civilization. "Science fiction looks at so many alien things that, in doing so, it finds the humanity in the otherness," he says.

In helping to define what it means to be human, science fiction can also help define what religion means to humans. "By wondering what it might mean for an alien to have a soul, we can reflect on what having a soul means for a human being," Consolmagno says. "If you're going to ask what it means to be human, to be a child of God, it helps to ask, 'Human as compared to what?'"

Not alone

Examining the possibility of extraterrestrial life can bring up interesting religious and ethical issues. It may be difficult for some to understand that God could have created other intelligent life besides humans. "Those who assume, as a matter of faith, that humankind is the pinnacle of God's Creation will probably be able to decide that the extraterrestrials are on a lower rung of the ladder," Gruenwald says.

Some think that the Bible includes examples of alien life, but Consolmagno disagrees that the "other sheep" Jesus refers to are extraterrestrials.

But something can be learned about extraterrestrial life from the Bible. "The very existence of angels (and fallen angels) is evidence that the Bible doesn't insist that human beings are God's only creatures who are capable of knowing and loving him," Consolmagno says. He points out that the parts of the Bible that refer to the heavens and stars "show that the authors of the Bible were perfectly comfortable with the idea of other beings besides humans who would know and love their Creator."

One of the issues that several science fiction authors have tried to tackle is whether extraterrestrials are capable of making moral decisions and committing sins. Gruenwald provides the example of Ray Bradbury's "The Fire Balloons," a short story in which Episcopal priests are sent to minister to the inhabitants of Mars. One priest assumes that "if the beings (a) are intelligent and (b) are capable of moral choices, then (c) they must be in need of salvation," Gruenwald says. "He finds it hard to deal with the proposition that in some circumstances, (a) plus (b) does not necessarily equal (c)."

Bradbury's short story also looks at whether sin is universal on all planets. One character in the story points out that sin cannot be universal since sin is sometimes based on the physical makeup of the human body. For example, an asexual being could not commit adultery.

Another novel that discusses extraterrestrials and sin is A Case of Conscience (Del Rey Impact) by James Blish. The book's main character is a Jesuit priest who is also a biologist. He travels to another planet to learn about intelligent life there. Chwedyk says the priest asks himself, "Are these creatures good? How will the notion of original sin play out?" Chwedyk points out that on earth, "original sin keeps us all on the same baseline." But the discovery of extraterrestrials may change how original sin is viewed.

The point of the story

In the gospels Jesus often uses parables to get his point across, and Durepos says that some of the best science fiction stories can be seen as parables for life on earth. The stories may take place in other galaxies, but the characters--whether human or android or alien--deal with moral dilemmas similar to those on earth.

Durepos argues that some science fiction can also relate to the gospel's message and how we are to live with one another. "Oftentimes, themes in science fiction involve socioeconomic issues that deal with how people are being treated," he says. "Often it is the dark side of what happens when we abandon the gospel message or just abandon our humanity."

Science fiction stories also offer a forum to evaluate the challenging ethical issues behind new technologies, like bioengineering, artificial intelligence, surveillance, and cloning.

"Science fiction has the advantage of putting these issues in a sufficiently different time and place so that we can suspend some of our original reactions long enough to get to understand the other side," Consolmagno says. "A good story is one that lets us live through a person experiencing all those dilemmas, so that vicariously we can experience what it feels like to end up closer, or farther, from the great Storyteller."

On the Web

For a list of science fiction with religious themes, visit uscatholic.org.

Kristin Peterson is a journalism at University in River Forest, Illinois.