Pope to hold press conference on aliens and the supernatural – and people are confused

!r-slurs !historychads !christians the Zambian Space Program is some of the most rDrama things to have ever existed!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Makuka_Nkoloso#Space_program

From 1960 until sometime after 1969, Nkoloso's "space program" sought to accomplish the launching of a rocket that would send 17-year-old Matha Mwambwa and two cats to the Moon. There were also plans for a trip to Mars. Nkoloso hoped to beat the United States and Soviet Union's respective space programs at the height of the Space Race.

To train the astronauts, Nkoloso set up a makeshift facility on an abandoned farm 11 kilometres (7 mi) from Lusaka, where the trainees would be rolled down a rough hill in a 200-litre (55 US gal, 44 imp gal) oil drum. This, according to Nkoloso, would train them in the feeling of weightlessness in both space travel and re-entry. In addition, they used a tyre swing to simulate weightlessness.

Nkoloso stated that the goals of the program were to establish a Christian ministry to "primitive" Martians and the hope of Zambia becoming the "controllers of the seventh heaven of interstellar space". However, he reportedly instructed the missionary in the space program not to force Christianity onto native Martians.

The rocket, named D-Kalu 1 after President Kenneth Kaunda, was a 3-metre by 2-metre (10x6 ft) drum-shaped vessel. Nkoloso claimed that it was made of "space-worthy" aluminium and copper. The planned launch date was on Independence Day, 24 October 1964 and would take place from the Independence Stadium, but the launch was purportedly denied permission due to being inappropriate.

He wanted the plane to stop so he could walk on the clouds, he had also been planning to send some of his trainee astronauts on a round space-trip to the sun as well.

It is said that he then asked UNESCO for a grant of £7,000,000 in Zambian pounds to support his space program. It is also said he requested $1.9 billion from "private foreign sources". However, the Ministry of Power, Transport and Communication is reported as stating those requests had not been made on the behalf of Zambia.

The term "Afronauts", coined by Nkoloso, refers to the participants of this program with hopes of bringing not just Zambia, but also the entire continent of Africa, to space.[4]

Interviewed in 2016, President Kenneth Kaunda said of the space program that "It wasn't a real thing ... It was more for fun than anything else."

Um yeah sweety but have you considered they aren't even mentioned in the bible? Checkmate

https://old.reddit.com/r/atheism/comments/1cq55f5/my_breaking_point_was_aliens/

Christ be praised!

The catholic church already issued a decree that not only is believing in aliens okay, butt also if aliens do exist they can be baptised and accept the sacrament as well.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-pope-extraterrestrials/vatican-scientist-says-belief-in-god-and-aliens-is-ok-idUKL146364620080514/

There's actually a pretty good scifi book with this premise, The Sparrow, which is about a Jesuit mission to Alpha Centauri.

Doesn't seem like a big deal for the faith. Only difficult question is if each planet gets a Jesus or if we have to share.

Human supremacy + xenophobia (jesus came to humans only) or Mormon style "he actually visited every planet" and the soul will have to be extended to sapience in general. I could also imagine incorporating whatever could be described as a religion amongst aliens as being syncretized with the abrahmics. You can stretch the bibles and Quran to mean whatever you want anyways so it's more how you already feel about aliens

They'd probably say something along the lines of "God didn't make them in his image and didn't send his only begotten Son to die so that they may have eternal life, therefore aliens can't sin and are morally equivalent to animals".

You couldn't handle the pleasure little boy