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Jim McCrory

Evidence of Extra-terrestrial Life Observing Us

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Edited by Jim McCrory, Sunday, 6 Oct 2024, 18:08



"Any extra-terrestrial life would be less disappointed by our technology

 than by our failure to live up to our humanity."

Jim McCrory



Image by https://unsplash.com/@nasa


NASA, the North American Space Administration, has invested billions of dollars developing technology to detect extra-terrestrial life. But to what end, I wonder? Is it merely a quest for knowledge, or are we yearning for validation from other worlds? If there is indeed life beyond Earth, what would these beings think of us, of our planet, and how we treat it?

Consider this: Earth, a planet abundant in resources, produces food in quantities that could feed all its inhabitants. Yet, we are bombarded with heart-wrenching images of emaciated children, flies buzzing around their eyes, in regions stricken by poverty and famine. How do we justify such stark contrasts? People die from ailments that could easily be cured with a simple course of antibiotics, while others live in unimaginable luxury. In our cities, the streets are filled with the homeless, despite an abundance of land that could provide shelter. Drugs tear at the fabric of society, and our leaders—entrusted with the responsibility to guide and protect—seem unable to agree on even the most basic issues. It’s like trying to herd fish in a stormy sea.

And yet, we imagine we are ready to meet other life forms.

What would these extra-terrestrials make of us? Perhaps they would be astonished by our achievements—technology that stretches beyond our atmosphere, art that speaks to the soul, and scientific discoveries that unravel the mysteries of the universe. But what of our failings? Would they be baffled by the contradictions in our nature, the way we hoard resources, while others starve? Would they wonder how we can be so divided on issues of justice, fairness, and human dignity, even while standing on a planet designed to sustain us all?

 And perhaps more thought-provoking still: What would we make of them? Imagine if these visitors from another world didn’t come with superior weapons or advanced technologies, but instead came with a message of morality—asking us to live by principles that, deep down, we already know.

What if they asked us to love our neighbours as ourselves, not just in theory but in practice? To truly commit to being loyal, never casting a glance in envy or desire toward another? What if they encouraged us to speak the truth in all matters, to be transparent in our dealings? What if they reminded us to consider the poor, the widow, the aged, and the fatherless with the same concern we have for our own families? How would we react if they implored us to respect all forms of life, including animals, and to treat them humanely?

Imagine if they instructed us to lend without interest, to refuse exploitation of the hired worker, to resist the temptations of jealousy, greed, gossip, and slander. To simply be human—compassionate, honest, and humble. Would we embrace that? Would we even recognize the wisdom in it? Or would we dismiss them, much as we often dismiss the moral teachings that have been passed down to us through millennia?

It’s sobering to think that the values we might expect from enlightened beings beyond our world are the same principles we’ve been given for centuries—principles we often fail to uphold. Could it be that the answers we seek in the stars are already within us?

What if these extra-terrestrial visitors are already watching us, not in curiosity but in judgment? They may not need to land ships on our lawns to assess the state of humanity. Perhaps their eyes are already upon us, evaluating how we handle the gifts we’ve been given. In this regard, they might resemble the God who, as it says in 2 Chronicles 16:9, “For the eyes of the LORD roam to and fro over all the earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose hearts are fully devoted to Him. "

The apostle Paul, in his speech to the people of Athens, touched on a similar theme: “that they should seek the Lord, if perhaps they might reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us.” (Acts 17:27). Perhaps, in our quest to reach beyond the stars, we are missing the profound truth that the divine—the eternal—has always been close, waiting for us to recognize it.

So, as we search for extra-terrestrial life, we might do well to pause and reflect on the life we already know—the life we share with one another here on Earth. For if we cannot live in harmony with those around us, what hope do we have of understanding life beyond our world? What if, before looking outward, we first learned to look inward, to search not for life among the stars, but for humanity within ourselves?

 

Bible verses from the Berean Standard Bible (BSB)


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Jim McCrory

Is It A Sin to Question Your Religion?

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Edited by Jim McCrory, Wednesday, 11 Sept 2024, 09:54



 "It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man."

Psalm118:8 KIV.


 

Image kindly provided by https://unsplash.com/@ryan_riggins



There are many reasons why a person may question their religion, some noble, some for a more nefarious reason. The latter may use doctrinal issues as an excuse to pursue an immoral life.

When my wife and I left our religion, we decided to read The Gospels and The Book of Acts and systematically ask ourselves, what does God and Jesus require of us? This brought a great sense of freedom. For the last three decades, I had been spinning around like a Sufi whirler and never thinking of stopping, getting off and assessing my form worship. There would be guilt trips if I sat and watched a movie or went away for a day’s leisure. With no shepherding or talks and items to prepare, I had time to read God’s word independently without outside influence. It felt refreshing.

At the time, I read Nothing to Envy by Barbara Demick. She is a North Korean defector. The parallels between the North Korean regime and my religion were cognate. She wrote about North Koreans having two conflicting thoughts in their heads: a cognitive bias like trains travelling on parallel lines. There was the official thought that Kim Jong Un is a god, but the lack of evidence to support the claim. If North Koreans spoke publicly about such contradictions, they would find themselves in a treacherous place. Sadly, the force of the regime, as with the society I was associated with, is to isolate its own people completely. Take a few moments to read key quotes from Demick’s book on the Goodreads website at,

https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/6358552-nothing-to-envy-ordinary-lives-in-north-korea#:~:text=Choosing%20where%20to%20live%2C%20what,the%20state%20their%20entire%20lives.


The Bereans

The Bereans were a devout group of religious people mentioned in the New Testament of the Bible at Acts 17:10-12. They lived in the city of Berea in Greece. They were known for their noble character and open-mindedness in receiving the message of the gospel, but they had conditions:

“As soon as night had fallen, the brothers sent Paul and Silas away to Berea. On arriving there, they went into the Jewish synagogue. Now the Bereans were more noble-minded than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if these teachings were true. As a result, many of them believed, along with quite a few prominent Greek women and men.” (BSB)

They used their God-given right to question and check what they were being told. When I looked at my own religious beliefs, I found them wanting. It is not a sin, it is noble-mindedness and courageous to question why you follow some man made doctrines and rules.

I am often saddened when I see former members of my religion falling into atheism and taking up the current Western world’s occupation towards secularism. God has given us the privilege of being free moral agents. It is not the wise choice to blame God for the way matters turned out. The Bible is full of cautions about trust in man. Despite leaving, we are all still subject to the issue that was raised by Satan. Is it loyalty to God and Christ, or the Satanic secular zeitgeist that is currently sweeping the West?



 

 


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