Vast Universe

If we have learned anything from recent advances in cosmology and astronomy, it is that we have only barely begun to comprehend the vastness of our universe and all that it contains. For Christians, this raises some fascinating questions:

• If there are intelligent beings out there, what would be their relationship to what Christianity claims is a special history on Earth of life with God?
• Would the fact of persons on other planets banish or modify our understanding of God? Would it reduce the importance of Jesus?
• What role might goodness and evil play in extraterrestrial civilizations?
• Might God have incarnated himself among other races of creatures, as he became incarnate as Jesus among us?

Respectful of the sciences that disclose the reality of the universe, Thomas O'Meara wonders about good and evil, intelligence and freedom, revelation and life as they might exist in other galaxies. In this book, one possible aspect of the universe we live in meets the perspective of Christian revelation.

Thomas F. O'Meara, O.P., Warren Professor Emeritus of the University of Notre Dame, is the author of Erich Przywara, S.J.: His Theology and His World (2009) and God in the World: A Guide to Karl Rahner's Theology (Liturgical Press, 2007).