Come On Down

[poliphilo]

A sci-fi fantasy I'm fond of- The Saga of the Exiles- predicates an alien intervention at the beginning of the 21st century (in fact, any time now.) The aliens- who are nice chaps- allow us the join their Federation, but on certain conditions. One of the conditions is that we abandon all but one of our religions.

And we do. Just like that.

How I wish. How I wish....

For some reason the religion we choose to retain is Roman Catholicism.

A certain leeway is allowed. People are permitted to flavour their Catholicism with Zen Buddhism or Hinduism or whatever they used to adhere to. But I don't remember there being any Muslim-flavoured Catholics or Southern Baptist-flavoured Catholics.

It's a silly book.

I wonder how long it's actually going to take us to get beyond our religious differences.
How many thousands of years.

Comments

[jackiejj.livejournal.com]

following the Prime Directive and keeping a very low profile.

You think?

How would they look like us? Surgical procedures via a Beverly Crusher sort of doctor?

I wish one of them would talk with Bush pretty soon.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

They are so far advanced they can transform themselves at will.

Or maybe they look like us already- and all they need to do is make minor adjusments- like Spock does in the movie, covering his pointy ears with a sweat band.

[jackiejj.livejournal.com]

Yeah, let's say they're from an M-class planet.

So how would they start helping us out?

I don't think they'd want to give us warp speeds just yet. Just thinking about that makes me smile. Can you imagine us nervous conflicted predators hurtling out into space to seek out other civilizations?

I wish I could imagine how they'd help us. It's beyond me. Sometimes I think only evolution itself will help us out.

We'll get our warp drive, but we'll be benign cockroaches in the year 40,000.

With opposable thumbs.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I think we'll learn how to speed up evolution. We'll merge with our computers and be able to carry the entire contents of the Internet around in our heads.

Something like that.

I think the aliens are merely observing us. Perhaps they give things a surrepticious nudge every once in a while. Oh- and when they get too bored with hanging about being frostily benign they fly down to New Mexico and mutilate a cow.