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Arthur C. Clarke in 2061: Odyssey Three describes what intelligent life may be like on Europa, a moon of Jupiter. Life flourishes around geothermal vents, much as around such vents in Earth's oceans. The boiling fluids gushing from the vents push back the cold and heat the ocean around the vent. Around one such vent intelligent Amphibian life has developed and a civilization has arisen. But the vents are isolated one from another by vast wildernesses of icy crust. "Along the narrow bands of fertility in the deserts of the deep, whole cultures and primitive civilizations had risen and fallen. And the rest of their world had never known, for all these oasis of warmth were as isolated from one another as the planets themselves ... [p. 290]." These Amphibian historians and philosophers, basking in the glow of a lava river would have found the hostile wilderness between vents as challenging as space is to us.

We can extrapolate from Clarke's vision and imagine the type of sacred cosmos that these alien creatures may develop. The vent is the center of their cosmos, enclosed by hellishly cold dangers. The warmth and light of the vent, not the cold distant sun that is merely a large star, symbolizes the Mystery of God. God is not located "up", but "down" toward the source of life. The wilderness is full of frozen demons. The Eurporan Amphibians are free willed and have fallen into a stratified society. Those who are inclined to the surface and not the vent are oppressed. They look across the vast wilderness and wonder about what is beyond ... Did Jesus Christ come to this strange world to redeem the Amphibian Europans?

We are on the cusp of a potentially exciting discovery. NASA is planning a number of robotic expeditions to Mars "to follow the water," since where there is water, there is a high probability of life. Scientists have also examined data sent back by probes passing Europa. This data indicates that Europa may have the conditions for life as well. Now, if we subscribe to the principle of biological determinism that when the conditions for life exit, life will prevail and will evolve towards intelligence, then we can anticipate that at sometime we will encounter Extraterrestrial Intelligence (ETI). Though we may dispute UFO encounters and argue if we could ever meet interstellar ET, the possibility of ETI is real. In response to this possibility the John Templeton Foundation in November 1998 sponsored a meeting of scientists and theologians that is documented in Many Worlds: The New Universe, Extraterrestrial Life and the Theological Implications, a set of essays by the attending scientists and theologians.

A question that arises in many of these essays is the significance, if any, of the Christ Event beyond our own world. This is not a new idea. Medieval and reformation scholars considered the problem. For them it was an academic question; for us it is a demand to not repeat past mistakes of previous "alien" encounters of one Earthly culture with another. Arthur Peacocke in his essay suggests, "What can the cosmic significance possibly be of the localized, terrestrial event of the existence of the historical Jesus [p. 103]?" McMullin in his essay asks, "Do these distant agents have a divided nature like ours? ... How far does their intelligence carry them in an understanding of the sources and sanctions of morality [p. 168]?" And Coyne asks, "Could Jesus Christ, fully a human being, exist on more than one planet at more than one time [p. 187]?" This article will propose one answer this matrix of questions.

What is the Christ Event and what is its essential nature? In Christian belief, the Christ Event is God incarnated as the human, Jesus. Jesus is both fully divine and fully human. Jesus lives and walks and loves and sorrows with humanity in the years that he spent on the earth. He is then arrested, tried, crucified and resurrected to ascend into heaven. The interpretations of these historic events vary among believers. Traditionally, Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection was seen as a vicarious sacrifice for our sins, restoring Eden, and resulting in universal forgiveness. If you accept the historic Jesus as your Savior, you are forgiven. However, more open-ended and liberal interpretations distinguish between the particularity of Jesus and the universality of Christ.

Paul Knitter in No Other Name? A Critical Survey of Christian Attitudes Toward the World Religions tells of Raimundo Panikkar, a Roman Catholic priest whose mother was a Spanish Catholic and father was an Indian Hindu. He sought how to bring unity to the diversity of religious beliefs. Panikkar suggested that the "fundamental religious fact" was the shared Mystery present everywhere in every religion. This shared Mystery is understood only partially by any one religious system. Thus the diversity of religious beliefs are essential to build a picture, although always incomplete, of the divine Mystery. No religion has a monopoly; no religion is superior, including Christianity. He then goes on to distinguish between the universal Christ and the particular Jesus. Christ is a symbol for the totality of reality, the intimate and complete unity between the divine and the created. God, the Father is the apophatic dimension of the godhead, whereas; Christ, the son, is the Logos, the external expression of the godhead. God is the ground of divinity for everything. The incarnation of Christ in Jesus is not final, normative, or definitive. No historical form can fully be Christ. Christ is also incarnated in the Buddha, in Rama, and others. But Christ can become real only through some particular, historical form. Knitter summarizes, the "Christ-principle [is] capable of self-realization in a plurality of Christ-events [p. 157]."

What then is the essence or principle of the Christ-event(s)? It is the transformative process of revealing the Utterly Other in and through all createds to guide them to wholeness. The incarnation of Christ into a particular historical person, such as Jesus, is the Utterly Other externalized. Such an incarnation is fully human, but fully in tune with the Divine - a kamayogi. In Christianity, this essence is traditionally cast into the metaphor of the Fall-Redemption model. Yet, when we stand in dialogue with science as well as with other religious beliefs, we are compelled to reform this model. No longer is the Christ-event the restoration to Eden because of the Fall. Evolutionarily, the Christ-event represents a crisis in evolutionary progress of converting from self-centeredness to other-centeredness. Eden is not the beginning, but the goal. We misuse and abuse our free will and so rebel against God. This process of on-going rebellion can be called "The Falling". "Redeeming" then is a process of self-awareness and self-consciousness moving towards other-centeredness (Eden). The Christ principle then is the essence of each Christ-event and is what we should be on the look out for in any encounter with ETI.

This essence is marked by the Utterly Other in each and every created. The interweaving of the divine and the created is the spark of the divine within every created. And that spark is that which is altogether different from the created, but within the created. The created universe is embraced by the divine and soaks up the divine. It is the source of the moral call. But is this interweaving of the divine and the created ("cosmotheandric reality" in Panikkar's words), truly cosmic and universal, or does it arise uniquely from human evolution and condition?

Nancey Murphy and George Ellis in On the Moral Nature of the Universe: Theology, Cosmology, and Ethics propose that the universe is kenotic: self-renunciation for the sake of the other is creation's highest good no matter the cost to the self. They demonstrate how this principle is played out in cosmology (by the lawlike character of the universe, the anthropic universe, chance, a provident universe, and the hidden nature of ultimate reality), biology (in the great chain of being), and quantum physics (by indeterminacy). The consequences of this proposal that intelligence are called to detach from material possessions, renounce their rights as rewards, choosing not to harm, being nonviolent, accepting suffering, and submitting to God would be cosmic and universal. Since this is a universal structure intrinsic in the cosmos, we could expect ETI to have also arrived at similar conclusions.

Additionally, Peacocke in Many Worlds reminds us of the Paradox of Human Nonadaptiveness. There appears to be a misfit between humans and their environment. Of all of the createds that we know about, humans uniquely feel out of place and seek self-realization and personal growth. This has led to our misguided notion that we are separate from nature and eternally alienated from it. We seem to be in a constant state of dis-ease and dissatisfaction. Peacocke suggests, "Does not the human condition raise the profound question of what humanity's true environment really is and of the nature of that reality to which it must relate [p. 101]?" Might our true environment be all of God's creation, including the soaked up divinity? And might other intelligences experience a similar sense of alienation? Indeed, might this restlessness be the root of self-awareness and a result of free will? Thus, are WE (humans and other ETI) a single, cosmic, spiritual species?

If we subscribe to biodeterminism and belief that ETI will or have arise and if we subscribe to a moral universe and the intrinsic nonadaptiveness of intelligence, then we can assume that ETI is also in need of the Christ principle.

If on the other hand, we discover (or belief) that we Earthlings are unique in the universe and are the sole free-willed intelligence, then God's love of the universe and the expression of that in life would call us to move out into the "empty" universe and spread life (panspermia). We need the Christ principle, but not just in its Christian mode, but in all the diversity of modes that have arise and may arise among far flung humans.

Now we can see that the Christ event is not universal, but a particular moment in a particular place in the cosmos. What is universal is the Christ principle or process of liberation from self-centeredness and all of the personal and social ills that brings about, finding forgiveness for that rebellion of free will and being redeemed to kenotic other-centeredness. If we encounter ETI, such as on Europa, we must approach them with ecoethical view that recognizes God's love and care for all createds, not only on Earth, but also throughout the cosmos. And we must pray that ETI will also approach us with an ecoethical view. God's Wisdom calls out to us to enter into understanding and dialogue with whatever intelligences we may encounter. First must come understanding. Who and what are they? How do they relate to the sacred and the divine? Then we can ask where is the Christ incarnated among them? Or indeed has Christ been incarnated among them?

In the Star Trek mythology, humans were expected to follow the Prime Directive: They were not to interfere with an intelligent species' development if they were deemed more primitive than ourselves. This is not what we are called to. All evolutionary process is "interference". We are not called to stand back. We are called to do God's will when we encounter ETI. Hence it is very important to know God in ETI and to consider are response before and during a contact. Christ incarnate will walk - or swim - or fly - among many species. Each encounter will deepen and enrich our - and their - understanding of the Utterly Other beyond us and within us.

If we return to our vision of the Europans, we can now ask some significant christocentric questions. How then would the Christ be incarnated among them? And if the ETI at one vent-oasis were able to find a means to cross the deadly wilderness between, would they recognize the incarnate Christ among Silicon-armored tappers of the lava streams or the Floaters harvesting the sea? Without the encounter with another oasis and its race, "otherness" may be a far more latent characteristic than for species who see the stars. Christ Incarnate may be even more critical to them to lead them beyond their narrow vent. For them, an Amphibian "Jesus" may be an adventurer-inventor dispelling demons and showing them the way to cross the icy crust, not only physically, but also spiritually, to oases and the stars.

And might we Earthlings see in this incarnation of Christ a different aspect? Europido, born of a poor, forsaken group, lay upon a rock poking through the melted ice. S/he gazes upon the huge, banded orb filling a quarter of the sky. Below bounded by high ice walls the volcanic vent seethes. Here, though, is still the borderlessness Beyond. Europido sets out across the ice wilderness ... Europido looks back - s/he has seen the Great Mystery and has touched it. S/he has swam in new vents with strange children. Now s/he dives into the vent of home and touches the people:

The Rev. John A. Mills is an ordained pastor in United Church of Christ. Rev. Mills is currently pastor of First Congregational Church (UCC) in Closter, N.J. and is also a senior solutions architect at Telcordia Technologies. Rev. Mills graduated from Drew University Theological School with a Masters of Divinity degree, Summa Cum Laude, and from Rutgers University with a Masters of Science degree. He has published various technical articles in the field of software engineering. Rev. Mills is also an expert in the relationship of science and Christianity, particularly with regard to mathematics and cosmology. He is a founding organizer of the currently forming New Jersey Roundtable on Religion and Science and has taught a variety of classes on the subject of Religion and Science to lay audiences in an effort to raise up this very important topic to the general public. He also has a written a number of commentaries on religious issues in local newspapers and is interested in mysticism which he expresses in both lyrical and epic poetry, see http://home.att.net/~john.a.mills.