UFO Religions

The ET Mythology as a Propaganda Tool, continued

This is a follow-up to my earlier post in regard to the article on how folklore served as a useful propaganda tool in Nazi Germany. The article was meant to point out that governmental power, totalitarian or otherwise, often makes use of “big picture” ideas - BELIEFS - to serve its own end. History literally teems with examples. Frankly, the idea that religion / belief (coherent to us or not) fuels action, including control of other people, is about as close to a self-evident truth as you’re likely to encounter. An idea like Manifest Destiny in U.S. history is illustrative.

For the Nazis, their religio-mythical base was the Aryan mythology wedded to Germanic folklore. In the hands of Himmler and his ilk, this amounted an amalgam of Blavatsky’s root races mythology and other elements of theosophy, occult bloodline lore, eastern religion, and even ET as a progenitor of the human race. If you’re interested in all this and want to read scholarly material on it, I recommend Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke’s “trilogy” - the first volume of which is his Oxford doctoral dissertation (the ET/UFO connection is in ch. 8 of the third book):

1. The Occult Roots of Nazism: Secret Aryan Cults and Their Influence on Nazi Ideology

2. Hitler’s Priestess: Savitri Devi, the Hindu-Aryan Myth, and Neo-Nazism

3. Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism, and the Politics of Identity

For our purposes, I thought this article could serve as a springboard to how the ET mythology of the 20^th century could serve various constituencies. Anyone who follows “exopolitics” knows that it’s already serving political ends. Let’s list a few that area already present, and some that might surface if there is an ET reality someday-or such a reality is contrived for the masses.

1. The radical political left-wingers - I’m thinking here of people like Alfred Webre and Steven Greer. ET is the answer to global warming and alternative energy. If something happened to sway the masses into believing ET contact had been made - or was genuinely on the horizon, people like Greer, who fancy themselves as some sort of avatar or liaison with ET would be in a position to demand real power and influence-effectively attaining that status. ET would be a political tool for all sorts of global change. Don’t believe me? Look at global warming (which I consider a myth in terms of human causation-and hence human solution-and thousands of scientists do as well, but are effectively silenced). Global warming is really about changing the global economy, redistributing the wealth of the West to the end of government ownership of industry (i.e. socialism and then communism), and keeping the Third World from developing. This is an old agenda, dating back to Marx and the Fabian society. If you want scholarship on this, I recommend the two academic works below:

My point here is that the global warming / climate change agenda has already been merged by some with the ET issue. That won’t change, and will gain momentum if ET becomes official (real or not).

2. The military industrial complex - This one’s easy and also already here (and has been for decades). If you’ve read The Façade, you know that one of my takes on the UFO issue is that the idea of alien craft visiting earth has been a useful lie since the events of Roswell. I was in print with this idea before Nick Redfern, but he’s the guy who’s put the most time into it. The alien crash myth was a carrot dangled before the public to cover up a PAPERCLIP screw-up at Roswell. The science fiction climate was just right for it, and it served as an unfalsifiable mythology that helped deflect attention away from the fact that Nazi and other war criminal scientists were on our payroll helping us fight the Cold War. I frankly wonder if mainstream science could ever come forth with an “ET is real” statement without getting the orders for doing so from the military. It’s a bit scary to think that the military really is in the position of “validating” ET for the scientific community (which wouldn’t be good science). What if there was a selfish, rogue element in our military that cared more for its own agenda than constitutional rule? All that would be needed is for the military to admit (even in private) that all that alien visitation and UFO crash stuff was real, but withheld from the public to avoid panic. The military industrial complex could bring about a new phase of the mythology to accelerate the weaponization of space. It really wouldn’t even need to be public. Admissions, advice, and demands could all be made behind the closed doors of Congress or the Oval Office. ET would be the ultimate enemy for the military to protect us from. Always formidable, always out there, always justifying the need for more. Again, all that’s needed is the BELIEF that ET is real. Just speculation for now, obviously. My point is only how the BELIEF could be used.

3. Radical Islam - Yes, you read correctly. Sound bizarre? Well, there isn’t much about radical Islam that’s very coherent, is there? Nevertheless, it is flourishing. This is in part because, as Muslims who have broken away from Islam (radical and otherwise) have told anyone who will listen, that 99% of Muslims know next to nothing about the contents of the Quran. They know only what their radicalizers tell them. Granted, there’s a lot of content in the Quran that fits their logic and agenda, but there’s also material that doesn’t. My point is that there is no intellectual wave of resistance within Islam against the radical fundamentalists in its ranks because most of the radicalized are ignorant. They are also kept in tow by fear. The educated radicals we read about from time to time typically buy it because they are taught to hate the West, as though Muslims could never be the source and solution for their own problems around the globe. Anyway-did you realize that the Quran allows for, and even suggests, that there is ET life?¹ Moreover, the Quran can also read as having Adam created off planet earth by Allah from blood and clay and even a “sperm drop” - who is spoken of in the plural. (Sounds like Sitchin, doesn’t it?).² I’m not suggesting that this is the correct way to read the Quran, only that it COULD be read this way - and I believe it WOULD be read that way in the wake of an ET revelation. It would be easy for radical Islam to claim that the discovery of real ET life and the relationship of humanity to our “space brothers” was anticipated only by the holy Quran, thereby validating its inspired status. I don’t think that would hurt Islam’s growth and power. Outside of the Al-Qaeda type, these ideas are already being popularized in the urban ghetto ³

4. The most scary group for my money is one that, to my knowledge, doesn’t exist yet in any unified, formalized, intentional body. This is the group that I’ll share some thoughts about in my next post.

Again, to be clear - none of this is about what’s real, only what could be believed, and how such beliefs could be used to manipulate. The ET myth could be a powerful tool to various ends.

Technorati Tags: alien gods, aliens, extraterrestrials, folklore, Islam, Nazis, Quran, religion, theosophy, UFOs

John Lamb Lash’s “Gnostic Archons = the Greys” Theory

I’ve blogged about this recently over at my other blog, PaleoBabble.  Part 1 was a sort of intro to the theory. Part 2 features a video of me searching the Nag Hammadi Gnostic texts (in digital form) for the terms Lash says are in the Gnostic texts that describe archons as “neonates” or “fetal” — the way the Greys appear.  Part 3 will likely be posted tonight, where I get to feature a Gnostic text that explicitly denies Lash’s theory.  What a surprise.

Technorati Tags: alien gods, Ancient Astronauts, gnosticism, john lamb lash, religion

Kind Words from the UFO Iconoclasts

My thanks to the UFO Iconoclasts for their kind words about me and this blog. Readers should note (and follow!) the link to their blog at the right, or in this post, and subscribe!

Technorati Tags: aliens, ExoTheology, religion, UFO sightings

UFOs, ETs, and Religion (Balducci’s Conundrum, Part 5)

It’s been a while since I’ve posted on Msgr. Balducci’s conundrum. The rabbit trails have been good, though, and we’ll revisit some of them in more detail in the future. Those who didn’t catch the previous four posts on this can find them on the blog. Briefly, though, the conundrum is as follows. Many people who have experienced or now experience UFO sightings have processed the event in theological ways — specifically, UFOs and their presumed occupants have often been cast as messianic, divine, or “spiritually enlightened” figures. That is, the UFO subject is NOT a religiously neutral one. The same goes for abductions. (In this post we’ll get into “abduction spiritualities”). Now the problem for Msgr. Balducci who wants to claim that UFOs and ETs have *nothing* to do with what Christianity references as the demonic. It’s the “nothing” that creates the problem for Balducci, whether he or his followers realize it or not. One simply needs to ask what kind of spiritual message is conveyed by the presumed ETs, whether at contact or during abductions. Does what they say jive with (for Balducci’s sake) doctrinal teachings that are core to Catholic Christianity? It is easily demonstrated that ET messages contradict doctrinal teachings about human depravity, sin, salvation, the person of Christ, and the saving work of Christ. Typically, religious teachings that contradict these doctrines — which are the very defining points of Christianity — would be viewed as “anti-Christ” or “anti-Christian” and therefore associated with (at best) error and (at worst) evil or the demonic, since they would be viewed as affronts to the faith. For someone who isn’t catholic or Christian, these things of course don’t matter. But Balduccci is a priest with theological commitments (one would assume). Hence the conundrum. IF he doesn’t think the UFO and abduction stuff (he hangs with popular ufology) isn’t a theological problem for him (as presented in popular ufology), he’s disturbingly naive.

“Abduction Spiritualities”

The second part of Partridge’s first chapter deals with “abduction spiritualities.” Were Msgr. Balducci aware of the scholarly research in this regard (or even the popular non-fiction works in the field), he would perhaps change his position.

Partridge overviews the work of scholars whose focus is the abduction experience. He cites the work of Brenda Denzler, author of The Lure of the Edge: Scientific Passions, Religious Beliefs, and the Pursuit of UFOs. Denzler’s book is based on her Ph.D. in Religious Studies from Duke University. She contributes a chapter to Partridge’s edited book; we’ll spend some time in that chapter in the future.

Partridge notes that Denzler’s work very capably demonstrates that although “there are those in the UFO community who consider themselves to be engaged in a purely scientific enterprise, eschewing religious interpretations, this is not the case for abductees.”¹ Partridge adds that “there is a conspicuous emphasis in abduction narratives on personal spiritual experience.”² David Jacobs, known more broadly in ufology than Denzler, reaches the same conclusion when he notes that abductees “found spiritual enlightenment and an expansion of their consciousness” via the experience.³ In Harvard psychiatrist John Mack’s first work on alien abductees, ABDUCTION: HUMAN ENCOUNTERS WITH ALIENS, Mack writes:

Many abduction experiences are unequivocally spiritual, which involves some sort of powerful encounter with, or immersion in, divine light . . . The alien beings, although resented for their intrusive activities, may also be seen as intermediaries, closer than we are to God or the source of being. Sometimes . . . they may even be seen as angels or analogous to God. A number of abductees with whom I have worked experience at certain points an openingup to the source of being in the cosmos.⁴

Partridge moves from this literature to make the observation that:

“[It] is hard to avoid the fact that the ‘enhanced spirituality’ (Mack) typical of abductees is consistent with the Eastern-influenced New Age spirituality that has emerged in the West, particularly since the 1960s, much of which can be traced back to theosophical thought. That is to say, whilst strictly speaking much of it is not theosophical, it is part of a stream of alternative spirituality which is indebted implicitly to Theosophy and explicitly to ideas found within the Indian religious tradition.⁵

Partridge goes on to cite a specific example. Quoting Professor Andrew Rawlinson’s work (University of Lancaster), Book of Enlightened Masters: Western Teachers in Eastern Traditions, Partridge identifies four principles of abduction spirituality that are essential to Eastern-based Western New Age spirituality:

1. Human beings are best understood in terms of consciousness and its modifications.

2. Consciousness can be transformed by spiritual practice.

3. There are gurus / masters / teachers who have done this.

4. They [the masters] can help others to do the same by some form of transmission . . . [which] ranges from formal initiation to a glance from the eye of the beloved.⁶

Partridge notes that all four of the elements above “can be found in UFO religions and abduction spiritualities, as can a host of other beliefs popular within the New Age network: e.g. reincarnation, chakras, past lives, future lives, psychic therapy, oneness with the Earth, channeling, astral travel, and so on.”⁷ The same conclusions, with abundant citation in the contactee literature, were drawn by journalism professor William Alnor in his book Ufo Cults and the New Millennium.

The point again for Msgr. Balducci is simple: Where in the belief systems put forth by ETs to their contactees or abductees do we see the core doctrines of your faith upheld, or at least not undermined? Who is Jesus, besides an alien creation or an alien emissary — merely one of the ascended masters, not virgin born, not uncreated, not the dead and risen Savior?  Msgr. Balducci has yet to address or even recognize these issues. Naturally, he may not be in the least bit interested. But if that’s the case, he could at least be honest and divorce himself from catholicism and go his own spiritual way, rather than pretend he or his faith is something that it is not.

Technorati Tags: abductions, alien abductions, aliens, Balducci, catholic, Christianity, ExoTheology, extraterrestrials

Those “UFO Reports” in Ancient Literature

Here’s a noteworthy post from the UFO Iconoclasts blog.  In a nutshell, it questions (coherently) the notion that there are a plethora (any?) UFO sightings in ancient writers, as so often reported.

My take on this is agreement.  I have said many times that these so-called reports nearly always involve astronomical or meteorological phenomena that were well-recognized omens in ancient culture and religion that are simply given a post-1947 spin — that is, flying saucers are completely read into the accounts. I have also noted that ancient writers had sufficient vocabulary to describe a UFO had writers seen one. Ancient Semitic languages (across the board), Greek, and Latin, for example, all had words for “metal”; “metallic”; “silver”; “windows”; “round”; “circle”; etc.  There would have been no difficulty at all in terms of language for an ancient person to describe what we think of as a flying saucer.  But they don’t.

I would add (and this is on my research plate right now) that I think it extremely important (if my suspicion is correct) that all (?) the pre-20th century reports of fairies and little people that are supposed to speak of the alien greys reported today lack one important element:  mention of flying craft.  I’ll be working on that to see if it’s the case.  That would be big points for the Vallee hypothesis, vs. the ET hypothesis.

Technorati Tags: Ancient Astronauts, ancient texts, UFO sightings, UFOs