Does life exist outside planet Earth?

(Life definitely exists outside planet Earth, if one includes the International Space Station, and the occupants of various space shuttles and rockets!)

Of course, I will assume that the question is directed at the existence of “non-Earthly” life.

For a strictly scientific answer, the question must be posed to an astronomer or a physicist.

For a religious answer (with a Christian bias), the question gets more philosophical and spiritual. Outside of experiential knowledge, information must come from religious texts, in the Christian case, the Old and New Testaments.

1. Psalm 19:1-2 states, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge.”

Poetic license? Perhaps, yet there is a sense that the Bible gives of a “bigger story” than simply the earthly, human story. Whether the “life” of the heavens is measurable in human terms, the Bible often speaks of the boundlessness of the realm of God, and the limitedness of human life on earth. From Genesis to Revelation, there is a sense of linear time that is not the whole story, and that human existence is, finally, an eternal story that goes beyond our earthly lives.

2. It is certainly consistent with Christian belief and with Scripture to consider that the God, who is over all things, is alive and existing outside of the boundaries of planet Earth. Both in the sense of the Creator God, and also in the Son of Man (Jesus Christ), God is alive within and also outside of the context of Earthly life. The Holy Spirit, the “one alongside of us,” also exists in a realm that is not bound by earth’s normal, physical laws (c.f. John 3:8). Discovering this reality gives a better sense of meaning and direction to any study of life, especially the life of Christ.

Suggested reading: (for someone’s imagining of extra-terrestrial life)

• C.S. Lewis, Space Trilogy: Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, That Hideous Strength