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Would St. Thomas Aquinas baptize an Extraterrestrial?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2024

Edmund Michael Lazzari
Edmund Michael Lazzari*
Affiliation:
St. Joseph's Seminary, Dogmatic Theology Yonkers, New York, United States
*
eddielazzari@gmail.com
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Abstract

This paper will attempt an investigation of hypothetical intelligent extraterrestrial life from the perspective of the philosophy and theology of St. Thomas Aquinas. Section I will feature an overview of St. Thomas's relevant philosophy of human nature and the differences between human and extraterrestrial natures (even though both have material bodies and immortal souls). Section II will, with special attention to St. Thomas's De malo, treat some possibilities regarding the need for salvation (or lack thereof) in our hypothetical species. Section III will outline relevant aspects of Thomistic soteriology, especially the reasons behind the Incarnation and the role of human nature in Redemption. Section IV will feature a critique of representatives from the two major schools of scholarly thought on this issue, showing that they either disregard the necessity of a human nature for incorporation into the Mystical Body of Christ or deny the magnitude and singular importance of the Incarnation. Section V will sketch some possibilities for the soteriology of extraterrestrial life using the theology of St. Thomas Aquinas as a framework.

Keywords

SoteriologyExtraterrestrial LifePhilosophical AnthropologySt. ThomasAquinasSystematic TheologyOriginal SinOriginal Justice
Type
Original Article
Information
New Blackfriars , Volume 99 , Issue 1082 , July 2018 , pp. 440 - 457
Copyright
Copyright © 2017 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers

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References

1 While a proper soteriology of humanity depends on a proper philosophical anthropology, I have dubbed the study of our hypothetical extraterrestrial mollusk‐like creatures “cephalopodology” from the study of cephalopods. While any alien species presumably would not be stricto sensu mollusks or cephalopods, the characteristic case I am imagining in my study is the squid‐like Admiral Ackbar from the Star Wars film series, who is described as being a part of the Mon Calamari species. I thought the category title would be appropriate to such a species.

2 For an excellent introduction to Aristotelian philosophy of nature, especially with respect to its functioning in the natural sciences, see Madden, James D., Mind, Matter, and Nature (Washington. DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2013), pp. 217‐249CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Also see Ashley, Benedict, The Way toward Wisdom: An Interdisciplinary and Intercultural Introduction to Metaphysics (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2009)Google Scholar and Wallace, William A., The Modeling of Nature: The Philosophy of Science and the Philosophy of Nature in Synthesis (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1996)Google Scholar.

3 For a full treatment of the Thomistic metaphysics of finite being, see Wippel, John F., The Metaphysical Thought of Thomas Aquinas, (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2000), pp. 197‐375Google Scholar.

4 De ente et essentia, c. 1 paragraph 4.

5 Ibid, paragraph 7.

6 Ibid, paragraph 7.

7 Ibid, paragraph 9.

8 Ibid, paragraph 10.

9 Ibid, paragraph 11.

10 Ibid, paragraphs 13‐15.

11 De principiis naturae, cc. 2‐3, 5.

12 De ente et essentia paragraph 15.

13 Ibid. paragraph 16. In paragraphs 23 and 24, St. Thomas makes a distinction between the designated matter on an individual (e.g. the individual tissues that make up Socrates's muscles) and undesignated or common matter that would be a part of the essence and denoted by the definition of the thing (e.g. human muscle tissue in general and not of any individual).

14 This grasp of the intelligible aspects of reality is manifested by the formation of language. As recent philosophers have pointed out, “in the behavior of man, the only linguistic animal, the functioning of signs—both verbal and non‐verbal, and both signals and designators—cannot be explained without attributing concept‐formation and concepts to human beings,” Adler, Mortimer, The Difference of Man and the Difference It Makes (New York City: Holt, Rienhart and Wilson, 1967), p. 189Google Scholar. The apprehension of concepts as manifested by syntactical language is also held as the unique marker of rationality in Braine, David, The Human Person: Animal and Spirit (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1992)Google Scholar and Sokolowski, Robert, Phenomenology of the Human Person (New York City: Cambridge University Press, 2008)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

15 That is, ST I Q. 75.

16 Summa Contra Gentiles Bk. 1, c. 3 (paragraph 3); In De Trinitate Boethii, q. 1 art. 3c; ST I, Q. 1, art. 1c.

17 St. Thomas does state that it is natural for human beings to die because matter naturally corrupts and becomes disintegrated from the whole. It was only a supernatural gift of God that man was preserved from death. Since one cannot presume upon the special grace of God without a guarantee of such from revelation, this study will assume that even unfallen extraterrestrials would naturally die, thus setting up the problem of what happens to the immortal souls of extraterrestrials as their final destiny. See ST I‐II, Q. 85, art. 6c; Compendium Theologiae c. 152.

18 ST I‐II, Q. 82, art. 3c “Tota autem ordinatio originalis iustitiae ex hoc est, quod voluntas hominis erat Deo subiecta.”

19 Ibid., ad 1.

20 Ibid., art. 3c.

21 ST. I‐II Q. 85 art. 1c.

22 De malo, Q. 4, art. 2 IVc.

23 ST I, Q. 90, art. 2c.

24 De malo, Q. 4, art. 1c.

25 Ibid.

26 Ibid., art. 8c.

27 Ibid.

28 ST I, Q. 96, art. 1 ad 2.

29 ST I, Q. 96, art. 1c.

30 ST I, Q. 96, art. 1 ad 2.

31 ST III, Q. 1, art. 2c.

32 ST III, Q. 1, art. 2c; Q. 4 art. 1c.

33 ST III, Q. 46, art. 2 ad 3.

34 ST III, Q. 1, art. 2c.

35 Ibid.

36 ST III, Q 1, art. 2, ad 2.

37 cf. Cessario, Romanus, The Godly Image: Christ and Salvation in Catholic Thought from St. Anselm to Aquinas (Petersham, MA: St. Bede's Press, 1990)Google Scholar.

38 ST III, Q. 48, art 1c.

39 Ibid.

40 ST III, Q. 48, art 1 ad 3.

41 ST III, Q. 48, art. 2c.

42 Ibid.

43 Ibid.

44 ST III, Q. 48, art. 1c.

45 ST III, Q. 49, art. 1c.

46 De malo, Q. 4, art. 1c.

47 ST III Q. 68, art. 2c.

48 For an excellent overview of contemporary literature on the topic, see Weintraub, David, Religions and Extraterrestrial Life, (New York City: Springer, 2014), pp. 91‐110CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

49 Gerard O'Collins and Augustine Di Noia are cited in an article by Allen, J. L. Jr. “This Time the Catholic Church is Ready,” National Catholic Reporter February 27, 2004Google Scholar.

50 Graebe, Brian, “Christianity's Next Frontier: How the Discovery of Extraterrestrial Life Would Impact Contemporary Christology,” Dunwoodie Review 33 (2010), pp. 145‐146Google Scholar.

51 Ibid., 147.

52 As asked by Consolmagno, Guy and Mueller, Paul, Would You Baptize an Extraterrestrial? (New York, Image: 2014)Google Scholar.

53 John Paul II, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis 4.

54 de Chardin, Pierre Teilhard, “Fall, Redemption, and Geocentrism,” in Christianity and Evolution, trans. Hague, René, (San Diego, CA: Harcourt, 1969), pp. 40‐41Google Scholar.

55 Ibid., 44.

56 Another scholar who maintains the necessity of multiple Incarnations comes from the Scotistic school. Ilia Delio takes the Scotistic doctrine of the absolute primacy of Christ and actually inverts the scriptural justification for the primacy of Christ. The absolute primacy of Christ in the scriptural justification shows how Christ is the center of all creation and the height of God's creating acts. Therefore, it could not have been worked in dependence to the fall of humanity because then it would not have happened except through a fault. Delio takes this position to have proven that God would have become incarnate to all intelligent creatures, thereby making Jesus Christ in the known Incarnation in fact only one of many of God's saving work. That God must become incarnate wherever there is intelligent life is certainly a position that is untenable from Scripture or Tradition. Delio, , “Christ and Extraterrestrial Life,” Theology and Science 5.3 (November 2007), pp. 249–265CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

57 ST III Q. 8, art. 4c. St. Thomas does say that the functioning of all makes a metaphorical body. His point in this passage is to establish the headship of Christ over the angels and not that the angels are part of the Mystical Body of Christ (i.e. requiring the Sacraments).

58 ST III Q. 3, art. 5c.

59 White, Thomas J., “Why Did God Become Human? Aquinas on the Incarnation,” Lecture at Thomistic Circles NYC, New York City, NY, November 14, 2015; Roch A. Kereszty, Jesus Christ: Fundamentals of Christology (New York City: St. Paul's Press, 2002), pp. 460‐461Google Scholar.

60 ST III Q. 8, art. 4c.

61 ST III Q. 68, art. 1 ad 1.