Faith in Space: American Religious Belief in Extraterrestrial Life

A cultural history of the American faith in alien life, from the Puritans to Heaven’s GateOver the past three centuries, belief in extraterrestrial life has had a profound influence on American religion.Faith in Space examines the key thinkers and religious leaders throughout American history who built faith communities around the notion that we are not alone in the universe, and that the path to spiritual truth leads heavenward to the stars. Paul Gutjahr reveals the pivotal role Protestant Christianity played in the formation of extraterrestrial belief in many of these traditions, sharing new perspectives on prominent Americans such as Cotton Mather, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and Thomas Paine.He goes on to examine familiar religious movements such as Spiritualism, Mormonism, Seventh-day Adventism, Scientology, the Nation of Islam, and Heaven’s Gate as well as lesser-known belief systems such as Swedenborgianism, Theosophy, the Nuwaubian Nation of Moors, and Ashtar Command.Gutjahr