Erich Von Daniken - The Gold Of The Gods

7 - "IT"
Against men made in God's image?
Ought not man to conceive of himself as an essential part of the
cosmos at last? Starting from this position he would acquire a more
balanced sense of his own importance, he could hold on to his world as
home and at the same time make a more daring reach for the stars. The
future will bring space travel-the moon landings were only a
beginning-because we shall need raw materials and also space. But
space travel will also bring with it, with a probability bordering on
certainty, the encounter with the 'lord from the other star."
This encounter has no place in the doctrines of the 20,000 religions
and sects, for the faithful sheep, man, must remain the summit of
creation. But what if intelligent beings far superior to us exist on other
planets without the benefit of the divine act of creation? Is it so
difficult to say goodbye to familiar and well-loved fairy stories?
In a devilishly clever way "they" try to sabotage space travel and its
goal. "They" warn against the results of research aimed at this goal.
This way of thinking is so insidious that many clever critics of plans
for space travel no longer realize who is guiding their pen when they
put forward their arguments.
What are we to do then?
Are we to blow up the temples, demolish the churches?
Certainly not.
In all the places where men gather together to praise the creator, they
feel a beneficent strengthening togetherness. As if roused by the note
of a tuning fork, the shared sense of something transcendent echoes
silently through the interior. Temples and churches are places for
contemplation, spaces for the communal praise of the in definable, of
IT, which for want of a better word we have learnt to call God. The
places of assembly are necessary, but the rest is superfluous.