The last centuries have witnessed countless discoveries: of continents, original peoples, species of living beings, galaxies, stars, the subatomic world, the original energies and recently, the Higgs particles, a kind of subtle fluid that fills the universe; the virtual particles that when touched, take on mass, and become stable. But we had not yet discovered the Earth as a planet, as our Common Home. We had to go beyond the Earth so as to see her from the outside, and then discover her and confirm the unity that is Earth-humanity.

That is the great legacy of the astronauts who were first able to see the Earth from outer space. They produce in us what has been called the Overview Effect, that is, «the effect of the vision from above». Frank White gathered very beautiful testimonies of the astronauts in his book Overview Effect (Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 1987). Reading those testimonies impact us tremendously, and produce a feeling of great reverence, a true spiritual experience. Let's read some.

Astronaut James Irwin said: «The Earth looks like a Christmas tree hung on the black backdrop of the universe; the further we go from her, the more she diminishes in size, until she is reduced to a small ball, more beautiful than anyone could imagine. That a living object so beautiful and so warm appears so fragile and delicate changes those who contemplate that beauty, because one starts to appreciate the creation of God and to discover the love of God». Another, Eugene Cernan, confessed: «I was the last man to set foot on the Moon, in December of 1972. From the lunar surface, I looked with reverential fear towards Earth, against a very dark background. What I saw was too beautiful to be grasped, too ordered and filled with intention to be the result of mere cosmic accident; one felt, deep inside, moved to praise God. God must exist, for having created that which I had the privilege to contemplate; the veneration and thankfulness surged spontaneously; for that the universe exists».

With fine intuition Joseph P. Allen, another astronaut, observed: «There was much discussion of the pros and cons of going to the Moon, but I heard no one say that we should go to the Moon in order to see the Earth from there, from the outside; that, after all, should have been the true reason for going to the Moon».

Through this singular experience, the human being awakens to the understanding that the human being and the Earth form a unity, and that this unity is part of a greater one, the solar unity, and this of another, still larger one, the galactic. This sends us to the whole universe, and the whole universe to the Mystery and from the Mystery to the Creator.

«From above», astronaut Cernan observed, «the barriers of skin color, religion and politics that divide the world here below cannot be seen». Everything is unified in one single planet, the Earth. Astronaut Salman al-Saud commented: «the first and the second day, we would point out our countries, on the third and fourth, our continents, and after the fifth day we were aware only of the Earth as a whole».

These testimonies convince us that in reality, Earth and Humanity form an indivisible whole. This is exactly what Isaac Asimov wrote in his New York Times article of October 9, 1982, on the 25th anniversary of the launching of Sputnik, which was the first to fly around the Earth. The title of the article was "Globalism:The Legacy of Sputnik". And Asimov said: «into our reluctant minds, the vision that the Earth and Humanity form a unique entity is imposed». Russian Anatoly Berezovoy, who spent 211 days in space, affirmed the same thing. Effectively, we cannot put the Earth on one side, and humanity on the other. We form an organic and living whole. We humans are the part of the Earth that feels, thinks, loves, cares, and venerates.

From almost anywhere, contemplating the Earthly globe, the thought arises spontaneously that in spite of all the threats of destruction that we mount against Gaia, a good and beneficial future is somehow guaranteed. So much beauty and splendor cannot be destroyed. As the Christians would say: This Earth is penetrated by the Spirit and by the Cosmic Christ. Part of our humanity has already been made eternal by Jesus, and is in the heart of the Trinity. It will not be on the ruins of the Earth that God will complete the divine work. The Resurrected and His Spirit are pushing evolution towards its culmination.

A modern legend gives substance to this belief: «Once upon a time there was a Christian Greenpeace militant, who was visited in his dreams by resurrected Jesus, who invited him to walk in the garden. The militant accepted with enthusiasm. After walking for a long while, admiring the biodiversity in that little space, the militant asked: "Lord, when you walked the paths of Palestine, you once said that you would return one day in all your pomp and glory. Your return is being delayed too much! When will you in fact return at last, Lord?" After some moments of silence that seemed like an eternity, the Lord answered: "My dear brother, when my presence in the universe and in nature are as evident as the light that illuminates this garden; when my presence under your skin and in your heart are as real as my presence here now, when this presence of mine becomes flesh and blood in yourself, to the point that you will not need to think about it anymore, when you are so imbued with this truth that you will not need to ask insistently, as you are doing now... then, dear brother, those will be the signs that I have returned with all my pomp and glory."»

Leonardo Boff

Translation Melina Alfaro, Esta dirección de correo electrónico está siendo protegida contra los robots de spam. Necesita tener JavaScript habilitado para poder verlo.,

done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.