"My view of our planet was a glimpse of divinity."
Today's quote comes from Edgar Mitchell, Apollo 14. For several of the Apollo astronauts, seeing the Earth from the Moon was a profoundly spiritual moment.
As far as I know, Edgar did not kneel and pray on the surface as I depict here (in fact, I'm not totally sure that would have been physically possible in one of those suits, they didn't bend well), but the rock-altar is based on a real rock at the Ap 14 site.
It is true that a passage from Genesis was read aloud by the Apollo 8 crew, the first crew to set eyes on the Earth from a distance. We do also know that Buzz Aldrin stopped to pray on the Moon and was, in fact, the first to celebrate holy communion on the Moon. Apollo 15 astronaut James Irwin was so deeply moved by his experience that he left the astronaut corp to became the founding president of the High Flight Foundation, an inter-denominational evangelical organization, and devoted the rest of his life to "spreading the good news of Jesus Christ."
Countdown to Earth Day part 1 part 2 part 3 part 4
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