Space Telescope Science Institute Office of Public Outreach Public
Rho Ophiuchi
The first anniversary image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope displays the Rho Ophiuchi cloud complex, the closest star-forming region to Earth. (NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI/Klaus Pontoppidan)
A United Methodist Insight Column
I'm a space junkie. I can't help it. I grew up on the other side of Florida across from Cape Canaveral where the first rockets launched. Given Florida's flat terrain, we could see the contrail of every flight that lifted off.
We listened to a radio broadcast during my third-grade class at Starkey Elementary when John Glenn made his historic flight. We stayed up late to watch Neil Armstrong take humanity's first steps on the moon. My mother, an engineering aide, worked on the navigational instruments made by Honeywell Aerospace for the Viking Mars lander.
The original "Star Trek" was my pole star for the future. Meeting and interviewing "Star Trek's" creator, Gene Roddenberry, was possibly the biggest thrill of my journalistic career. Between NASA and Star Trek, I gained hope for the future – for any future, standing as we did in the shadow of nuclear war in my childhood and youth.
So, it stands to reason that I'm enthralled by the first-anniversary photos from the James Webb Space Telescope, but not solely because of my star-spangled life history. Every time NASA and its space exploration colleagues publish new photos from the JWST, as it's now being called, I gain another spiritual insight.
In each new spectacular view of the cosmos, I see the hands of God.
Tarantula Nebula
An image of the Tarantula Nebula from the James Webb Space Telescope that Cynthia Astle keeps on her computer desktop. (NASA Photo)
Prominent astronomers such as the late Carl Sagan and Neil deGrasse Tyson don't believe in God. I can understand their perspectives, because science itself can be so overwhelming in telling the "how" of the universe that shifting to a different perspective can be all but impossible. After all, scientists only recently came to understand that space and time both are being affected by gravity waves, something that Newtonian physicists laughed off when Albert Einstein proposed the idea in his theory of general relativity more than a century ago.
Yet for all its precision, science has yet to tell us why the universe exists. That's the role of faith, and in my view faith's transcendent nature complements science well.
Such visions should humble us into reverence, if for no other purpose than to counteract human hubris. This summer's extreme weather events from scorching heat domes to cascades of floodwaters underscore what our hubris has done to the planet God gave us. I can appreciate the revelation of actor William Shatner, "Star Trek's" original Captain Kirk, who was moved to greater eco-consciousness by his brief space flight aboard Jeff Bezos' craft. Nonetheless I think his conclusion misses the point: yes, we must reverse humanity's degradation of Earth, but that needn't stop us reaching for the stars.
Science fiction has long traded on human hubris as the reason for planet-killing horrors, and today that fiction has become fact as we continue to chart the hottest days in Earth's recorded history. The stunning JWST images mustn't blind us to the realities here on Earth, but they also shouldn't cause us to give up believing that we can atone for our mistakes and learn to live in greater harmony with the universe.
Thus, I return to my original question: why did God create the universe that the JWST is helping us see so much clearer? Well, why not? If one has the power, as we believe God has, to create limitless star-making galaxies with brilliant suns and planets teeming with life, why not? What if the reason behind all the incredible images from the James Webb Space Telescope is simply the sheer joy of creation?
Because "joy" is what I see most in these spectacular images. No, make that "JOY!" Joy in the act of flinging galaxies across an empty universe by a single word. Joy in watching elements combine to create light, heat, land, water, life. Joy in the reality that an ever-expanding universe will continue to re-create itself eternally. Joy even in the hectic bustle of life forms when that bustle subsides into death from which new life can spring, like the outpouring of an exploding star that transmutates planets into elements which in millions of years create new planets, new life. The Webb telescope images speak of life far beyond our miniscule human scale.
Scientists should well rejoice over the images and data they're getting from the James Webb Space Telescope. For those of us who seek the "why" of the Creation, these new footprints of time in space leave us transfixed with sheer joy.
Veteran award-winning religion journalist Cynthia B. Astle has reported on The United Methodist Church at all levels for 35 years. She serves as Editor of United Methodist Insight, an online journal she founded in 2011 as a media channel for marginalized and under-served United Methodist news and views. She regularly reads Earth/Sky and Space.com newsletters and has been a "Trekker" for nearly six decades.