ONE of the astronauts on the Artemis II space mission, Victor Glover, thanked God after the crew touched down safely on Friday.
Mr Glover was speaking in Houston, Texas, at the weekend, after the four-person crew returned safely from their journey to the far side of the moon — further than any human had travelled in space before (Comment, 10 April).
Besides Mr Glover, the crew consisted of NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman and Christina Koch, and the Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen.
Mr Glover, who was the pilot of the mission’s Orion spacecraft, which the crew named Integrity, said that, when the mission began, he had “wanted to thank God in public, and I want to thank God again, because, even bigger than my challenge trying to describe what we went through, the gratitude of seeing what we saw, doing what we did, and being with who I was with — it’s too big to just be in one body.”
During his communications to Mission Control during the ten-day mission, he read passages from St Matthew’s Gospel as the crew were just moments away from losing communication as they passed behind the moon.
He said: “As we continue to unlock the mystery of the cosmos, I’d like to remind you of one of the most important mysteries there on earth, and that’s love. Christ said . . . the greatest command is to love God with all that you are . . . and the second is equal to it: to love your neighbor as yourself.”
Mr Glover and his wife, Dionne, and four daughters attend a Churches of Christ congregation in Friendswood, Texas, at which he is Sunday-school teacher.
The Artemis II mission is the first crewed mission to the moon since 1972.
Many of the thousands of staff supporting the mission are also parishioners of St Thomas Episcopal Church, Huntsville, Alabama, home of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
John Hanson, a retired aerospace engineer whose work included developing techniques used by the Orion spacecraft, told the Episcopal News Service: “When we talk about creation care, we tend to only focus on what’s happening on earth. But there’s so much beyond our galaxy that we have yet to explore, and there is evidence that the universe appears to be fine-tuned for life to exist.
“All the incredible things we already know that are going on in the amazing universe, and all the incredible things we have yet to explore, to me, are all kinds of pointers to God.”
A special prayer on the St Thomas’ Facebook page said: “As the astronauts gaze upon your glorious and all encompassing creation in the days ahead, let them feel your presence. Guide them through the vastness of space and around the moon, and finally, when your journey is finished, bring them back to earth in safety.”