Catherine L. Newell, an associate professor of religion and science at the University of Miami, is convinced that the Americans landed on the Moon thanks to secular faith in the myth of frontier and in American inventiveness. Not so much thanks to the Cold War. Not so much thanks to the success of Sputnik. Newell considers Bonestell’s artwork and Bonestell’s collaboration with Willy Ley, Werner von Braun, Walt Disney to be the originator of these myths. These people caught the attention of Americans to space travel.
“Perhaps, then, a more useful way to approach the topic of science versus reli-gion is not to begin with the idea of conflict nor to explore the mutual indebted-ness of their histories in the canon and chronology of Western science. Perhaps a new resolution can be reached by looking at both science and religion through the vantage point of human endeavor, whether it is religious ideas framed around the conquest of the western frontier or scientific advancements made in the service of reaching the Moon. Inherent in both activities is the element of human imagination. Endemic to both institutionalized religion and paradig-matic science is what I call a teleology of inspiration: a trajectory of revelation toward application that marks both activities as essentially human creative en-deavors. I argue here that it was this secular faith—faith in the myth of frontier as a legitimization of ancestors’ tales and faith in American ingenuity—that put a human being on the Moon. Not the Cold War. Not the Russians. Rather than an attempt to have our own Sputnik moment, one of the greatest scientific and technological achievements in human history was the direct result of public, secular faith in science, technology, and humankind’s ability to fulfill what we believe is our destiny.” [1, p. 29]
Note: [1] CATHERINE L. NEWELL. Destined for the Stars: Faith, the Future, and America 19s Final Frontier. 2019. ISBN 9780822945567.