Role reversal: NASA and the Vatican trade places.

In an ironic twist, two often diametrically opposed organizations have taken on the roles of the other, short lived as it may be. NASA is vigorously attacking rumors of the Earth’s demise in the year 2012.

“There is no factual basis for these claims,” NASA said in a question-and-answer posting on its website.

Speaking about the possibility of a cosmic collision NASA was quick to point out the obvious.

If such a collision were real “astronomers would have been tracking it for at least the past decade, and it would be visible by now to the naked eye,” it added. “Obviously, it does not exist.”

Of course the Catholic Church isn’t being so dismissivein the search for life on other worlds. Centuries after the hasty condemnation of notable astronomers like Galileo, the church is turning it’s gaze upwards for a different reason.

Father Jose Funes, a Jesuit astronomer at the Vatican Observatory and one of the organisers of the conference, said: “As a multiplicity of creatures exists on Earth, so there could be other beings, also intelligent, created by God.

Of course this new stance isn’t without criticism.

Paul Davies, a theoretical physicist and author of The Goldilocks Enigma, told The Washington Post that the threat to Christianity is “being downplayed” by Church leaders. He said: “I think the discovery of a second genesis would be of enormous spiritual significance.

“The real threat would come from the discovery of extraterrestrial intelligence, because if there are beings elsewhere in the universe, then Christians, they’re in this horrible bind.

“They believe that God became incarnate in the form of Jesus Christ in order to save humankind, not dolphins or chimpanzees or little green men on other planets.”

Fair enough, but that is subjective as to how “in His image” is defined and father Funes disagrees with you.

Father Funes, director of the Vatican Observatory near Rome, is a respected scientist who collaborates with universities around the world.

“The search for forms of extraterrestrial life, he says, does not contradict belief in God.”

Fine, but don’t come crying to me when this happens.

Or this.

And this.

Certainly not this.