Apollo 8 astronauts delivered a 1968 Christmas message that calmed a ravaged nation
Apollo 8 skittered around the moon 50 years ago this Christmas Eve.
Carrying American astronauts Frank Borman, Jim Lovell and Bill Anders, it was the first time humans had glimpsed the far side of the moon, and Anders’ photograph of Earthrise remains the most iconic image, arguably, of human exploration.
That night, as Christmas prepared to dawn on a tired and ravaged America in 1968 — worn down by riots, protests and war gone wrong — the astronauts found the words to calm a nation.
Anders began the conclusion of the crew’s Christmas Eve television broadcast with these words:
"For all the people on Earth, the crew of Apollo 8 has a message we would like to send you,” he said.
"In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
"And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep.
"And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, ‘Let there be light’: and there was light.
"And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness."
These men represented the best of America
I am far from the first journalist to compose an opus on Apollo 8’s Genesis reading 50 years ago, but I’ve had it on my mind a lot of late.
I was 5 years old when “Apollo 13” appeared as a movie. I must have watched it hundreds of times, fascinated not so much by the idea of space travel, but by the brave men who undertook it.
Tough, disciplined and adventurous, the early astronauts, and the controllers on the ground who helped them fly (flight director Gene Kranz remains my personal hero), represented what I thought, and largely still think, was the best of America.
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They had the ability to bring a fractured nation together in a common cause, and that must have been on Lovell’s mind when he took up the reading.
"And God called the light day, and the darkness he called night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
"And God said, ‘Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.’
"And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.
"And God called the firmament heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.”
The idea to read from Genesis came from the wife of a newspaper reporter, Lovell said in 2013 at a re-enactment of the event, because Genesis is the foundation of three of the world’s largest religions.
To be sure, many in the viewing audience, including many of the engineers and scientists at NASA, were not religious adherents at all, but for others, including myself today, the moment is a sort of proof that our belief is justified.
That despite the common narrative that science and religion must be in conflict, in actuality, the more we understand about science, the more we understand about our creator.
'God bless all of you — all of you on the good Earth'
Apollo 8 itself was a sort of miracle. Coming less than two years after the deaths of three astronauts in a launchpad test for Apollo 1, Apollo 8 was a NASA gamble to get the assassinated President John F. Kennedy’s wish for a moon landing before 1970 back on track.
Asked to develop a plan to circle the moon, a dubious Chris Kraft, NASA’s first flight director, ended up proposing something far more daring: to enter the moon’s gravitational orbit, which would allow the astronauts to do some more extensive work in preparation for a future moon landing.
“That sounded too damn good to me,” Kraft, now 94, said in a 2017 interview. “Because it made a hell of a lot of sense.”
So here was Apollo 8, orbiting the moon for all of humanity, the vehicle Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin would use to land on the moon not yet even ready for use, beaming back to Earth a message of comfort and triumph.
Borman, the mission commander, finished the reading.
"And God said, ‘Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear’: and it was so.
"And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called the seas: and God saw that it was good.
"And from the crew of Apollo 8, we close with good night, good luck, a Merry Christmas, and God bless all of you — all of you on the good Earth."
Alex Hubbard is a columnist for the USA TODAY NETWORK - Tennessee, where this column originally appeared. Follow him on Twitter: @alexhubbard7
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This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Apollo 8 astronauts delivered a 1968 Christmas message that calmed a ravaged nation
