It is said that “if you remember the 60’s you were not there!”
I have three vivid memories of the 60’s. All of them are related in some way to the television we had at the time:
1. The assassination of JF Kennedy on 22 November 1963.
The geopolitical implications of this were somewhat lost on my 7-year-old self, but I do remember that the cowboy show Bonanza was interrupted for a newsflash.
2. England winning the World Cup by beating West Germany 4–2 on 30th July 1966.
My memories of that occasion are in colour, even though I am sure we only had a black and white television at the time. My ten-year-old self imagined that this is what England football teams did. How wrong can you be?
3 The first men to land on the Moon on 16th July 1969.
I remember the grainy footage on the television and the iconic lines spoken by a 38-year-old American astronaut:
“That’s one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind,”
At the time my 13-year-old self was more interested in rock stars rather than space but many of my friends were excited about the Moon landings.
I was reminded of that excitement while seeing photographs of the Artemas 2 crew on their journey around the Moon last week. One of those photographs was a view of the Earthrise from the perspective of the Moon. This is clearly one of the memorable sights for those who have travelled to the moon.
One of the other 12 men who set foot on the Moon and had that unique view of the earth was Edgar Mitchell. He said,
“You develop an instant global consciousness, a people orientation, an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world and a compulsion to do something about it.”
Eventually Mitchell found a way to describe what he felt in space: the Overview Effect. This describes the sense of awe felt by astronauts who were able to look back at the earth without borders, factions and disharmony.
It is highly unlikely that any readers of this blog will get the opportunity to go into space and look back at the Blue Planet. Yet the perspective embedded in the term ‘Overview Effect’ is an important one to grasp.
What sort of response should such a concept evoke in us?
Awe and Wonder
Pictures of the earth speak to me of the fragile beauty of what God has made. From a distance it is not a divided and fragmented place. The Overview Effect has created a sense of the oneness of the planet. This big picture helps us to see what a wonderful earth God has made for us and our commission to value and care for it.
Humility
From where we stand it can be difficult to grasp how big Earth is and how small we are in contrast.
“The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it for he founded it on the seas and established it on the waters.” (Psalm 34:1–2)
A big vision of the Earth and the God who made it helps to keep us grounded and remember that we are not God.