“Christians do not have to renounce their faith in God just because of new unexpected information of a religious nature regarding extraterrestrial civilizations,” said Giuseppe Tanzella-Nitti, Vatican astronomer and theologian.

Once believers will have verified that these alien civilizations come from another planet, he said. They will have to conduct a “rereading of the Gospel in light of the new data.”

In sum, most of these observers believe the Catholic faith is strong enough to withstand the test of extraterrestrial life. Be it in the Jazz scene in Star Wars or Captain Kirk’s deck, be it tall blue Avatars or helping E.T. “phone home,” there will always be “space” for Catholicism.

After speaking with several of the naval aviators who observed the unknown craft, NASA’s chief is convinced that the pilots “saw something, and their radars locked onto it.” Asked to speculate about the nature of the phenomena, Nelson – an Army veteran, former senator and ex-astronaut – responded, “Who am I to say that planet Earth is the only location of a life form that is civilized and organized like ours?”

As surprising as his answer may be, Nelson is only the latest high-level official to hint that UFOs may have otherworldly explanations.

Asked in June about the military’s recent encounters with mysterious craft, former President Bill Clinton – like Nelson – responded by pondering the vastness of the universe and the high probability of life existing beyond Earth. Similarly, former President Obama speculated about the extraordinary implications if recent incidents involved otherworldly objects. Of note, Clinton and Obama retain access to top-level intelligence briefings.

But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Queried about the Navy’s encounters with UFOs, former CIA director John Brennan speculated that the objects might “constitute a different form of life.” Channeling Clinton, Obama and NASA’s Nelson, Brennan stated that “it’s a bit presumptuous and arrogant for us to believe that there’s no other form of life anywhere in the entire universe.”

In much the same vein, former CIA Director James Woolsey, a longtime UFO skeptic, recently signaled openness to the possibility that such encounters have otherworldly explanations.

John Ratcliffe, former President Trump’s director of national intelligence, is particularly vocal about UFOs.

In a series of interviews, Ratcliffe ruled out secret U.S. technology and cited “high confidence” intelligence assessments to eliminate foreign adversaries as possible explanations for the most compelling UFO encounters. According to the former head of U.S. intelligence, some UFOs exhibit “technologies that we don’t have and, frankly, that we are not capable of defending against.”

them going: now's a good time to shoot down some UFOs and tell the public about it to see how they react
"Coming immediately after an intrusion by positively identified as a Chinese espionage balloon, it is hard to assume that the new objects, which were also slow, high-altitude objects also coming from the same direction, were not simply more of the same."
"But the Pentagon is strongly resisting this interpretation, and, even more bizarrely, refuses to call them aircraft but insists on objects ... as in unidentified flying objects."

"I’m not going to categorize them as balloons," he said. "We’re calling them objects for a reason. I'm not able to categorize how they stay aloft."

Feb. 12: Lake Huron

Location and altitude: The object was around 20,000 feet, soaring near the eastern portion of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. It was shot down over Lake Huron, "about 15 nautical miles east of the Upper Peninsula," VanHerck said.

Size and shape: "It presented as an octagonal structure with strings hanging off but no discernable payload," a senior Biden administration official said.

What shot it down: An F-16, firing an AIM-9X Sidewinder missile.

Feb. 11: Yukon, Canada

Location and altitude: Approximately 40,000 feet, in Canada's central Yukon, after crossing the border from Alaska. The shootdown took place around 100 miles from the U.S.-Canada line.

Size and shape: Early indications showed "this object is potentially similar" to the one shot down off the South Carolina coast, Canadian Defense Minister Anita Anand said, adding that it was "smaller in size and cylindrical."

What shot it down: An F-22 fired an AIM-9X Sidewinder missile, said Ryder, the Pentagon press secretary.

Feb. 10: Alaskan coast

Location and altitude: It was at 40,000 feet, over Prudhoe Bay along Alaska's northern coast.

Size and shape: "The object was about the size of a small car," Ryder told reporters, adding that it was "not similar in size or shape to the high-altitude surveillance balloon" from the previous weekend.

What shot it down: An F-22 fired an AIM-9X Sidewinder missile.

Feb. 4: South Carolina coast

Size and shape: The balloon was estimated to be up to 200 feet tall. Of the payload, VanHerck said, "I would categorize that as a jet airliner type of size, maybe a regional jet," with a weight of more than 2,000 pounds.

Location and altitude: The balloon famously crossed much of the continental U.S. before being shot down over the Atlantic Ocean, near Myrtle Beach, S.C. It was flying between 60,000 and 65,000 feet.

What shot it down: An F-22 Raptor using an AIM-9X Sidewinder missile.

Having come from the Pentagon, I can tell you that some of these UAPs, while we may not be able to know what each and every one is doing, some of the big concern there was that
a lot — not — many of those reports were happening around our training ranges, were happening around air training ranges. So combat pilots were seeing these things. And it was — and there was a potential impact to the safety of flight of our pilots. But you may not have but a fleeting moment on some of these things to see it. And so, it’s different.

In these cases, we had time to detect, time to analyze, time to engage, time to make those kinds of decisions. But it all comes down to safety and security, first and foremost.

“I was told for decades that Lockheed had some of these retrieved materials,” he said. “And I tried to get, as I recall, a classified approval by the Pentagon to have me go look at the stuff. They would not approve that. I don’t know what all the numbers were, what kind of classification it was, but they would not give that to me.” He told me that the Pentagon had not provided a reason. I asked if that was why he’d requested SAP status for AATIP. He said, “Yeah, that’s why I wanted them to take a look at it. But they wouldn’t give me the clearance.” (A representative of Lockheed Martin declined to comment for this article.)