Dear Mr. Connelly,

This letter is in reference to Dr. Barry H. Downing’s article, “The Bible And UFO Abductions.”

My name is Wes Clark.  I am a MUFON Field Investigator in Titusville, Florida, and Vice President of CE 4 Research Group, Inc., also based in Titusville.  Joseph G. Jordan is a MUFON State Section Director for Brevard and Volusia Counties, Florida, and the President of CE 4 Research Group, Inc.

In the course of performing occasional sighting investigations and Joe heading up a monthly forum group in Cocoa, Florida, several would-be abductees began turning up in the local area.  I suppose they assumed if we were specifically MUFON Field Investigators, then we would objectively listen to their stories, which we did.  We found ourselves dealing with half a dozen experiencers who wanted answers and the best we could do was just be good listeners.

Eventually, Joe and I decided to pursue the abduction phenomenon from a research perspective.  In the course of our research, we, like virtually every other researcher in the field, rehashed the same old data and ended up with the same old, unanswerable questions.

Then we came across a guy who related an experience where he stopped his potential abduction by calling upon the name of Jesus.  We’d never heard of anyone “stopping” a potential abduction, and he did it by calling upon the name of Jesus Christ.  I had a belief in God, but that was about the extent of my spirituality.  Joe was a crystal rolling New Ager.  Neither one of us had ever even considered a spiritual origin of the phenomenon.  We had a hunch we were onto something.

In October, 1996, we formed CE 4 Research Group, Inc. as a legal entity to clearly separate our MUFON activities from our abduction research efforts for obvious reasons.

Then our Biblical research began.  15 months later we find ourselves standing on a premise based upon what we feel is an iron clad understanding of Scripture.  The reason we say “iron clad” is because all the pieces of the puzzle fit like a hand in a glove.  Now our mission, as we see it, is to present this premise to the field for their consideration.

As to Dr. Downings’s article, we feel he is in error on several points that beg for correction, but the root of his error is, he does not understand what “Holy Spirit” is.  What he has said, essentially, is: ‘I will no longer refer to God as a spiritual being with a distinct personality.  I will now refer to God as a “Space Brother” and attempt to make the Bible fit that premise.’

We feel Dr. Downing’s premise is not only incorrect, but is a blatant misrepresentation of Scripture.  We want to make perfectly clear at the start that we do not take issue with Dr. Downing personally.  For all we know, he is probably a very nice gentleman.  Our issue is with his premise. 

I realize in this realm words such as “Bible,” “Jesus,” “Holy,” etc. often suggests distasteful mental images of ranting raving televangelists and perhaps the last spiritual beating one received in church before they bailed out.  I used to feel this way myself until our research went in this direction.  After all the time we’ve spent researching the Word so far, I’ve come to realize there is a vast gulf of difference between Christianity and “religion,” “religion” being nothing more than a cheap counterfeit of reality.

If the Bible contains any truth at all, it needs to be looked at and factored in to the equation, no matter how folks may feel about it.  As I’ve often said, truth is truth is truth, even if that truth turns out to be something other than what we thought it was or even hoped it might be.

Several months ago I had a guy tell me referencing the Bible was fine, but one must first separate “the wheat from the chaff.”  OK then, what’s wheat and what’s chaff?  And according to who’s authority?  The Word tells us:

II Timothy 3:16-17
“All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness [or ‘rightness’]: That the man [and woman!] of God may be perfect, throughly [or ‘thoroughly’] furnished unto all good works.” 

All means all, with no exception.  The whole thing.

Also:

II Peter 2:20-21
“Knowing this first, that no prophesy [or profession] of scripture is of any private interpretation.  For the prophesy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.” 

So the Word wasn’t “just written by men” after all.  That’s why, after 66 books and 44 authors over a period of 1600 years, it all fits like a hand in a glove, because it was essentially written by the same author, the Holy Spirit.   Also, there goes the argument for “It all depends on how you interpret it.”   There is no private interpretation.  It says what it means and means what it says.  If something doesn’t seem to make sense, it’s due to a problem with the English translation or our understanding of it.

Keeping this in mind, our English Bible is simply a translation of the original manuscripts (or as close to the original as possible).  Every word each writer used was used for a reason, and that reason was to convey a specific message.

I’d like to present the following points regarding Dr. Downing’s article.

1. “What is interesting here for me is the model of the relation between the UFO reality, humanity, and abductions: abductions are the means by which humans are brought to a higher level of spirituality.”

What kind of “spirituality” are we talking about here?  The message of the “UFO reality” is, “We are from god.”  But which god?   There is God the almighty, righteous, wise, omnipotent, creator, father of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, then there is the “god of this world,” otherwise known as Satan, aka, Lucifer, the deceiver.  Jesus himself called him a liar and a murderer.

John 8:44
“Ye [the Pharisees, or religious leaders in Jerusalem] are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do.  He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him.  When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.” 

Also:

II  Corinthians 11:13-15
“For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ.  And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.  Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers [these so-called spiritually advanced “Space Brothers” for example] also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works.” 

The message of “UFO reality” is basically a new gospel when the Word says there is no new gospel.  That makes “UFO reality” nothing more than a dangerous, destructive, deceptive counterfeit of reality.  “UFO reality” is NOT the Biblical message.

As far as bringing humans to a higher level of spirituality, let’s not kid each other.  I can’t think of a single abductee I either know personally or read about where anyone has ever said, “These abductees are just so spiritual!  I wish I could be like them!”  On the contrary, most of the abductees I know or have read about, their lives are in shambles. Their families are falling apart, their marriages are on the rocks, they have problems on the job.  Everything about these peoples’ lives have been turned upside down.  I don’t think these people are any too spiritual.

2. "In 'The Bible And Flying Saucers,' I mainly focused on UFOs that were near the key leaders-the pillar of cloud and fire near Moses, the chariot of fire with Elijah, the ‘bright cloud’ with Jesus at his Transfiguration, as well as his Ascension, the bright light and Paul on the road to Damascus.”

Dr. Downing assumes all these events were UFOs or at least UFO related.  There is nothing within the Biblical context that even remotely suggests this is the case.   All these events were Spiritual phenomena as it manifested into the physical realm.   Being physical beings, we cannot see spirit; only its indirect manifestation into the physical realm, as anomalous lights that zip back and forth, shape shift and appear and disappear out of nowhere are spiritual manifestations into the physical realm.   One can reference the writings of Jacques Vallee and J. Allen Hynek to see how well this fits together in the premise.

The pillar of cloud and fire were physical things the Israelites could see and follow across the Sinai Desert.  Likewise, Elijah’s “chariot of fire” was a Spiritual manifestation.  According to the Biblical context, he wasn’t abducted.

The Transfiguration event mentions nothing of a UFO.  Jesus displayed the glory of God, or at least a tiny example of it, to Peter, James and John who witnessed the event.   An interesting sidenote is, in the Transfiguration account in Matthew chapter 17, in verse 3 the word ‘appear’ in the Greek is the word ‘optomai’ which means to see something objectively as in "It appears he told the truth on the witness stand."  Matthew could have used the word ‘blepo’ which denotes the physical use of the eye to see as in "The airplane appeared from behind the cloud."  Matthew could have used ‘blepo,’ but he didn’t. he used the word ‘optomai’ instead.  Again, in verse 8, the word ‘saw’ is the Greek word ‘eidon’ which is to see as in mental perception.  And again, Matthew could have used the word ‘blepo,’ but he did not.  What I’m trying to point out here is that WORDS MEAN THINGS.

The Ascension event took place not quite 2000 years ago.  The inhabitants of Jerusalem and the surrounding area were quite familiar with metallic objects.  Had Jesus zipped away to the “mother ship” in a UFO, the writer of Acts would have suggested something to that effect in the account.  Instead, we are told Jesus ascended up, up, up, until those watching the event lost sight of Him in the clouds.   I tend to suspect that’s exactly what happened.  Jesus also was not abducted.  His earthly  mission in the Plan of Redemption was complete.  He was going home to His Father’s throne.

3. “But abduction images are also part of the biblical story.”

No, they’re not.

4. “The biblical message seems to be this: the heavenly UFO reality, whatever it is, can take us from earth to another world, and then bring us back...”

That’s not the Biblical message.  Jesus Christ and man’s redemption are the Biblical message.  One can see the “Red Thread” running all the way from Genesis 3:15 to Revelation 22:21.

5. “Furthermore, during the time the UFO (the pillar of cloud and fire) landed on Mt. Sinai, Moses went alone to the top of the mountain to encounter the divine being in the UFO.”

We’ve got to quit reading things into the Word that just aren’t there, or we’re never going to get to the bottom of UFO/abduction phenomena and we’re going to continue to miss out on what the truth is.

6. Moses

In a nutshell, Moses didn’t receive spiritual information from a “Space Brother.”  He received the law from God, over 700 laws, including the 10 Commandments.  Some laws dealt with aspects of worship for sure, but most were dietary and cleanliness laws, designed to keep literally thousands of people alive in a desolate wasteland and maintain some kind of civil structure for an extended period of time.  For example, it wasn’t until the last century that science finally started seeing the connection between health and hygiene.  Had the Israelites asked why, they wouldn’t have understood the answer, so God said, “Just do it.”

When Moses came down from the mountain, his face glowed.  I bet yours would too if you spent 40 days in the direct presence of the glory of God.

7. Elijah 

Elijah was a busy man.  He was led to go everywhere as the Holy Spirit moved him.   He was a hard guy to find and wasn’t likely to be in any one place for any length of time.  It was as simple as that.  No abduction here.

Before the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit was not available except as it came upon individuals.  As people were (and still are) physical beings, they were hard pressed to adequately describe Spirit.  They did the best they could (speaking as they were moved by the Spirit), but it is absolutely crystal clear by the context these people were NOT describing UFOs.  Period.  And that’s really hard to miss by a serious student of the Scriptures. 

8. Jesus

At the Jordan River, if the Word tells us Jesus went up from the water, maybe that’s exactly what He did.  If you jump into a swimming pool for a dip, don’t you “come up” out of the pool?  No UFO here.  If it had been a UFO landing on Jesus, it probably would have “alit” more like a Sherman tank than a dove.

After Jesus’ Baptism (of water AND Holy Spirit), He went off alone into the wilderness for a 40 day period of severe temptation, directly from Satan himself.   This was a legal requirement that needed to be satisfied in the plan of redemption.   Jesus had to be given a specific chance to fall just like Adam had.  The Word tells us Satan worked Jesus over pretty hard.  In Luke 4:1, we are told He was led into the wilderness.  The Greek word here is “ago” (long on the ‘O’), which simply means He was driven or impelled to go to the wilderness.  By the way, wilderness is wilderness, not another planet.  (says what it means, means what it says.)  Notice here Jesus always responds to Satan with “It is written...”   Jesus thought the Word was important, so I do too, important enough in fact to be as accurate with it as possible.

The temptation event IS reminiscent of an abduction, and I'm at least a little surprized Dr. Downing didn't mention it in his article.  For example, notice in verse 5 of chapter 4 how the devil, “taking Him up into an high mountain, shewed unto Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time.”  Talk about screen memories!   This is the exact same tactic the enemy uses in modern day abductions to razzle/dazzle their victims, making them think their abductors are so divine!   Deception is what the enemy is best at, and they are sucking people in at this very moment.

9. Philip

Here, Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch go down into the water, then come up out of the water.  Then they went their separate ways.  It’s as simple as that.   The next time Philip shows up in the narrative, we find him in Azotus, preaching in various towns on his way to Caesarea.  Pretty simple stuff.  No abduction or UFO transportation here.

By the way, the Ethiopian eunuch believed the Word.  He didn’t try to read stuff into it.  Maybe we shouldn’t either.

So far, we still have absolutely no connection with the Biblical record and UFO/abduction phenomena whatsoever.

10.  “The Bible reports that Jesus had unusual powers to heal the sick, raise the dead or even turn water into wine.  None of his miracles were reported previous to his baptism.”

That’s because Jesus wasn’t capable of doing these things by Himself, but only through the Holy Spirit which He received at His baptism in the Jordan River.

11. “As a seminary-trained and ordained pastor, I must admit the above interpretation of the baptism of Jesus is far removed from church tradition.  But as we try to make sense of UFO abductions, scientific method demands that we explore the possibility that the baptism/Spirit of God sequence at the beginning of the ministry of Jesus was an abduction experience, even though from the point of view of religious orthodoxy, this seems highly unlikely.  I believe much we are doing in UFO research raises huge questions for religious faith—we can avoid the questions only by not asking them.”

We've found through our research that UFO abductions make better sense if we just accept what the Word is telling us.  If we keep on trying to make it say things it's not saying, this phenomenon will never make any sense.  It’s certainly OK to ask the questions, and we need to, but if the answers don’t stack up with truth and reality, we need to drop them in favor of answers that do, or else we’ll spend the next 50 years pretty much the way we’ve spent the last; going round and round in circles and never getting anywhere.

12. Paul

In Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus, it was Jesus he saw in all His resurrected glory.  Here was Paul, or Saul of Tarsus, who was a militant Pharisee.   He took sport in going from town to town, rounding up Christian men, women and children, and having them executed.  He was on his way to Damascus to do just that.   There was a job Paul was chosen by God to do, and Jesus had to get the boy’s attention!

When Paul was shown the “third heaven” as he tells us in II Corinthians 12, he was at a particularly low ebb, physically, emotionally and Spiritually.  Paul had spent all these years just trying to preach the Word.  For that he was imprisoned, beaten, flogged, stoned and left for dead; he lived with this kind of treatment on a regular basis.  No wonder the guy was depressed!  The entire reason for this Spiritual event was to show Paul that yes, it was indeed all worth it.  Paul was shown some things that none of us get to see in the physical realm, or if we could, we wouldn’t be able to comprehend it.  But according to Paul, all these things are in store for those who love God. 

What Whitley Streiber describes is just plain Satanic.  Everything Satan does is a counterfeit, but unfortunately a very good counterfeit to a Spiritually undiscerning mind.   I have never seen a counterfeit $23 bill, and neither have you.  That’s because there are no real $23 bills.  There are counterfeit $20 bills out there because there are real $20 bills.  Only reality gets counterfeited.   Furthermore, if I were to give you a counterfeit $20, it better look an awful lot like a real $20, or you’d never accept it.  And so it goes with the abduction phenomenon.

If we could just allow ourselves to believe the Word instead of what some “Space Brother” tells us, then we could all see the counterfeits for what they really are.

13. John

As far as John is concerned, everything John saw in his Revelation on the Island of Patmos was revealed to him in the Spirit, and he tells us so right in his introduction.   No UFOs or abductions here.

14. “If being ‘in the Spirit’ is not just a psychic state, but the equivalent of being ‘in a chariot of fire,’ then John’s Revelation may have been part of a UFO abduction experience, an experience or vision that is not unlike the voice of God heard by Betty Andreasson during her abduction.”

The voice of “God,” but again, which god?

John tells us to test the spirits, and the test is pretty simple:

I John 4:1-4
“Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.  Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: And this is that spirit of anti-christ, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world.  Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them [the enemy]: because greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world.”  

The word “world” in the Greek, is “kosmos,” or the universal realm.   So the implication here is that we are not dealing with little gray folks from Zeta Reticulii, but deceptive demonic entities from the spiritual realm.  The sooner we start getting that and forgetting what’s being foisting upon us with all this New Age trip, the sooner we’ll understand the nature of the UFO/abduction phenomenon and what we can do about it.

15. “I obviously do not know if any of the biblical people were abducted by UFOs.   But our culture, in popular TV shows like ‘The Visitor,’ can now imagine that humans might be abducted, and then be placed back on earth to carry out some kind of spiritual mission of salvation.”

The Word tells us what the mission is.  When are we going to believe that?   The integrity of the Word speaks for itself.

16. “My main point is this: such an idea would not be foreign to biblical thinking.  It is foreign to the way religious leaders today think about the Bible, but I do not believe it is foreign to the Bible.
 I realize this point of view is inconvenient for both religious traditionalists, and for scientists who do not want religion mixed with their UFO research.” 

My point is this: the UFO/abduction message is COMPLETELY foreign to the Bible.   The only reason “UFO reality” is inconvenient to religious traditionalists is because the message of “UFO reality” is a lie that simply doesn’t stack up with truth.

Traditional science naturally looks at physical, nuts-and-bolts issues and is not equipped to deal with spiritual realities.  It is literally impossible to use a physical law or process to prove or disprove a spiritual point.  I would suggest that scientists who wish not to mix spirituality with their UFO research are like the guy who drops a dime in the living room but looks for it in the kitchen because the light’s better there. 

If those of us working in the UFO/abduction field want to call ourselves researchers, that’s perfectly fine, but we have to do the research!  If we’re going to reference Scripture, that’s fine, but it has to be presented accurately and correctly.

It has always been my understanding that MUFON is a scientific research organization.   I would guess there are MUFON Field Investigators who represent virtually every faith, belief, premise and position imaginable.  It would seem to me that as a scientifically based organization, MUFON must at least consider ALL the data, and let the chips fall where they may.

Sincerely,

Wes Clark,
CE 4 Research Group