The Astronomical Rise of a New Religion

In a time when so many of us have lost faith, there is a new religion on the rise:  Asteroidology. It was founded by former agnostic, Nancy Bellvue, of Holyrood, Kansas in 2015. Downtrodden by the emotional and financial strain of a divorce, with a job as a bookkeeper she despised, combined with the atrocities of the world she had no control over, she searched for something to believe in. 

“That’s when I had an epiphany”, she said. “It’s as if the entire universe opened up to me and told me everything was going to be ok.”  Bellvue went on to say that Asteroidology is different from most other religions, more akin to Buddhism, in that it’s more of a philosophy with the goal to end human suffering and isn’t deity based.  “In an evermore bleak and depressing world, pain in unavoidable and people need something to believe in. Something to count on. Even atheists and agnostics. We don’t discriminate against non-theists. Asteroidology is all inclusive”, the founder explained.    

But, don’t go looking for a big fancy church, Asteroidologists gather for meetings at observatories nationwide on their sabbath; Tuesday evenings. (Which coincidentally is also kids eat for $2.99 at Golden Corral night where the pre-sabbath festivities begin.) At the meetings, they use information from NASA to track asteroids whose trajectories threaten to impact with Earth.  Then they pray for a collision that would result in the total annihilation of life as we know it and thus, resulting in the end of human suffering. 

Bob Frankenship, a devoted follower of Asteroidology for two months from Lakeland, Florida explains.  “There are so many asteroids that come as close as 275,000 miles from Earth. It’s much more common than people realize. Sooner or later, one of the rocks catapulting through space will be the chosen one. We of course, pray it’ll be sooner. To spare the world from things like hunger, disease, the end of oil and terrorism.  But also the lesser known evils of failing to plan for retirement, the confusing conversion to chip encoded credit cards, enduring small talk with Trader Joe’s employees and the results of the U.S. presidential election.”  

Devotees believe the outcome of an asteroid colliding with the Earth would be a swift, fairly painless humane death if you are within 100 to 200 miles from ground zero that is.  Also, if the asteroid is larger than a mile wide, which is big enough to wipe out life on the planet. It would of course be a prolonged demise caused by debris blocking the sun, the further one is from the impact site. It goes without saying that smaller asteroids would have less significant global results. Thus, have less merciful, magnanimous results on the end of humanity as a whole.  

Bellvue summed it up best.  “We just have to take it on faith that a really massive asteroid is sent our way from beyond at the end of times.  And soon.”