I was at my parent's house recently and found an old copy of The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury. When I opened the beat up cover, I found this quote:
"It is good to renew one's wonder ..."
Those words came back to me this past Saturday after I watched the 50th anniversary special of Doctor Who. It was a great episode of a great show, and it made me realize why I love science fiction so much.
If you have followed me online, you know that when it comes to books, movies, and TV shows, my tastes usually tend to go towards sci-fi. It's been that way for most of my life - for whatever reason, the stories that draw me in are usually ones about the fantastic, the futuristic, or the mysterious.
It's not escapism. What I look for and find in good sci-fi is a fresh look on my own world. By enjoying these tales of a world so unlike my own, I come back to the real world with that renewed sense of wonder.
I am drawn to science fiction because of the beauty it reveals in the world around me - mountains, stars, even computers: they all have a hint of the otherworldly, something more.
To make it clearer: science fiction makes me a better Catholic.
As members of the Church, we look at the world with a sacramental outlook. Yes, the sacraments themselves are more than what they appear to be, but it extends beyond that: the world around us speaks to us about God. It may not be in the mind of every sci-fi writer or filmmaker to lead us to that worldview of faith, but that doesn't make it untrue.
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