Written by Maggie Samples // Photo by Edgar Cardiel
Harding hosted Mike O’Neal, a former NASA chaplain, in honor of the eclipse on Monday. He spoke in chapel and presented at 3:30 p.m. in the Anthony Wright Administration Auditorium.
O’Neal worked for the Kennedy Space Center for over 31 years and has written four books published by 21st Century Christian. He was awarded the agency’s outstanding leadership medal and two exceptional service medals.
In both his afternoon lecture and his chapel presentation, O’Neal spoke about his experience at NASA and the ways that astronauts incorporated their faith into their time in space.
“When I was with NASA, for two years, I researched how we would provide spiritual support for the astronauts on long duration missions,” O’Neal said. “As a part of that study, I looked into the history of spirituality and spaceflight. I had to make recommendations and so I had to understand, ‘What have those astronauts been doing?’”
For the rest of his lecture, O’Neal shared stories about specific astronauts and the ways they incorporated and adapted their faith into their time in space.
“One of the things that we bump into as Christians in our society is the entertainment industry and the media,” O’Neal said. “They tend to look down on us nowadays, and our ethics and morality are becoming antiquated. We have these astronauts who are men and women of great intellect and great courage, and a lot of them are men and women of great faith as well.”
O’Neal said these astronauts can serve as good examples of Christians in society and that he is grateful for the God-given opportunity to travel and spread this knowledge.
“I can’t tell you how many people have told me just how encouraging that is for them to hear, because of all the negative things they always hear,” O’Neal said.
Freshman education major Charlie Foster said she appreciated the lecture and the spiritual aspect of the conversation.
“I really like how he had so many stories to tell,” Foster said. “It’s just really cool to hear how many people changed their perspective of God and creation.”
Freshman software development major Nathaniel Kinonen said he enjoyed the lecture.
“I thought he was knowledgeable and did a really good job linking everything to the spiritual aspect of space and NASA’s mission,” Kinonen said.
