Explaining God, to the extent that it is possible for humans to understand him, is not a bad thing. I think what makes the cartoon hilarious is that it captures the attitude of those theologians who do not consider themselves bound by doctrinal orthodoxy and end up trying to explain away God.
I’ve always heard that some of the first Russian cosmonauts reported back that they had seen no sign of any God while they were up there in space.
Is that true, or an urban legend?
I think that if it is true, they said it as a joke.
Not necessarily a joke, but hard to track down.
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Yuri_Gagarin
“I looked and looked but I didn’t see God.” – Yuri Gagarin
Quoted in To Rise from Earth (1996) by Wayne Lee; Variant: There are also websites which quote him as saying “I looked and looked and looked but I didn’t see God.” on the same someone in Moscow remarked “if you could not see him on earth, how could you see him in the space?”[1] on 14 April 1961, a couple days after his historic flight.
If is striking to compare how the Fathers wrote about the Star of Bethlehem and how people now are always trying to find a natural explanation for it. You can read some of the Fathers’ comments here. (There’s something else cool on that page, too: how the constellation of Orion is seen as a symbol of the Magi and their quest for Christ).
I saw on EWTN the other day that Byzantine Catholics traditionally see the star as the flaming chariot of Elijah come to proclaim Christ’s birth to the world.
I like the second panel because it shows how much theologians have their work cut out for themselves. I do not see the people relaxing by the pool as theologians but as those the theologians are called to minister.
Reminds me a story by B16 where he portrays the modern theologian in terms of a circus clown trying to warn the village of a fire which is spreading from his circus to the town and nobody takes him seriously because of his costume.