Papal visit: All entities 'God's children'

Any intelligent aliens living elsewhere in the universe should be considered God's children, the Pope's astronomer said.

Brother Guy Consolmagno, pictured, who is due to speak at the British Science Festival at Aston University in Birmingham today, said: "Going back to the Middle Ages, the definition of a soul is to have intelligence, free will, freedom to love or not to love, freedom to make decisions. Any entity - no matter how many tentacles it has - has a soul." He says he would be willing to baptise an alien, but "only if they asked".

Brother Consolmagno, whose appearance at the British Science Festival is unrelated to Pope Benedict's state visit, said: "I'd be delighted if we found life elsewhere and delighted if we found intelligent life elsewhere.

"God is bigger than just humanity. God is also the god of angels."

On physicist Professor Steven Hawking, who has claimed there is no need for a god to explain the origin of the universe, Brother Consolmagno said: "The whole idea of what creation means is not a case of who wound up the clock and set it going, it's the fact there's a clock to be wound up in the first place.

"A god that started things up would be a pagan god. The God I believe in is outside space and time."

He criticised "creationists" who believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible, saying they were turning God "into the pagan god of thunder and lightning".