December 24, 1968

Apollo 8  lifted off on December 21, 1968 and 3 scant days later arrived at the moon for our first up close and personal look at our lunar neighbor .  Astronauts Jim Lovell (Apollo 13), Frank Borman and William Anders were understandably overwhelmed and gave us a wonderful Christmas gift from space, a kind of responsive reading of Genesis 1:1-10 that began like this in an intro by William Anders.

“We are now approaching lunar sunrise and, for all the people back on earth, the crew of Apollo 8 has a message that we would like to send to you.”

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth …

Frank Borman gave this closing after the reading.

“And from the crew of Apollo 8, we close with good night,good luck, a Merry Christmas-and God bless all of you, all of you on the good Earth.”

Predictably, everyone was not happy with their endeavor but I, for one,  am forever grateful at the gift they gave us.

So, Merry Christmas to all and to all a joyous night .

Shalom