By the way, two of the great works of religious science fiction are discussed on different blogs. Claude Muncie posts on James Blish's A Case of Conscience, which he notes is a s good upon rereading in 2003 as it was when he first read it in 1976. Kevin Holtsberry posts on A Canticle for Leibowtiz by Walter M. Miller, Jr. Kevin doesn't find "A Canticle" penetrable and asks for clarification. "Canticle may be dated because of both its pre-Vatican model of Catholicism and, oddly, its post-nuclear apocolyptic setting. I don't know, but I thought it was great. I would also nominate John Boyd's The Last Starship from Earth as one of the great SF religious alternate history novels - in Haldane IV's world, because Christ died during the final assault on Rome, people make the Sign of the Crossbow - and Anthony Boucher's The Quest for Saint Aquin as one of the great SF religious novellas.