The Orville’s “Mad Idolatry” and Star Trek: Voyager’s “Sacred Ground” as a Lesson in Explanatory Ethics

In The Orville’s “Mad Idolatry” (2017) Kelly Grayson violates initial contact protocol with a lesser developed species to assist a girl who had hurt herself. Kelly heals the girl and before she becomes aware of the seriousness of the situation, villagers arrive behind her and witness the act. In time, Kelly becomes worshiped as a deity and for hundreds of years she is considered the savior of their world. Much like how Christianity developed in the Middles Ages, great horror is committed in her name. Murder, torture, condemnation, judgment, all traced back to the idea that Kelly will save those who are innocent and judge those who are not, with the condemnation of death. “If you are innocent, Kelly will heal your wounds,” the dominant religious authorities say as they cut those subject to condemnation in such a way that they will bleed out until death.

There is a parallel worth considering on an ethical domination persuasion that tatters reality. In Star Trek: Voyager’s “Sacred Ground,” (1996) Kes encounters a what is considered a holy protection from what that alien species believes is subject to the spirits and she is almost killed. She is literally zapped from something more than a force field, something more than protection, and she falls into something more than a coma. Captain Janeway convinces the order of that religion to allow her to go through a ritual in the hope of saving Kes and convincing the spirits of that alien species to heal Kes and allow Janeway the blessing of their ways.

Just as Janeway must convince the spirits of that world that she is worthy of the blessing to heal Kes, Cmdr. Grayson works to convince the population of that world that she is not a deity. They both work to change and shift the patterned ontology of those world’s religious stance. Janeway, because at first, she does not believe the spirits are real, but that the ritual is just a test to convince the locals and learn, scientifically, what will cure Kes from her ailment, and Grayson because she must indeed prove that world’s practiced tests are false in an attempt to speak to officials. The key difference is that Janeway comes to question her disbelief, she comes to see that science is not holistically complete and perhaps not the only answer to resolving life’s problems, life’s core circumstance in a universe that must always have clear answers where questions are mystic. Grayson also changes, somewhat, or at least we can say it is likely. Once the population evolves to the point of leaving their religion behind and developing space travel, they seek to meet her and comfort her that their history of religious barbarism was not her fault, “our planet worshiped you as a deity for many centuries, but had it not been you the myth would have found another face. That is the truth of growing that all worlds must go through, it is a natural stage, and it eventually brought us here. So you must also believe in the higher self, just as we now do,” to paraphrase somewhat.

I had stated these are lessons in explanatory ethics. This is true. Janeway learns a lesson outside of science, which was indeed her religion. She comes to gain insight into spiritual matters. She thought she only had to complete a test, to prove herself, but it was the spiritual reality that was proved and placed her in an ontological stance that removed certainty and practical explanations. Likewise, despite Cmdr. Grayson’s self-loathing and self-blame for a religion of butchery that revolved around her, she finally meets that evolved species that does not blame her at all, but seeks to explain, to comfort her, to let her know that the planet thrived in spite of their own dark history. She is not to blame. She is encouraged to see beyond the simple growth practices and believe the possibilities of social evolution, and to take comfort in that. That comfort is certainly a spiritual revelation, an eclipse towards more practiced reality and sees beyond the ramifications of history and into the practiced reality of the here and now. Just as Janeway gains spiritual insight into the here and now, Grayson recovers from her self-blame and narrow pursuit of her vision of history. “None of this matters,” Janeway is told. And she comes to see why. The real test, for both Janeway and Grayson, is an explanatory ethos into the ultimate belief in self.