Want to be the first person to drink alcohol on the Moon? Buzz Aldrin already did it

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Aldrin had already participated in space exploration—the longest “space walker” in history, in fact—but when he went to the moon as part of the Apollo 11 mission, the committed Presbyterian wanted to commemorate humankind’s first moon strut with something very specific: communion. (Also known as the Christian religious act of eating consecrated bread and wine as a symbol or incarnation of Jesus.) As Aldrin wrote in Guidepost magazine only a few months after his return, “I could carry the bread in a plastic packet, the way regular inflight food is wrapped. And the wine also–there will be just enough gravity on the moon for liquid to pour. I’ll be able to drink normally from a cup.”

Despite careful and conscientious planning with the pastor of his Western Presbyterian Church, and despite performing an unprecedented act on the only satellite rock created by planet collision that also creepily stalks the Earth, nothing much is known of it. We know that a golf ball was hit on the moon. So why don’t we get a good visual of some moon wine? Aldrin actually recounts the way the wine “curled” up the side of the cup gracefully. That would have been a cool pic!

As he told Guideposts, “In the radio blackout I opened the little plastic packages which contained bread and wine.” He had wanted to share that moment with the world, but apparently NASA wasn’t entirely comfortable with the idea. Madalyn Murray O’Hair had previously protested the reading of Genesis by Apollo 8, so the concept of the second man to step onto the moon performing a religious act might have been a bit too much at the time.

So Aldrin took his communion, and drank his wine, but historically it’s gone basically unnoticed. What we remember of most lunar landings, or incredibly expensive, incredibly incredible space explorations, is mostly that we haven’t found aliens yet. And, yes, when we do, we’ll need a glass of wine.

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