Our galaxy contains 200-400 billions stars, it is truly massive, our universe is theoretically without end. Orbiting these stars have to be some planets that support life, some may already have inter-stellar spacecraft, and could have even visited Earths for thousands of years. After all if you do a little digging in ancient cultures there are countless accounts of beings coming from the sky. In Sankrit texts describe flying machines called "Vimanas", and on archaeological digs in Mayan cities revealed miniature scale gold sculptures of planes, they were scaled up and were perfectly aerodynamic, even though they were millennia behind the wright brothers. As an interesting topic as it is, is not the point of my blog. If we had the opportunity to make First Contact with an alien race, how would they react when they find out that the inhabitants of our backwater blue planet have the hubris to believe that the entire universe was created for them.

Mathematics is often describes as the universal language, they may not know maths the way we do, but they will know it. Now religion, in my opinion will be the ultimate IQ test for a sentient race, if they think we believe an imaginary friend created all we hold dear. If some religious zealot is somehow mistaken as an ambassador for the entire human race, or is the first to make contact and fuck it up for the rest of us by proclaiming we are made by a God. Depending on where contact is made, they could either be picketed by disgusting Westboro Baptist Church freaks, as the aliens contradict the bible, or be suicide bombed by some Muslim prick who thinks he is going to get 72 virgins for his trouble.  We may be exterminated before we can develop inter-stellar travel and carry the taint of religion with us.
If one day we are visited by an alien civilisation, which I believe one day we will be. If there is still organized religion it will be the most damaging thing to making peaceful contact, as religions seek to bastardize each others religions made up of fellow human beings, who knows what they will proclaim against aliens. Hopefully the aliens will have knowledge of this from the days of their own evolution, as I firmly believe that a race of beings could only ever become inter-stellar by shaking off the shackles of religion, uniting under the banner of science and exploring the universe.  If first contact is ever made, I hope it is made with an atheist, or in fact anyone who is not a fucking idiot who believes in fairtales.