Diana Pasulka
Diana Walsh Pasulka is a professor of religious studies at the University of North Carolina Wilmington who researches the historical and theological intersection of UFO phenomena and religion. Her research began with Catholic historical accounts of divine and angelic contact and expanded into a comparative study of modern UAP experience reports, arguing that the two categories share consistent phenomenological features.
Biography
Background and methodology
Pasulka's early scholarship focused on Purgatory in Catholic tradition and the theology of the afterlife, resulting in her first scholarly book, Heaven Can Wait: Purgatory in Catholic Devotional Culture. While translating primary-source accounts of reported saintly visions for that research, she identified a pattern: her direct translations of contact experiences diverged from the Church's official versions, and the original descriptions bore close resemblance to modern UFO encounter reports -- including cases involving Francis of Assisi, Teresa of Avila, and the Merkabah tradition of Ezekiel's vision.
The methodology of her field as maintaining neither belief nor disbelief: "We don't believe or disbelieve in my field."
Disclosure and public activities
Books
Pasulka's American Cosmic (2019) documents her fieldwork with scientists, aerospace professionals, and alleged participants in secret space programs, including a pseudonymous NASA mission controller she calls "Tyler" who introduced her and Gary Nolan to an alleged UAP crash retrieval site in New Mexico. The book also documents a visit to the Vatican Observatory at Castel Gandolfo.
Her second book, Encounters (2023), broadens the scope to include technologists, AI researchers, and experiencers, arguing that the contemporary disclosure conversation is framed too narrowly around U.S. government sources and overlooks centuries of non-Western and indigenous contact traditions.
Key claims
Space programme and occult connections
The space programme -- from Konstantin Tsiolkovsky and Jack Parsons through contemporary Space Force operations -- has always had a religious or esoteric dimension that its official public history does not acknowledge, including the use of ancient Latin invocations at launches. The discussion of the Babalon Working and Jack Parsons' occult-facilitated rocket breakthroughs is documented in the Babalon Working article.
Appearances
Pasulka appeared on the Danny Jones Podcast (episode #188) discussing elite aerospace scientists' views on UFOs and biblical time. She also appeared on the Shawn Ryan Show (episode #166) in February 2025, discussing religious history, UFO phenomena, and Purgatory.