father and was thus "an ideal link between two very important peoples in the history of the world." He added that he was also selected because he lived in France, which the Elohim considered a more open-minded country than most others. Raël subsequently stated that these prophets are themselves the result of a human mother breeding with an Eloha father, with the human mothers having been chosen for the purity of their genetic code, beamed onto an Elohim spacecraft, impregnated, and then returned to Earth with their memory of the event erased. In his 1979 book, Let's Welcome Our Fathers from Space, Raël added that he was the biological son of the Eloha whom he first encountered, Yahweh. He noted that Yahweh was also the father of Jesus, making the latter Raël's half-brother. In 2003, Raël publicly identified himself as Maitreya, the prophesied future bodhisattva of Mahayana Buddhism. He maintains that he continues to be in telepathic contact with the Elohim, hearing Yahweh's voice guiding him in making decisions affecting Raëlianism. The religion also teaches that the Elohim continue to monitor every human individual on Earth, remotely, from their planet. This is done so that the Elohim can decide which individuals merit being offered the opportunity of eternal life. It argues that the Elohim continue to visit the Earth, as evidenced by crop circles, which adherents regard as the landing spaces of the Elohim's spacecraft. Raëlians generally understand sightings of unidentified flying objects (UFOs) as confirmation of their belief in the Elohim, although their opinion of Ufology is ambiguous. Raëlians also consider the appearance of "angel hair" as evidence of the Elohim's presence, stating that it has appeared at various Raëlian summer gatherings. They typically express scepticism regarding claims by alleged alien contactees other than Raël. Raëlians believe that they are all capable of linking telepathically with the Elohim but that only Raël is permitted to meet with them physically or receive their revelations. The Age of Apocalypse and the Elohim's Return Raëlism is a millenarian philosophy. Raël claims that since the U.S. military's use of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima in 1945, humanity have been living in the "Age of Apocalypse" or "Revelation". It states that the human species must now choose whether to use science and technology to enhance life or to use it to bring about nuclear annihilation. It claims that if humans successfully get through this