Here are a few data points to consider:

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• This question has never been divinely revealed, since God revealed only what is necessary for salvation. Nor can reason conclude definitively.

• While the vastness of the universe is way beyond our comprehension and imagination, so too is the number of factors necessary to create and sustain life.

• We need to differentiate between ET ‘life’ and ET ‘intelligent life’. One is purely physical, the other has a spiritual component.

• If there are other creatures with intelligent life, they would have free will to choose good and evil.

• If they’ve sinned, it’s reasonable to hypothesize that God may have assumed their nature in order to save them, as He did ours. This means the second Person of the Trinity may have assumed more than one created nature.

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My quick thoughts, in a nutshell:

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Although I lean toward thinking there may be various life forms throughout creation, I’m not convinced there’s intelligent/personal life (other than humans and angels). I’m not closed to the possibility, since God can certainly surprise us, but I remain skeptical. Nonetheless, as long as something doesn’t contradict the nature of God (which is reason and love) or what He has divinely Revealed, anything is possible.

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So, while it’s good to free oneself from intellectual comfort zones and to recognize possibilities ‘outside the box’, it doesn’t mean such possibilities actually exist. My stand at the current time?  Skeptical openness may be a fitting term.