Raël (born Claude Maurice Marcel Vorilhon, 30 September 1946) is a French journalist who founded and currently leads the Raëlian Movement, an international UFO religion. Prior to becoming a religious leader, Raël, then known as Claude Vorilhon, worked as sports-car journalist and test driver for his own car-racing magazine, Autopop. Following a purported extraterrestrial encounter in December 1973, he formed the Raëlian Movement and changed his name to Raël (meaning "messenger of the Elohim"). He later published several books, which detail th…