TIME magazine, unlike many other older magazines, never had a tradition of publishing short fiction — until golden age of SF author Arthur C. Clarke offered to change that. “The Hammer of God” takes us a century into the future, aboard the good ship Goliath. Its mission is to rendezvous with rama — um, “Kali”, an asteroid that is headed to strike Earth and end all life as we know it. They have equipment that can be used to alter the asteroid’s course, so that it will avoid the Earth — or at worse, skim the atmosphere and give some people below a fireworks show. Unfortunately, though, as the story opens on the demoralized captain indicates, something with the equipment has gone wrong — internal sabotage that wasn’t caught before initialization! I won’t comment further on the story, given how close to the surface spoilers can be in a short piece, but I enjoyed it despite the fact that multiple parts of Clarke’s future-building struck me as nonsensical. Not the technical aspects, but his idea of an economy managed by experts in chaos theory, and the rise of a merger religion of Christianity and Islam. That particular possibility could only occur to someone with no real grasp on either religion, I think. Still, I might check out the expanded novelization he did of his story, carrying the same name.
“Hammer of God” can be read at Time.com’s archives, though I listened to it from audible.
Reading Freely 
I think this Clarke novel might be one of the few of his I haven’t read… although I did stop reading his later stuff after a few bad experiences.
I’m tempted to ask, but don’t want to poison the well. The only one of his novels I’ve read is 2001, but Rendezvous with Rama sounds interesting.
‘2001’ is OK if rather bland in some ways. ‘Rama’ is pretty good, but I wouldn’t bother with the sequels… I’m ‘planning’ to re-read a few of his earlier works ‘soon’ including ‘A Fall of Moondust’ and ‘The Sands of Mars’ both of which I remember enjoying a lot in my teens/early 20’s. He’s definitely good when he’s good.
rise of a merger religion of Christianity and Islam. That particular possibility could only occur to someone with no real grasp on either religion
It’s called Chrislam and it exists and it’s growing stronger.
I only ever enjoyed Clarke’s short fiction. His novels almost universally left me cold. Childhood’s End I read twice to make sure my dislike wasn’t just a stage, but nope, I didn’t care for it either time 😀
Huh. Will look into it.