{"id":103332,"date":"2024-01-02T19:01:11","date_gmt":"2024-01-03T02:01:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=103332"},"modified":"2024-01-02T19:13:09","modified_gmt":"2024-01-03T02:13:09","slug":"ive-seen-them-both-and-theyre-not-the-same","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2024\/01\/ive-seen-them-both-and-theyre-not-the-same.html","title":{"rendered":"“I’ve seen them both, and they’re not the same.”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/a>

The Celestial Room of the Idaho Falls Temple.
Note the heavenly reunions depicted in the mural on the wall.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I\u2019ve recently shared three or four passages here with you from Hadley Vlahos, The In-Between: Unforgettable Encounters During Life\u2019s Final Moments<\/em> (New York: Ballantine Books, 2023). \u00a0Here\u2019s another one that I really liked, and that I think you might find interesting, as well:<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve seen just as many patients who aren\u2019t religious and don\u2019t believe in an afterlife have end-of-life visitations from loved ones as I have those who do believe in a life after this one. \u00a0Having said that, I don\u2019t think that we can explain everything that happens here on Earth, much less what ever comes after we physically leave our bodies. \u00a0I do believe that our loved ones come to get us when we pass, and I don\u2019t believe that\u2019s the result of a chemical reaction in our brain in those final hours. \u00a0There\u2019s a big difference between hallucinations and the sort of visitations described in this book \u2014 I\u2019ve seen them both, and they\u2019re not the same. \u00a0While hallucinations can be anything from spiders on the wall to the house morphing around you, visitations are lucid and matter-of-fact to the patient who\u2019s describing them. \u00a0While hallucinations can incite anxiety or fear, visitations bring with them a sense of calm and peace. \u00a0(250)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

At the very end of her book, Ms. Vlahos<\/a>, who is a registered nurse and a specialist in hospice care, addresses the patients whom she treated at the end of their lives. \u00a0One of them was an outspokenly atheistic patient that she calls \u201cFrank,\u201d who, along with his wife, wanted no \u201creligion\u201d brought into his passing. \u00a0Nonetheless, at the end, he said, his sister was visiting and conversing with him. \u00a0And, when his wife bluntly reminded him that his sister was dead, he brushed the objection aside and remarked that his sister was nobody of whom anyone needed to be afraid (233-235). \u00a0To him, Ms. Vlahos writes,<\/p>\n

Your unwavering belief in, well, no beliefs has allowed me to better understand and explain to others that no matter what your beliefs \u2014 or lack thereof \u2014 your loved ones will still come to get you. \u00a0(258)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I couldn\u2019t help but be reminded in this connection of a passage from the text of one of the lectures contained in Elisabeth K\u00fcbler-Ross, On Life after Death<\/em> (Berkeley and Toronto: Celestial Arts, 2008).\u00a0 Dr. K\u00fcbler-Ross<\/a>, who died herself some years ago, was a Swiss-born physician and psychiatrist who became very famous for her revolutionary work with dying patients, particularly through a hugely influential 1969 book entitled On Death and Dying<\/em>. \u00a0This passage is, though, as I say, from On Life after Death<\/em>:<\/p>\n

At the moment of this transition, you are never, ever alone.\u00a0 You are never alone now, but you don\u2019t know it.\u00a0 But at the time of transition, your guides, your guardian angels, people whom you have loved and who have passed on before you, will be there to help you.\u00a0 We have verified this beyond a shadow of a doubt, and I say this as a scientist.\u00a0 There will always be someone to help you with this transition.\u00a0 Most of the time it is a mother or father, a grandparent, or a child if you have lost a child.\u00a0 Sometimes it is people you didn\u2019t know were \u201con the other side\u201d already.<\/span><\/p>\n

We had one case of a child, a twelve year old, who did not want to share with her mother what a beautiful experience it was when she died.\u00a0 No mother likes to hear that her child found a place nicer than home, and that\u2019s very understandable.\u00a0 But this child had such a unique experience that she needed desperately to share it with somebody, so one day she confided in her father.\u00a0 She told him that it was such a beautiful experience when she died that she did not want to come back.\u00a0 What made it very special, besides the whole atmosphere and the fantastic love and light that most of them convey, was that her brother was there with her, and held her with great tenderness, love, and compassion.\u00a0 After sharing this she said to her father, \u201cThe only problem is that I don\u2019t have a brother.\u201d\u00a0 Her father started to cry, and confessed that she did indeed have a brother who died three months before she was born.\u00a0 They had never told her.<\/span><\/p>\n

Do you understand why I am bringing up examples like this?\u00a0 Many people will say, \u201cWell, you know, they were not dead, and at the moment of their dying they naturally think of their loved ones, so they naturally visualize them.\u201d\u00a0 But nobody could visualize a brother they never knew about.\u00a0 (27-28)<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/a>

The Idaho Falls Idaho Temple, on the Snake River
(LDS Media Library). \u00a0One of the most powerful intimations that I\u2019ve ever experienced both of a dimly perceived or intuited and almost ineffable holiness as well as, very specifically, of the reality of life after death came to me during an evening visit to the grounds of this temple. \u00a0It occurred when I was in my early to mid-teens. \u00a0I said nothing about it to anybody at the time, but I\u2019ve never forgotten it. \u00a0I still remember the impression that came over me (and the image that occasioned that impression) very distinctly, and I think of it whenever I visit the temple in Idaho Falls.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Here are two stanzas of a hymn that, candidly, I long hated as too treacly, too corny, too sentimental.\u00a0 I don\u2019t feel that way anymore:<\/p>\n

"

Oh, what songs of the heart
\nWe shall sing all the day,
\nWhen again we assemble at home,
\nWhen we meet ne\u2019er to part
\nWith the blest o\u2019er the way,
\nThere no more from our loved ones to roam!
\nWhen we meet ne\u2019er to part,
\nOh, what songs of the heart
\nWe shall sing in our beautiful home.<\/p>\n

Tho our rapture and bliss
\nThere\u2019s no song can express,
\nWe will shout, we will sing o\u2019er and o\u2019er,
\nAs we greet with a kiss,
\nAnd with joy we caress
\nAll our loved ones that passed on before;
\nAs we greet with a kiss,
\nIn our rapture and bliss,
\nAll our loved ones that passed on before.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 I\u2019ve recently shared three or four passages here with you from Hadley Vlahos, The In-Between: Unforgettable Encounters During Life\u2019s Final Moments (New York: Ballantine Books, 2023). \u00a0Here\u2019s another one that I really liked, and that I think you might find interesting, as well: I\u2019ve seen just as many patients who aren\u2019t religious and don\u2019t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":18577,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1104,5835,17683,37044,11908,37053],"class_list":["post-103332","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-death","tag-dying","tag-elisabeth-kubler-ross","tag-hadley-vlahos","tag-kubler-ross","tag-the-in-between"],"yoast_head":"\n"I've seen them both, and they're not the same."<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"  I've 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