"Though all are different, all are great" ***

As I was sitting with a dying patient the other night, her family and I began the inevitable discussion of life after death. The dying woman had been reaching her arms up towards the sky, and she periodically opened her eyes and appeared to be watching or looking at something or someone or someplace that was unseen by the rest of us. This behavior is common, and I see it at most every death with very few exceptions. Most of my patients are Christian, and they tell me they are unafraid of death because they know they are going to Heaven. However, what they are afraid of is the actual process of dying...the transition from this world into the next. Will there be pain? Will there be light? Will they make the transition by themselves? How will they know what to do? It is my personal belief that God is well aware of these fears. And so He eases that fear by sending someone from Heaven to assure the dying person and to guide them. A vast majority of my patients have conversations with people who are unseen by anyone else. More often than not, they see their deceased mothers. Sometimes it's a spouse, a father, or a child who has died. Sometimes they report seeing angels. This is what I believe was happening to the woman I was with the other night. She was seeing into the afterlife, and there were people she loved who were coming to greet her.

This experience got my wheels to turning about religion and the various religious beliefs that exist on this great big planet of ours. It has always been my nature to question the norm. I do not question it just for the sake of being argumentative. I do not question it because I am doubting my own beliefs. Usually, I am questioning simply out of curiosity. When I'm questioning religous beliefs, I find that people get defensive and tend to end the discussion rather quickly. It's not my intention to offend people; but I do like to talk about religion from a philosophical point of view, as well as a faith-based one. I like to ask lots of "what if" questions.

A co-worker of mine, who happens to be a nurse, shared with me that a recently deceased patient of hers had reported seeing Jesus prior to her death. The patient described Jesus has being Caucasian, having rosy cheeks, and having long brown hair. My co-worker smirked and cited this vision as evidence that Jesus' physical appearance was just as she herself had always pictured it...fair-skinned with long straight brown hair. I suggested that perhaps Jesus appeared to her patient specficially in that form so that she would recognize him. Perhaps Jesus did not look anything like that while he walked on the Earth, but if had he appeared to this woman in an unfamiliar form, she would not have recognized him. She may not have been open to this vision or been comforted by it, so he appeared to her in the only form that she knew. This seemed to offend my co-worker, and I guess I had rained on her parade a little bit. Again, it was not my intention to ruffle any feathers; I was truly only speculating out loud.

I once had a deaf patient who communicated only with American Sign Language. He had been deaf since birth, and he had never spoken a word or heard one. I was sitting with him as he was dying, and suddenly his eyes flew open. He pointed at something/someone unseen by me, and he followed it around the room with his eyes and with his finger. He looked at me with an incredulous expression on his face, as if to ask "Did you see that?" There was not an interpreter present, so I couldn't ask what he saw. I wondered if he saw angels, and that lead to another speculative question: Would an angel use sign language to speak to him? If an angel truly speaks (in the verbal sense) in a vision, wouldn't it stand to reason that he or she would speak in the native tongue of the person who is having the vision? So I had this beautiful image in my head of an angel using sign language to speak to my patient. I mentioned this to another co-worker, and she was pretty adamant that the angel wouldn't need to speak sign language because the patient would be "healed" and "perfect" upon entering Heaven, and he would be able to hear. I countered with "Maybe God doesn't consider deafness to be an imperfection...maybe that's something that we mortals have decided." What if "healing" someone who has known only deafness for his entire life would be like "healing" someone because they have blue eyes? My feeling was that perhaps if this patient has never heard a spoken word before, then there would be no need for him to have the ability to hear in Heaven...? My co-worker took great offense to this and snapped "Well, I know he's going to be perfect when he gets to Heaven, and he'll be healed from his deafness!" She walked away in a bit of a huff, thereby ending our debate.

So my questions ( I mean them rhetorically, but I'm open to reading responses) are these: When a person is seeing into the afterlife as they prepare to die, do they see the afterlife as it truly exists? Or is it all about one's own personal perception? Does God (or whatever Higher Being you believe in) send visions that are tailor-made to that person's personal beliefs? Visions that are manifested in a way that is consistent with that person's own experiences?

As I mentioned earlier, the community I serve is mostly Christian. After working eleven years with this hospice, I can count the number of non-Christian patients I've served on one hand. I've never been with a non-Christian in the last moments of his or her life. I think it would be interesting to sit with a Muslim, a Jew, a Hindu, or a member of another world religion and observe their behavior as they die. Will they also reach to Heaven? Will they see Jesus? Will they see angels? Will they see loved ones who have died? Or will their experience be something completely different because of their different perceptions and beliefs?

I will add these questions to my "Things to Ask God When I Get To Heaven" list.

***From "The Stairs", a song by INXS, referring to the different faiths around the world

God's Open Door Policy

I was visiting with a patient today who recently received some bad news. She has a lung disease, and she was evaluated for a lung transplant. Since she's only in her 50's, she was hopeful that she would be approved and would be placed on a waiting list for a healthy set of lungs. However, due to some co-existing medical conditions, she was told that she would not be eligible for a transplant after all. The doctors felt that the surgery and the recovery process would only weaken her further and detract from her quality of life...possibly hastening her death. At first, she seemed okay with it; she voiced acceptance and said that this was God's plan. She would simply live with it and enjoy whatever time she had left with her family. However, as time has passed and she's had more time to think about it, she is struggling more and more. She was tearful during my visit with her today, and she said she doesn't think that God is listening to her. Then she immediately started to back pedal and said "Not that I would ever question God, of course." What I'm hearing from her is that she's angry at God, and she feels guilty for that. I think she's struggling with her anger and disappointment in God and the subsequent guilt as well.

This got me to thinking more about my own views about God and being angry with Him. My thought is that it's okay to feel angry with God and to express it to Him. He can handle it. He created anger. Jesus became angry when he discovered the temple was being used as a marketplace. God became angry when His Son died. Anger is not sin. It doesn't indicate a lack of faith. Anger is not a sign of disrespect. Anger can result in sin if it is not properly channeled...but anger in and of itself is not sinful.

I think God has an open door policy. If you're angry, then it's okay to talk to Him about it. I think that He wants you to. My relationship with God is no different than my relationship with family and friends. If I'm angry with someone I love, I'm miserable. I don't want to be angry with them. I want to talk about it as soon as possible and fix it. Why shouldn't my approach towards my relationship with God be the same way? I've been in relationships before when I didn't express anger for fear of retribution or fear that the person wouldn't love me as much as they did before. Guess what? My anger didn't fade. It festered. I became resentful, and my relationship suffered. I think the same thing can happen in a relationship with God. If you don't talk to Him and acknowledge your anger (He already knows you're angry, by the way...He's God!), then your anger will fester, too. Your relationship can become strained and broken.

I've been angry with God before, and I approached Him in the same manner that I approach other loved ones. My prayer to Him went something like this: "God, I'm so angry with You right now, and I hate it. I don't know what to do with it, but I know I don't want it to be like this. Please help me to understand what is happening. I can't go on like this...I need You too badly." My anger didn't fade instantaneously. I continued to pray and talk to God about it over the next few days. Eventually, I made peace with God and the issue that angered me. God and I kissed and made up, figuratively speaking. We were okay again. Actually, my bond with Him felt stronger and deeper. It felt more vibrant.

A long time ago, I met a gentleman named R.F Smith, Jr. He was a pastor, and his sister was a patient of mine. He traveled from his home in West Virginia to spend her last days with her, and he and I had several opportunities to talk. As it turns out, he is the author of a book entitled "Sit Down, God...I'm Angry." It is about his own struggle with his anger towards God after his 17-year-old son died in a water skiing accident. He donated an autographed copy to our resource library, and I read it in about two days. It's a phenomenal book. I would highly recommend it to anyone who is trying to come to grips with anger towards God, as well as pastors and counselors who may encounter people who are dealing with this strife.

Here's Your Sign

I've been a social worker with hospice for almost eleven years now. Every then and again, I start to feel tired and weary. I wonder "What am I doing here?" "Am I really making a difference?" "Do I need to do something else?"

And it never fails. Just when I think I have reached the end of my rope, God sends signs to me just when I need them. The people He puts into my path are not-so-subtle reminders that I am where I need to be.

For the past few weeks, I've been feeling worn and burned out. I had hit one of my slides when I start to wonder if my purpose at hospice has run its course. And then it happened.

I was at the grocery store yesterday, and I heard a familiar voice say "Excuse me." I looked up, and it was Bonnie, the wife of a former patient who had died five years ago. She grabbed me and hugged me, and she started to cry. We stood in the produce department for about twenty minutes, and I listened as she talked about her husband and how much she missed him. She was able to recall things that I had done for her husband and her (things that I had forgotten about), and she was very grateful...even after five years.

Today, I went to the funeral of a patient who died over the weekend. His wife, Mary, hugged me. Next thing I knew, her daughter (whom I had never met until today) was hugging me and thanking me for everything I had done for her mother. Evidently, Mary had been talking to her about me. Mary's sister and brother-in-law approached me and hugged me. I had had only a few conversations with them, but apparently, something I did or said meant something to them.

At this same funeral, I ran into the friend of another patient of mine who died several months ago. This lady also knew Mary and her husband. I had only met her once, but she remembered me. She hugged me and said that when Mary told her that her social worker's name was Pam, she told her "you will be in good hands." As I was walking back to my car after the funeral, I said quietly under my breath, "Thank you, God. I needed that."

Tonight, I'm feeling affirmed and re-energized. The funny thing is that I always forget that God does this for me. I never realize that I need it, and I never know to ask for it. Yet He gives it to me anyway. I always think, "Oh yeah! He does do this, doesn't He?"