Another plausible explanation of what goes on "on the other side."

** An excerpt from “Life,” a sermon by Mary Baker Eddy

(As reprinted in the Christian Science Sentinel, Feb 2, 1918)

Since ever we investigated metaphysics and traversed in freedom the realm of Mind, we have been careful not to overrate our discoveries, or to state what we had not first understood. We have not demonstrated the actual state of man's existence beyond the limits of the observation of our senses, and only as we reason from deduction is it possible to define this state. Any hypothesis beyond this conclusion, presupposing the condition of the departed is fully understood, is a vain conjecture, unsupported by reason or revelation.

From facts apparent to the understanding and gathered from the Science of Soul we know that man is immortal, and that the shadow we call death is but a phase of mortal belief. No change has been wrought when we say, “My friend has just died;” that friend is saying in the full consciousness of existence and with its same surroundings, “I never died. It was but a dream I had; for life is going with me the same as before. I am not spirit; yet I am as much flesh and bones as I ever were [was]; the only change to me is, I cannot communicate with my friends,—and why? Because they do not understand me now. They call me spirit, but I am not; they say I died, but I did not; they do not know what I am, where I am, or what I am pursuing. I shall not be spirit until I lose all limits; they have lost their evidences of me through their personal senses, because they have said I changed, I died; their mistaken views of life have parted us; their belief that life ended with me, or took upon itself a new form, has prevented their under standing the reality of my present existence,—hence our separation through these opposite beliefs and our opposite conditions as the result thereof. Further communication between us is impossible, until their belief changes through the footsteps that mine has done and becomes like mine. This change will be named death, but that is their belief of it, not ours who have rent the veil that hides the mystery of a moment.”

Yes, we shall know each other there; we shall love and loved; we shall never lose our identity, but find it more and more in its order, beauty, and goodness. Men claim to know that pain is a fact, although it is unseen; they need know that peace and bliss are greater facts and that this world is the veil of brighter glory that lies beyond it.

Having never been dead before...

** ...I can't verify the truth of the following - but it sure makes a lot of sense to me!

Death is nothing at all
Henry Scott Holland 1847-1918, canon of St Paul's Cathedral

Death is nothing at all.
It does not count.
I have only slipped away into the next room.
Nothing has happened.
Everything remains exactly as it was.

I am I, and you are you,
and the old life that we lived so fondly together
is untouched, unchanged.
Whatever we were to each other, that we are still.

Call me by the old familiar name.
Speak of me in the easy way which you always used.
Put no difference into your tone.
Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow.

Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes that we enjoyed together.
Play, smile, think of me, pray for me.
Let my name be ever the household word that it always was.
Let it be spoken without an effort,
without the ghost of a shadow upon it.

Life means all that it ever meant.
It is the same as it ever was.
There is absolute and unbroken continuity.
What is death but a negligible accident?
Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight?

I am but waiting for you,
for an interval,
somewhere very near,
just round the corner.
All is well.

I THOUGHT I felt better!

A New York Times article says that researchers at the University of Wisconsin are reporting that the activation of brain regions associated with negative emotions appears to weaken people's immune response to a flu vaccine. Test subjects were asked contemplate an extremely meaningful event in their lives. Then they were given a flu vaccine. Six months later theywere tested for the presence of antibodies. Read more at: Power of Positive Thinking May Have a Health Benefit, Study Says

While the doctor is out, live a little.

Britain's Independent has a story that notes death rates actually fall during doctors strikes. No one is quite sure why, but the article ventures that with fewer doctors around there is less chance for catastrophic treatments. If true this would take "iatrogenic disease" to a startling new dimension. 'During the doctors' strike in the 1970s, death rates fell'