http://www.holycrossyakima.org/orthodoxPdfs/VISION OF HEAVEN AND HELL.pdf A VISION OF HEAVEN AND HELL my spiritual rebirth by Dushan Yovanovich Kragujevac Yugoslavia 1983 Reprinted from the Newspaper of The Serbian Patriarchate Checked by Hieromonk Dr. Amfilohije Radovich, Belgrad, Yugoslavia ( at this time,2000A.D., Metropolitan of Montenegro) Translated by: Prof. Momcilo Miljkovic at Hershey Medical Center Hershey, PA 17033-USA Dec - 1984
Seems like I remember reading this story a while back (I thought it was on this site) and I remember trying to research this story and person but I recall that there was feedback that this story was not authentic. But I couldn't find any recent information about this person and since it didn't occur all that long ago you'd think it would be easy to find with technology today. Just my 2 cents. God Bless!
"After these words the cloud moved in the easterly direction and higher. As we moved I saw a lot of people, looking like glowing shadows moving around us in all directions. Their arms, legs, heads, and faces were easily recognizable. I wondered who all these people were when, as if he read my thoughts, the angel said, '”These are not humans, but only human souls. God is the Light, and after creating humans from earth, He breathed His spirit into them. Humans then became living souls, which is why the souls glow. When a soul leaves a human body it retains sight, hearing, speech, memory, feelings and some other features which it had when it was in the body." He also told me that the soul is present in every part of the body and that it is the moving force of the whole organism. Without the soul there is no life in the body. Then he explained to me that when the soul leaves the body, it re-lives its earthly life in the next forty days. Everything the soul has done, said, or thought is reviewed, and after forty days it goes to heaven to be judged and sent to the place it deserves." This is what the Eastern Catholic (and Orthodox) believe. That is why there is the initial 'funeral Divine Liturgy', then 40 days afterwards a Divine Liturgy is said for their soul....very cool!!
The Tibetan Buddhists have an interesting belief that when souls leave the body they enter the Bardo world. In a kind of way this teaching is that when we leave this world we kind of take our suitcases with us. So if haven't kind of overcome the falsities (sins) of existence we kind of take the baggage with us to the next. This is not dissimiliar I think to Catholic teaching on Purgatory. My own private belief is that when the soul passes on it is often allowed to linger for various pieces of unfinished buisness. To take an example a dead mother or father staying to comfort a young family left behind. This is much, much more common and folks think, its just that in the Western World we are afraid to discuss personal incidents in case of being though nuts. But ask any priest worth his salt and he'll relate many stories folks have told him about such goings on. A friend told me one time about his mother dying when he was very young and a couple of days later his dead mother visiting himself and his sister in a dormitory in the night to comfort and talk with them . Interestingly both brother and sister saw the mother at the same time so it was not purely subjective.
Padraig, I agree. While Ive not personally seen a soul after theyve passed, my grandmother and cousin did, and like your story above, they saw the soul simultaneously. Ive experienced the perfume of a soul who passed, suddenly and without warning while reading in bed. This soul always wore this perfum and was known to have worn no other brand of perfume. It was very strong and then disappeared without a trace. Interestingly, I wasnt in the least bit afraid during or after the experience and was grateful for it.
Padraig. When my grandmother who is now deceased was 11 (I think) her youngest sister veronica died of fever. Either that night or a few nights later my grandmother and all her brothers and sisters saw her outside the window just hovering there. Many were afraid to open the window, but my grandmother did and she flew into the room and just smiled at them. My grandmother had dimensia in her later years but all the way up to before the dimentia set in, she swore that this was true and that she did not make it up just tell it to her own kids and grandkids a nice bed time story.
