Immortality, a Reality?

Immortality, afterlife, spirits and the like have always fascinated and intrigued me. But, deep within me is a fear of an encounter with the supernatural thanks to Hollywood horror. My belief in it exists nonetheless. Recently, I stumbled on a book whose title aroused my curiosity and got me reading. Immortality: The Scientific Evidence by Alson J. Smith, presents scientifically observed, tested and documented evidence for the existence of souls after death and the possibility of communicating across ‘natural’ boundaries of physicality determined by space and time. I confess that this book has made me pensive.

As Catholics, we believe in the Resurrection and life after death. We believe in heaven, hell, purgatory, even though we are not quite sure how they function or what they are like. Despite all this, I’m sure we still feel at least slightly uncomfortable to think that the dead still hang around on earth and are nearer to us then we would like to expect. Their ability to possess us and use us etc can seem discomforting. It’s one thing to have a ‘fairytale’ style truth preached to you and quite another to have scientific proof. I don’t know about you, but I sure feel a bit creeped out. Studies in parapsychology-a recent branch of science which specializes in studies of psychic phenomena, possesses amply documented proof of the same. Myriads of testimonies, cases, and researches provide solid proof of the existence of life after death. Parapsychology challenges materialism and atheism with its scientific evidence.

The evidence re-enforces the philosophical and theological assertion of man’s immortality. The author being a clergyman himself takes pride in presenting the proof for Christian belief in the afterlife, thereby overturning the prejudice that Christianity is based on irrational foundations and promises a pie in the sky. The age-old philosophical debate about the interaction of body and soul also receives a definitive conclusion, with the facts pointing to an immortal soul inhabiting a body without being entirely dependent on it for its existence.

The book contains testimonies and cases of people who have seen the dead, touched them, interacted with them and have even received information of past or future events from them. Practices like clairvoyance, telepathy, automatism-writing or speaking when in a ‘possessed’ state, séances and ouija boards are mentioned and significant cases with regard to each of them are narrated. All of us are psychics, the book says, and are capable of communicating with the supernatural. Some of us are more adept and psychically inclined, while others may require greater effort. Before reading this book, all this psychic phenomena was all theory in the realm of possibility but now I’m convinced of its reality. Prayer is something similar. It is getting in touch with the supernatural or divine. The approaches vary but the outcome is similar. Of course, prayer cannot be put in the same category as psychic phenomena.

The afterlife is not something out there. It’s right here. We are in the midst of it. We are not living in time, we are living in eternity. Death is not the end. This is our faith and our hope. Now it has a scientific basis. Let us beware of living in the illusion that the spiritual world is a poetic or literary construct or that it exists somewhere far from us. We are surrounded by it and are very much a part of it. We need to open ourselves to this reality for that is what faith is-opening ourselves to God and allowing Him to work in and through us.