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By comparison, contemporary NDEs feature no ordeals, cater easy hope, and ignore suffering as assiduously as a Christian Science convert visiting a cancer ward. In a fairly typical account of the climax of modern NDEs, a woman named Phyllis shifts to third person to explain how she comes to judge her intentions and actions during her life on Earth. Phyllis had sometimes done wrong, she observes, but at least she always did "something . … She tried. Much of what she did was constructive and positive. She learned and grew in her learning. This was satisfying. Phyllis was okay."

Given the depth of drama inherent in even the most ordinary person's daily existence, this trivializes the pain and joy, the struggle with good and evil, that most of us know in a year let alone a lifetime. And that says nothing about the extraordinarily heroic figure, who may not genuinely be "bigger than life" but is certainly bigger than life as the contemporary NDE envisions it. Imagine Crime and Punishment ending with "Raskolnikov was okay."

Zaleski correctly identifies the dominant cultural influence here as client-centered psychology. In modern NDEs, God is created in the image of therapist Carl Rogers. It raises a worthy question for those who think the Christian story incredible and deadening. Does the newer culturally dominant version of the truth, supposedly so much more credible and promising, really help us better learn how to live and die meaningfully?

First published October 7, 1988

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Also posted today is

Travel Writing from the Afterlife | If the Bible doesn't quench your curiosity on what it's like in heaven and hell, we have two new firsthand accounts.

Other Christianity Today articles on the afterlife include:

Harleys in Heaven | What Christians have thought of the afterlife, & what difference it makes now. (June 6, 2003)

Hell's Final Enigma | Won't heaven's joy be spoiled by our awareness of unsaved loved ones in hell? (April 24, 2004)

Christian History Corner: How the Early Church Saw Heaven | The first Christians had very specific ideas about who they would meet in the afterlife. (August 9, 2002)

What's a Heaven For? | C.S. Lewis saw belief in heaven not as wishful thinking, but as thoughtful wishing. (Oct. 26, 1998)

The Believer's Final Bliss | The regeneration of man requires that old things must pass away and all things become new. By John Murray (July 7, 1958)

The Glories of Heaven | While heaven will be glorious, the greater glory will consist in our transformation. By Stanley C. Baldwin (May 22, 1964)

The Hope of Heaven | Have Christians forfeited their rightful anticipation of eternity? By L. Nelson Bell (May 24, 1968)

Illusion or Reality? | Heaven is a place. There is a city we are going to see and walk in. By Edith Schaeffer (Mar. 12, 1976)

Heaven Can't Wait | I have seen the electrifying results of what can happen when the reality comes alive. By Philip Yancey (Sept. 7, 1984)

Heaven: Not Just an Eternal Day Off | As if anticipating the question, "Will life on the new earth be boring?" the Bible points to much activity there. By Anthony Hoekema (Sept. 20, 1985)

What Will Heaven Be Like? | Thirty-five frequently asked questions about eternity. By Peter Kreeft (from Tough Questions Christians Ask, 1989)

The Eternal Weight of Glory | If only we could have the positives of earthly life without the negatives. By Harry Blamires (May 27, 1991)

Afraid of Heaven | We do not yearn to be near God because we do not find sin utterly repugnant or goodness rapturously attractive. By Kenneth Kantzer (May 27, 1991)

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