An atheist began caring for the dying.
What he saw changed his view of faith
— and the afterlife
CNN,
by
John Blake
Original Article
Posted By: sunset,
8/17/2025 10:42:38 PM
Scott Janssen’s heart was racing. He took shallow breaths. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing, but he tried to hide his shock.
It was a crisp autumn day, and Janssen was visiting Buddy, an elderly client, at his small brick home on a dead-end street in Durham, North Carolina.
Buddy had just lost May, his wife of 40 years. She was bed-ridden and had suffered from Alzheimer’s disease. Janssen, a hospice social worker, had been visiting the couple for nine months. During that time he had never heard May utter a sound and only saw her open her eyes once.
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Reply 1 - Posted by:
DVC 8/18/2025 12:17:11 AM (No. 1992070)
Very interesting.
23 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
Timber Queen 8/18/2025 1:10:53 AM (No. 1992074)
For just over 15 years TK and I were Home Eucharistic Ministers, and then I served 5 more years by myself. One of our duties was to take the Eucharist to our homebound and those hospitalized after Mass on Sundays. We ministered to many people over 100; one being the oldest living American at 116 for the last eight years of her life. Some of them told of visits from angels or long-passed relatives. In many cases I had the feeling it was my last visit because the person's demeanor was often changed from fearful and concerned to peaceful. Sometimes I had the distinct knowledge it was the last time I would see them in this life. I no longer fear death and look forward to embracing my final days on this earth always looking forward to Heaven.
God bless us all.
89 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
Catherine 8/18/2025 1:16:11 AM (No. 1992075)
My mother was at my paternal grandfathers bed when he died. She said suddenly he cried "Mama, Papa' -then he died. My son died on the operating table and saw his dad. His dad told him it wasn't time yet, he had to go back. So yeah, I'm convinced there is something after this life and by all accounts, it's pretty wonderful.
48 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
jalo1951 8/18/2025 1:31:04 AM (No. 1992076)
Excellent article. I too have had two very personal experiences with a family member and a friend who passed. Yes, I believe. There is something. Some call it heaven and have a very specific place in mind where we go when it is our time. I just give it the generic term of the afterlife. Too many unanswered questions, unexplained circumstances to simply write it off. Science will stick its nose in and give it a specific medical term, say that they can explain it. That's okay because we know better as they will one day. My favorite story about death is that while we stand and mourn the person who has left us there is a group of people on the other side that is excited because they are happy this person is arriving.
35 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
goodolmom 8/18/2025 1:36:30 AM (No. 1992077)
When my father had his first heart attack, he died. Happily for us, he returned and told us what he'd experienced. He said he was in a place that was warm and absolutely filled with love. As with many others, he didn't want to come back. The one thing that hit me hardest was that he said the colors were amazing. He was color-blind.
44 people like this.
Reply 6 - Posted by:
thefield 8/18/2025 2:37:41 AM (No. 1992079)
This story makes me feel sorry for those who lost their faith.
40 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
Dodge Boy 8/18/2025 3:22:17 AM (No. 1992082)
We have returned from Iceland after celebrating the miracle of our marriage of 50 years. And I come home to see this beautiful story. God's work in plain sight and His Miracle.
38 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
franq 8/18/2025 6:06:31 AM (No. 1992085)
Hear the words of Jesus in John 14.
Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.
In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.
And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.
And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know. Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?
Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
God is real. Heaven is real. Hell is real. There are NDEs relating to the existence of both places.
34 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
BirdsNest 8/18/2025 6:49:19 AM (No. 1992092)
#7, wow! 50 years. What a gift.
19 people like this.
Every man that ever lived and every angel ever created has a final destination for eternity. The Bible speaks about hell much more than heaven. Perhaps for the same reason that we speak to our kids incessantly about not playing in the street, but give very little instructions about playing in their safe back yard.
The book Heaven by Randy Alcorn is the most comprehensive look at what we can know about heaven.
15 people like this.
Reply 11 - Posted by:
Highlander 8/18/2025 7:48:34 AM (No. 1992111)
Not to be flip or disrespectful; I haven’t seen any stories about the opposite side. You know, like when a dying man gets wildly bug-eyed with fright, seeing where he’s going the wrong way.
7 people like this.
#11 There are many such stories, but some discard them as bad dreams. Try a Startpage search (I never suggest using google) of Howard Storm who was an art professor and chairman of the art department at Northern Kentucky University.
In Luke 16:19 he Bible tells a story about a rich man who went to Hell and begged for the ability to warn his brothers so they would not end up there also. However, there is no story in the Bible about anyone who went to hell and got to return to their life on earth.
14 people like this.
Reply 13 - Posted by:
rikkitikki 8/18/2025 10:01:19 AM (No. 1992159)
Besides their modern frequency, another bit of evidence to consider is how long such stories have been experienced. They have been around since long before modern medicine was available to induce them.
I am almost 70 years old now, but when I was about 12 yrs old, I recall my mother telling me that old folks in our family line often had similar experiences on their death beds (some having died 50 years before I was 12), such as having visions of dead relatives and friends, speaking with them, and having visions filled with vibrant colors and beautiful scenery. And none of those old folks died under the influence of any modern meds such as pain killers or sedatives.
Based on those stories, and this one, I presume that people have been having such death-bed experiences all along.
9 people like this.
Reply 14 - Posted by:
JHHolliday 8/18/2025 10:02:25 AM (No. 1992160)
Nice, inspiring article. Thanks for posting, OP.
10 people like this.
Reply 15 - Posted by:
slipstik 8/18/2025 10:52:19 AM (No. 1992184)
My mother was repeatedly hospitalized out of the care facility. Even though the wheel chair looked like a garbage truck with a myriad of blinking lights, AND a siren that blared when she stood up, she'd get up, fall down, and go to the hospital, where they'd keep her for a long time tryna fix all that was wrong. She was 93+, and mostly lucid all the time.
She would regularly report new conversations with my dad, and my son, both dead. I'd check the whiteboard in her room and her O2 saturation was
5 people like this.
Reply 16 - Posted by:
slipstik 8/18/2025 11:11:40 AM (No. 1992191)
Add on to #15, not everything uploaded.
...was less than 90%. When they got her saturation back into the 90's these experiences disappeared.
I believe in God, I certainly hope that we are multi dimensional beings because life in this humanity is pretty worthless if this is all there is. But these out of body experiences are largely caused by oxygen starvation to the brain.
2 people like this.
Reply 17 - Posted by:
Catherine 8/18/2025 12:28:06 PM (No. 1992215)
# 11 - I read an article about things hospice workers had experienced. One said the dying man on the bed had been a terrible human. He had a couple of family members by his bed but they said as he died, he suddenly yelled "oh no, no, no...." So maybe not all experiences are so wonderful. Wish we knew what the 'no' guy saw.
5 people like this.
Reply 18 - Posted by:
Geoman 8/18/2025 12:37:02 PM (No. 1992218)
FTA: “Whenever people ask if I believe in God, I say yes. But the word God means so many different things to people,” he said. “I believe there is a unifying, conscious energy or force that connects us all. I think we go back to our source, which for me is God.”
There is no apparent belief in God in terms of the Holy Trinity; the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit but rather a more New Agey "force" that "connects" humans with no apparent redemptive value and no mention of grace, faith, or salvation. CNN further tips their religious belief hand in another article linked to this story and its conclusion that the burning of fossil fuels is causing the rapid intensification of hurricanes.
6 people like this.
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A truly sincere story about one's journey to faith.