From a mountain top I can see the Gateway to Paradise!

From a mountain top I can see the Gateway to Paradise!

Of course it is a dream that everyone would like to share in the reality of eternal salvation.  Yet, how many there are that would push this memorable existence away upon waking and saying they were glad it was only a dream.  How would we, who welcomed this same explicit scene, react to their obvious distaste of a heavenly reality?

Looking around at the current moments of violence on our street corners, in subways where there is no longer the sign of law enforcement, and of course in schools where the only encounters are constant bullying?

We can read this in newspapers or blogs, watch the nightly news, or just walk down some crowded streets with your head looking behind you for fear of an unexpected attack.  All of this is a reiteration of what now has become commonplace in most cities across America.  So to dream or imagine the ability to view what we have been promised by Christ as a real significance that will soothe the trembling feelings of danger at every turn we take, it can become a certain protection at least in our minds.  

I often think of how my son, who passed away from liver disease, must have felt or sensed in some way, when he took his final breath.  We were beside him when this happened and were not aware that was his last.  It was peaceful, at least to us.  But it must have been at that moment he could see the gateway to paradise.  At least it is comforting for us that this was the probability he saw. 

When my father died, and I went to the hospital, the nurse led me to his room and closed the door.  As I stood there watching his lifeless body a feeling of comfort came over me and looking to my right saw in a vision my father standing beside an angel.  He was smiling at me.  I knew he wanted to wait until I arrived before leaving.  The interesting thing about my father, who was a converted Catholic, rarely went to Church.  But, he had a sense of faith that was missing in many cradle catholics.  When I was in the hospital with a serious infection, the doctors told my parents I had a 50/50 chance of dying.  My mother told me at a later time that my father, who played the numbers, used a term to describe the addiction of gambling with bookies.   He made a covenant with God that if he gave me back he would quit the numbers.  Obviously that all occurred.  I used that covenant he made with God in my homily at his funeral.  His faith at that very moment was more certain than what many cradle catholics can show.  Perhaps as he stood there he also could see the Gateway to Paradise.  

A vision of paradise doesn’t need to be in a dream, or at our last breath.  It must be through the gift of faith that will become a reality as long as we hold onto that gift and nurture its very presence in our soul!

Ralph B. Hathaway