April 2016 AOM: The Dead Saints Chronicles: A Zen Journey through the Christian Afterlife
On Thursday, June 13, 2013, as I neared completing two years of intensive NDE (Near-Death Experience) research, I was diagnosed with stage IV glioma (GBM), a very rare, aggressive form of terminal brain cancer with a median survival rate of 15-18 months, and no recorded instances of permanent remission. The catastrophic news halted midstream, the completion of Akio Botanical Gardens, a five-acre Japanese landscaping project that surrounded our home in Washington State.
Though tragic, the scientist in me was able to recognize and even appreciate it as an opportunity to explore, in a unique fashion, the unknown territory called The Afterlife. Though intensive and wide-ranging, up to this point my NDE studies were without focus. I thought there might be a book in it (my NDE “hobby” had already assembled a vast trove of disorganized but potentially valuable near-death material)
But without the life-shattering jolt of that cancer diagnosis it probably would never have happened. The “hobby” became a mission.
If my life had an earlier expiration date than I had ever imagined, I had better get to work! After months of planning (I’m a habitual and instinctive planner), The Dead Saints Chronicles burgeoned into a Trilogy… three separate but complementary explorations of a single grand theme. Vol. I, this one just published, A Zen Journey Through the Christian Afterlife, Vol. III, The Armageddon Stones would incorporate my many years of prior research into ancient catastrophe accounts as they applied to religious texts globally. Vol. II Training Wires of the Soul would be autobiographical. It’s been a long, eventful, winding and well- traveled path: from penniless backwoods country boy, to wannabe astronaut, to charismatic Christian mystic’s apprentice, to Bonsai and Tai Chi teacher, to millionaire businessman, to co- Pastor of his Church, to full-time NDE scholar/researcher/author…
Between the apparently inescapable prognosis and my own instinct, I knew the writing project would be a race to the finish, probably right to my final seconds. Yet, despite brain fog and long bouts of radiation/chemo fatigue the pieces fell miraculously into place on an almost daily basis. It was as though it was being orchestrated from above—by God and His angels, as well as deceased friends and teachers already on the “other side.”
The Race
There were periods of despair, brought on by physical exhaustion, when I wanted to abandon the Chronicles and focus only on my family and my bucket list. I was dying! But then, the Hand of God would reach down, slap me upside the head with some new inspiration. I’d get a phone call from some friend I hadn’t heard from in thirty years. He’d relate a dream, a new thought, a reference I should follow up on or perhaps just a sunrise I should experience. So the Chronicles became my Afterlife training ground, our divine “boot camp.” My book would be the culmination of forty years of personal experiences, Eastern and Western spiritual practice, scientific/scholarly research into a variety of related fields, ongoing journal work and dream analysis. The Dead Saints Chronicles would set out to validate the vivid descriptions of the mysterious Afterlife realm recorded by the great mystics throughout human history. My prognosis assured my own entry into that realm in the not- so-distant future, lending it an immediacy and a unique perspective; a book about the Afterlife unlike anything written to date.
April 2016 AOM: The Dead Saints Chronicles: A Zen Journey through the Christian Afterlife