Near-Death Experiences

Dr. Diane Komp, a professor of pediatrics at Yale University School of Medicine, has viewed the deaths of numerous terminally-ill children.  Her job is a tough one by anyone's standards.

Dr. Komp, however, has discovered that death is not always a hopeless and melancholy specter.  Sitting at the bedsides of children near death has taught her to look for God, even in the most unexpected places.

Her first experiences of this kind occurred in the room of a 7-year-old leukemia victim.  According to Komp, before the little girl died, she "found the energy to sit up and say, 'The angels - they're so beautiful!  Mommy, can you see them?  Do you hear them singing?  I've never heard such beautiful singing.'"

Komp, who admits that her Christian beliefs were derailed in medical school, has reaffirmed her faith because of such experiences.  Having seen so many of her young patients die in peace after such visions, she believes firmly in Jesus' words "to look to the children to find the secrets of the kingdom of God."

Her favorite story is that of a dying boy at Yale-New Haven Hospital.  The boy's parents had ordered those attending their son not to discuss death or religion with him.  Komp relates that the boy, who suffered from leukemia, had a dream in which a school bus pulled up to his house.  Jesus was on the bus and invited him to come along.  On the bus, Jesus told the boy of his coming death, and by doing so, gave the boy a strong sense of peace.

Komp asserts that this "great peace...is one of the common threads in all of these stories."