Conversation | 04/09/2008 12:00 am

What Happens to Us After We Die?

With Julia Reed, Lily Tomlin and Sheila Nevins

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EDITOR’S NOTE: To listen in on this conversation, click the play button above. Also featuring special guest, Joni Evans, CEO of wowOwow. The following text has been edited for clarity.

JONI: So, William Buckley died and at the memorial his son Christopher told how his father was once asked what would be the right epitaph for him when he died. And — I believe his answer came from the Book of Job, or I read that it was — he said: “I know that my Redeemer liveth,” which is the perfect lead-in to: What do you think happens after we die?

LILY: Has anyone ever exhumed a human body, or are you just going beyond the corpus?

SHEILA: Do you mean it’s rotting, or it’s spiritual?

JONI: Well both. We can talk about exhuming a human body.

LILY: Well, if you want to.

JONI: Well, Lily, you just said that you did …

LILY: I did. I’m saying I have an inordinate interest in anatomy and physiological processes and things. So I know what happens to us physically. We deteriorate eventually. But I was raised Fundamentalist Baptist. What were you raised, Julia?

JULIA: Presbyterian. I just went to the Presbyterian church this morning like a good little Catholic.

LILY: You all may be more spiritual than I am.

SHEILA: I’m not at all. I was raised as a Communist Atheist by my parents.

JULIA: Well, I think being raised Baptist has made most of my Baptist friends become Communist Atheists.

LILY: Well maybe that’s kind of what I was leading to.

JONI: So, was there no religion or any kind of faith in your childhoods that led you to believe we might live on after this world?

Read more about: Death, Lou Dobbs, Religion, Rosemary Altea

357 Reader Comments (so far…) Sign In or Register to comment

Bonnie T—I have heard a number of people say they’ve had this kind of experience over the years. All very vivid just as you say. Did your mother actually speak? Because I’ve never heard of anyone speaking. Actually on Nob Hill in San Francisco there was a house owned by a wealthy man who was prominent in the City. But he had been on the Titanic and had been one of the men who’d dressed as a woman and pushed people out of the way to get on a lifeboat. The story got out and he became something of an outcast and recluse. Many years after his death another family bought the house. Very nice couple with children…and they all said the ghost of the man still lives in the house…they see him..he never speaks and if they pay attention to him he goes away.

By Buh-Bye Hillary Hillary Buh-Bye on 04/11/2008 4:34 am

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If you don’t mind, I would like to use a real story before I explain something. “It has been a hard long year being a single mother and raising two children (one eight and one three). Friday was payday and I had to go and put a bike and doll in the lay-a-way. It took me quite a while, working and paying, working and paying. Finally the day arrived, my last payment, I could bring the toys home! I was so excited as I wrapped their gifts and put on big bows! As I wrapped, I thought ‘the children didn’t really deserve these gifts. They had been sassy, not done their small chores; in fact, I guess Santa would say they had not been “good”. They had not worked for these gifts. Their gift would be absolutely FREE just because I loved them and even though they had not been good or deserving. I had done the work and I really wanted them to accept their gift; but, when did this gift really become theirs? Oh, I knew it was theirs when I worked for the money to pay for it and I knew it was theirs when I paid the price for it; but, when would it really be theirs? On Christmas morn when —-they RECEIVED IT!!!’ Life after death is just like my illustration. None of us are good, no not even one when we compare our “good selves” to perfection; and, we can’t work to pay for a gift that is FREE. Jesus Christ did the work. He paid the price we could never pay. The gift of life after death is FREE. Our part is to RECEIVE IT.

By Judith Harte on 04/09/2008 7:07 am

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Considering William F Buckley’s age, reading habits, and cynicism, I wonder if he wasn’t just quoting a J D Donleavy character? I envy those who believe there is an afterlife, but can’t get myself to believe in it myself. It seems most depictions of eternity have more to do with the psychlogical needs of the believer …. armies, second chances (aka Karma), intellectual miasmas, or father figure/saviors. This seems to be true in whole societies, too. When change comes along entire belief systems are abandoned and become interesting subjects for archelogists.

By Carol Reitz-Butler on 04/09/2008 7:27 am

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And Carol….Gore Vidal is CONTINUING his famous battle with Buckley even after his nemesis has died. “Gore Vidal Speaks Seriously Ill of the Dead”…good old Gore, he never stops! http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080320_gore_vidal_speaks_seriously…

By Buh-Bye Hillary Hillary Buh-Bye on 04/09/2008 7:01 pm

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You may want to edit Ms. Harte, who appears several times… For me, this is the pivotal question that is linked to our religious beliefs and, thus, one that separates us from each other. It creates a hierarchy—I am going to a better place; you do not believe what I believe, so you are not. Where we go when we die is the underlying question that causes any behavior from harsh words to wars. Here is what I think (not believe) and it is encapsulated in a very short quote. Seneca said: ‘fear begets gods.’ If we are all afraid of dying, then we need to create a belief system as a bulwark against death. Fine…there are many. No one is superior than any other, although the Jesus story is the most compelling because it offers “life everlasting.” I tend to look at a body as a corporeal entity that will die. Our memory or spirit may live on in works we have created, kindnesses offered to other living beings and things, and is then incorporated into some communal spirit. This is not metaphysical. Biblical miracles are metaphorical…Joseph Campbell said and I paraphrase: “I don’t have to have beliefs; I have experience.” I hope this stimulates some conversation.

By Kay Weeks on 04/09/2008 7:28 am

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‘lo there Kay, I’m with you all the way on this one - heirachy creates beliefs - I’d not thought of that before, and the Joseph Campbell quote re. experience obviating beliefs is also a new one on me, and I’ll remember it. Are you familiar with Douglas Adams of ‘Hitch-hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” fame? He had a great analogy for religious beliefs in general, not just pertaining to life-after-death; rain falling into and filling a pot-hole says to itself, “Hey, this hole is exactly the right size and shape for me - someone must have made it with me in mind, it couldn’t just have happened.” Sorry, I’ve no time to enlarge further just now, it’s the end of my lunch-break.

By Theresa Mhaidhc Moriarty on 04/09/2008 8:00 am

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Hi Theresa, Leonardo da Vinci said: “Just as courage imperils life, fear protects it.” Religion was born of fear. Every culture has invented a religion as a bulwark against death…to soften and protect. That’s fine—it means we are all essentially the same. No religion is better than another. They are all creations of our ever-wondering and wandering minds trying to find respite in final answers. Of course, there are none.

By Kay Weeks on 04/09/2008 8:25 am

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Kay, you sound like someone I’d love to have coffee with some day. What good ideas you have, and how calmly put!

By Jean Bean on 04/09/2008 1:39 pm

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Jean! I am so honored to have you say that. Maybe we CAN. I live in Ellicott City, MD (a neat little historic district) and there is a coffee shop where we could meet!

By Kay Weeks on 04/09/2008 3:51 pm

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KAY, ah, I’m afraid it’s too late for us! Several years ago while we were still sailing our boat around Chesapeake Bay, it might well have been a possibility. Now we’re staying closer to home here in Peoria. I’ll be watching for your intelligent posts, tho.

By Jean Bean on 04/10/2008 9:46 am

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Last year, I had a massive stroke and was in a coma for more than 2 weeks. I had “near death experiences”. I am not going to share the specifics here, but I learned two things: 1. The “world to come” (this is the Jewish term) looks much like this one, and those who have gone ahead of us can see and talk to us. 2 people who were close to me came and sat by my bed and spoke with me. One of them even explained to me why it wasn’t my time to go yet. 2. There’s nothing to fear except whatever regrets we are creating to take with us.

By lawyermom 2000 on 04/09/2008 12:44 pm

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Thanks for sharing…I read Joni Evan’s experience last night and was glad to see others share their “Damascus Moments”. As one who’s been blessed with many and took it for granted that it was “normal”, only to have a Mother who’s a “Doubting Thomas”, I can identify with all postings, who speak of their thoughts on this subject. Only thing is, there are those of us who can “believe without knowing” and those of who wish they could know…and I suppose it’s why we are left to testify to these who “have ears to hear”. I believe that everytime we can tell of our knowing, we can’t help but reach someone who needs to hear those words we’ve been given to say. Isn’t it strange that none of the cells in our bodies are over 7 yrs old…but we still have some of the earliest memories, intact. I find it strange that some can defend, so strongly, their beliefs in nothing…who can believe in air, which can’t be seen. Like air, there is that “something” which can’t be seen, that’s there; whether a person believes it, or not. Even scientists have trouble getting others to believe evidence of things not seen by the naked eye; those who speak of the evidence of both secular and spiritual energies…and the symbiotics between these, at many levels. My mother’s 84 yrs old and still has that God-shaped void, yet unfilled. Anyone who feels inclined to pray for her, please do. Thanks.

By S.A. McClellan on 04/09/2008 5:14 pm

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I am constantly surprised by people’s assertion that they have found the answer. They have found an answer for themselves. That is all that has been found. No matter how certain you are that you are right. There is no way to know that. Because we are talking about states of energy and our perception of them. We perceive with faulty, imperfect and prejudicial senses. We can absolutely only experience a small sampling of what ‘is’. Just the touching of the tip of an elephant’s tail and we think we can “know” what the he elephant is. But we can’t. You can be right for yourself, but you can not be right for me. I interpret things differently than you do. I am not less open, less accepting, less intelligent, than you. I think, I perceive, I understand, differently. Am i right? I don’t know. Maybe in some small way. But who knows? I don’t need to be right. I need to have set of concepts that work for me. But I also need to allow other people to have a set of concepts that work for them. I need to allow them the dignity of their personhood and their choices. I do not assume, I know their voids or what it takes to fill them. For instance, in my view, testifying means standing mutely, without judgment and observing. Without judgment, being the operative concept. That plateau is obviously, light years beyond my evolutionary plane.

By Deni G on 04/09/2008 7:19 pm