Subject: UFOs and NDEs - the whole truth
Date: 9 Jun 94 19:40:22 GMT



NDEs and UFOs --THE WHOLE TRUTH  
             by N. Pacheco, Ph.D.

Excerpted from the book "Unmasking the Enemy: Visions 
and Deception in the End Times," 2nd ed., by  N. Pacheco 
and T. Blann, pub. by Bendan Press, POB 16085, 
Arlington, VA 22215-1085..  

Copyright (C) 1994 by the authors.  

This file may be copied and freely distributed, but must be 
copied in its entirety.  

e-mail may be sent to the authors at: 
npacheco@delphi.com or 71564.3204@compuserve.com 
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     Beginning with the work of Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-
Ross in the 1960s and the publication of "Life After Life" in 
1975 by Dr. Raymond Moody, a new branch of  thanatology 
(the study of the death process) has evolved, known as the 
New Death Experience (NDE).  Although  not the main 
subject of our book, some researchers are now making a  
connection between NDEs and the UFO abduction 
experience.  In his book "The  Omega  Project" (with 
foreword by popular horror novelist and UFO abductee 
Whitley Streiber), Dr. Kenneth Ring collects information on 
the experiences of both UFO abductees and NDE 
percipients, and claims that they may be "in effect _alternate 
pathways_ (Dr. Ring's  emphasis) to  the same type of 
psychospiritual transformation."  This is a strong statement, 
no doubt suggested by the similarity between the UFO and 
NDE percipient's altered state of  consciousness  during the 
experience, their alleged contact with non-human entities, 
and the experience's after-effects.  Dr. Ring further 
describes the "psychospiritual transformation" that both 
abductees and NDE-ers go through as being "one that 
expresses itself in greater awareness of the inter-
connectedness and sacredness of all life and necessarily 
fosters a heightened ecological concern for the welfare of the 
planet."  Since this has the makings for a new social and 
spiritual movement, it is important to understand the nature 
of an NDE -- not just what is reported, but the whole truth.

     What is an NDE?  Although the particular experience 
may  vary, an NDE can be defined as the vivid and detailed 
report given by  an individual who has been close to death 
(or has even been declared clinically dead), but has survived 
either through good fortune or  through modern medical 
resuscitation efforts.  Several decades ago, individuals who 
were declared clinically dead could seldom be resuscitated.  
Over the last several decades, however, medical  resuscitory 
technology has advanced to such a level that many patients  
who are clinically dead in the sense of having flatline EKGs 
and no discernible brain activity for several minutes have 
been brought back to life.  Surprisingly, reports began to 
surface from these individuals that were very similar in 
content, suggesting that their consciousness and personality 
had continued (and even been enhanced) into the period after  
clinical death.

     At first such reports were simply ignored by 
attending physicians and nurses, who were properly 
concerned with the patient's physical rather than spiritual 
condition (they still are in many cases).  When the reports 
began to be noticed by the medical community, they were 
assumed to be the result of delirium brought on by lack of 
oxygen to the brain, by administration of pain-killing 
narcotics, by endorphins released in the brain, by erratic 
temporal lobe activity, and other medical factors.  However, 
further investigation by pioneers such as Drs. Raymond  
Moody, Melvin Morse, and others have made a strong case 
that such NDEs represent a real rather than hallucinatory 
experience.  For example,  measurements of brain oxygen 
levels in dying patients has shown that many of those who 
report an NDE were at a normal oxygen level.  Others, such  
as Dannion Brinkley (author of "Saved by the Light"), who 
"died" at home  from a lightning strike while holding a 
telephone, had no drugs administered.  Endorphin and 
temporal lobe-related hallucinations replicated in other 
settings do not repeat the same sequences as in an NDE.  
Most fantastically, some NDE-ers verified details of their  
own resuscitation and even the layout and activities of their 
relatives in  other rooms while they were clinically dead.
One such woman well known to the authors, Lynn 
(not her real name), "died" in 1973 and returned with a 
fascinating story.  Although others have tried to investigate 
and relate the story of this honest and credible woman, she 
has never before given permission because of its personal 
nature and its religious significance.  Even well-known UFO 
abduction researcher Budd Hopkins tried to have her agree 
to a hypnosis session with him, which she refused.  Because 
of her trust in our desire to present the entire account, she 
has agreed to the release of her story.

     LynnUs story begins in 1973 in Texas, where she 
was seven months pregnant and began complaining of 
severe abdominal pain and discomfort.  Her husband Ted 
(not his real name) rushed her to a local clinic through a 
driving rainstorm, where she was diagnosed as having an 
infection due to possible appendicitis.  Treatment of her 
deteriorating condition, combined with her pregnancy, was 
beyond the capabilities of the local clinic.  She was instead 
rushed immediately in an ambulance to the emergency room  
of a major hospital.  Her husband drove his car behind the 
ambulance, and when he arrived at the hospital he called 
several relatives and family friends to tell them about the 
situation.  At the hospital it was found that her appendix was 
in fact close to bursting, and she was quickly prepared for 
surgery.  Lynn remembers having her arms strapped to 
boards alongside the bed and having an IV started in a vein 
before she lost consciousness.  Her pregnancy and 
weakened state made the operation particularly difficult.  
During the operation her condition deteriorated and her heart 
arrested, which made the doctors call a RCode Blue.S
Lynn suddenly found herself still in the operating 
room, but this time floating above her body.  From her 
position, she could see and hear the doctors and nurses 
giving commands and then bringing paddles to jolt her now 
still heart.  However, Lynn did not feel any pain or sense of 
panic.  Instead she felt warm and protected, more of a 
spectator than a participant.  She found that she could move 
about freely, and proceeded to float through the wall and into 
the adjacent waiting room while the physicians feverishly 
worked on her now lifeless body.  

     When she reached the waiting room, she saw her 
mother, two aunts, and a friend looking very worried, but 
her husband was not there.  Unbeknownst to her, Ted had 
rushed from the waiting room into the hospital chapel when 
he heard the doctors yelling "Code Blue," and began praying 
for his wife's recovery.  Lynn floated out of the waiting 
room into  the corridor, and saw Ted leaving the chapel and 
running into two family  friends who were just arriving: 
James (a professional TV cameraman) and  Alan (an 
Episcopal priest). 

     In spite of the commotion around her, Lynn was 
very much at peace  in her rather bizarre state, and felt that 
she was being called to  proceed to another plane of 
existence.  However, she could sense that her husband 
needed her, and his prayers were somehow holding her in 
this world.  Although none of her family or friends seemed 
able to see her, she  instinctively "yelled" the words  "Ted, 
let me go!" but realized that  Ted could not hear her.  
However, Alan did seem to hear her, because he suddenly 
looked "spooked" and stared at her position, although it was 
clear from his look that he could not see her.  She again 
yelled "Ted, let me go!" two more times, and the third time 
Ted also heard her and thought he was being paged.  Ted ran 
to the reception desk and said that he had just been paged.  
The receptionist told him that he had not, and in fact was not 
even possible at the time because the thunderstorms had 
knocked out their  commercial power (which powered their 
paging system) and they were on  emergency power.
At that point Lynn saw what appeared to be a tunnel 
and was drawn to it, moving rapidly through it towards a 
distant point of light.  While she was going through the 
tunnel, still totally at peace, she was fascinated by the many 
beautiful colors that she could see going past her.  As Lynn 
approached the light it became intensely bright but  did not in 
any way hurt her "eyes."  In fact, she felt very much loved 
and accepted by this being of light, and when she 
approached him, she recognized him as Jesus Christ--not 
through a physical resemblance but rather through some kind 
of direct knowledge.  Christ took Lynn to a beautiful  place 
full of love and light which she knew was heaven.  While 
there, she  saw her deceased father, her deceased great 
grandmother, and a long-time friend since the first grade 
who had been killed in a car accident in 1971.  

     Lynn saw earth-like features in heaven, but  much 
more beautiful.  For example, the flowers seemed to glow 
brilliantly  with multiple beautiful colors.  Although she very 
much wanted to remain there, she looked at Christ and felt 
Him lovingly telling her that it was now time to go back.  
Like a little girl, she looked to her father to ask him why she 
had to go, because she felt so happy there.  Her father told 
her that it was not her  time, and then she heard Christ  
explain that her work was not yet finished on earth, and she 
had to return.

     Lynn hesitatingly agreed to return, and found herself 
back in the hospital room where she saw that the doctors 
were still trying to  resuscitate her.  She came back into her 
body, and immediately felt excruciating pain while the 
doctors kept up their resuscitation efforts. After a difficult 
and lengthy resuscitation effort Lynn was brought back and 
recovered.

     Three days later, Lynn delivered a healthy baby boy 
through natural childbirth and recovered fully.  After the 
baby was delivered, their priest friend Alan came to visit her 
and told her somewhat nervously that there was something 
he wanted to talk to her about.  Lynn sensed what he wanted 
to talk about and said, "Alan, the tie, handkerchief, and 
yellow shirt you  were wearing when I died did not match 
your maroon coat."  This was precisely what he had been 
wearing when he "heard" Lynn's voice in the corridor 
outside of the  hospital chapel while she was having her 
NDE -- which left Alan dumbfounded. 

     Although the individuals in this account are still 
alive, known to the authors, and of incontrovertible character 
and honesty, all such accounts nevertheless remain anecdotal 
until we all discover for ourselves if they are objectively 
true.  Lynn's account contains many of the themes which are 
now recognized as being normative in an NDE.  According 
to Dr. Moody, nine such themes have emerged from NDE 
experiences: (1) a sense of having died, (2) feelings of 
peace, (3) an out-of-body experience, (4) going  through a  
tunnel, (5) seeing beings of light, (6) being greeted by a 
particular being of light, (7) having an  instant review of 
their life, (8) returning in spite of a desire to not return, and 
(9) having a psychospiritual transformation after they return.  
Not all who experience an NDE  report all of the 
characteristics now recognized as being common  in such 
episodes (Lynn, for example, only experienced seven of the 
nine).  Nevertheless, it has been found by Dr. Moody and 
others that every  NDE percipient reported at  least one of the 
nine themes, and some reported many (a few all nine).
The life review (which Lynn did not experience) is  
said to  consist of vivid scenes from their life, which pass 
instantaneously and yet can be reviewed in detail -- as if the 
individual no longer exists in time.  They see both the good 
and the bad.  While they observe these  scenes from their 
own lives, NDE-ers can feel not only what their own  
emotions were at that time, but also the consequences of 
their acts on others whom they had either hurt or been hurt 
by, or to whom they had performed acts of love and 
kindness.   Some of these NDE percipients claim to receive 
knowledge of spiritual and scientific mysteries while they are 
in this state, although most of them forget this knowledge 
once they return.  They are usually given a choice to either 
remain  there or to return, and as is obvious from the fact 
that they  came back  to life, they all chose to return -- 
usually not for themselves, but for  the  sake of some loved 
one  for whom they cared.

     Of particular importance to this book is the nature of 
the "being of light"  towards which NDE percipients are 
drawn and their life review.  Although the percipients  
themselves say they felt either self-judgmental or happy as 
each of these events flash before them, the being of light is 
said to be non-judgmental and to express unconditional love, 
regardless of the moral quality of the scene being viewed by 
the percipient (even in the case of homicide).  We will return 
to  this thought.

     The comparisons drawn between the UFO abduction 
experience and NDEs by Dr. Ring and  others may at first 
appear tenuous.  However, there are at least three 
similarities:  the percipients enter an altered state of 
consciousness, they claim to communicate with  
metaphysical entities, and they return with a newly found 
sense of  mission.  In particular, many of the abductees and 
the NDE-ers return with a  mission to help the  environment 
and proclaim a "gospel" of universal  love, peace, and 
brotherhood.

     A recent Gallup poll estimates that as many as eleven 
million  Americans may have experienced  an NDE.  
Combined with the (arguably high) estimate of five million 
that have reported incidents that may be related to UFO 
abductions, we may now have a critical mass  of individuals 
ready to proclaim a new religion based not on faith but on 
personal experience.  

     NDE-er Dannion Brinkley mentions such a religion 
in his book "Saved by  the Light." (with foreword by Dr. 
Moody).  He claims that in 1975, while he was clinically 
dead, thirteen wise "beings of light" showed him a number 
of future earth events stretching  through the end of the 20th 
century and into the beginning of the next  century.  Unlike 
typical NDE percipients, Brinkley was able to return with 
this knowledge and even claims to have been given the 
power to read minds.  Among the events he was shown 
were the fall of the Soviet Union in 1989, the oil crisis, the 
Chernobyl disaster, and the Gulf War.  According to 
Brinkley, he was also told that there would be a series of 
environmental disasters which would usher in a new 
environmental religion.  Interestingly, one of Brinkley's 
prophecies is of a major nuclear disaster that will occur in a 
badly polluted northern sea in a part of the world that has 
fjords that reminded him of Norway.  This accident is to 
occur in 1995 and "could  spread radiation everywhere and 
affect all humankind."  In his foreword  to Brinkley's book, 
Dr. Moody states confirms that Brinkley told him about  
these events when he interviewed him in 1976.  He 
dismissed the prophesies  at the time, until he saw them 
coming true.

     With fantastic tales such as these, many in the UFO 
and NDE communities  appear to be joining hands, 
preaching a gospel of knowledge, of loving "space  
brothers" coming in UFOs to save mankind, or 
unconditionally loving "beings  of light" that warn us about 
coming disasters and greet us in the afterlife.   It is claimed 
that those who come back from an NDE have a deeper 
spirituality, but broaden their perspective to encompass all 
religions rather than the one they may have espoused before 
the NDE.  Spiritual centers are beginning to be set up by 
NDE researchers such as Dr. Moody.  Together with 
Dannion Brinkley, who is now his associate, Dr. Moody has 
established an "Aesculapian Temple" at his retirement home 
near Anniston, Alabama, dedicated to psychic healing, 
necromancy, past-lives regression, and other such things.  
Dr. Moody and other researchers are said to be attempting to 
produce near death-like experiences while they are still alive, 
through stimulated out-of-body episodes.  

     In his recent book "To Hell and Back," Dr. Maurice 
Rawlings states that Dr. Moody gives seminars on a method 
of Rthought travelS which he calls RscryingS with a process 
using mirrors and crystals.  In Faber, Virginia, out-of-body- 
experience (OOBE) researcher Robert Monroe has 
established the Monroe Institute, which teaches techniques 
for OOBEs to thousands.  His RWeekend GatewayS program 
is a tailored Rsystem of exercises and technologyS which is 
said to have Raided more than 10,000 participants.S  For 
those who can not attend the institute, Monroe even provides 
home study courses which include video and audio tapes.  
NDE pioneer Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, who according to 
Dr. Rawlings now claims to channel several spirits, used 
MonroeUs machinery and techniques to have her own OOBE.  
Monroe is said to have experimented with a mesmerizing 
Rtime machineS known as the M-5000 that allowed subjects 
to travel astrally from his Virginia home to Stanford 
University, Berkeley, or UC Davis, where notable 
parapsychologists such as Dr. Charles Tart assembled and 
verified through telephone calls that the astral traveler could 
accurately describe what they had seen.  It should be noted, 
however, that Dr. Tart and others claimed similar success 
with Uri Geller and a method they called Rremote viewingS 
in the 1970s, claims which were later shown by the National 
Research Council to be unsubstantiated.

     This is all very fascinating -- but is it credible?  
Given the deception and manipulation of UFO abduction 
victims that we have uncovered elsewhere in this book, is it 
possible that there might also be deception and manipulation 
brewing behind NDE percipients?

     First, let us state that regardless of the objective 
reality of UFO abductions and NDEs, it is clear that most 
percipients are themselves credible and believe that 
something phenomenal has happened to them.  Furthermore, 
a great number of NDEs, perhaps most, are very positive 
experiences that provide hope for the resuscitated as well as 
for their  loved ones.  Most NDEs  have a spiritual context 
that is consistent  with the personal beliefs of the percipient 
(with the possible exception  of atheists, who are faced with 
a bit of a contradiction).   As in the example of  Lynn, 
Christians have identified the "being of light" as Jesus 
Christ, and  some have even reported seeing the crucifixion 
wounds on His body.  Those of  other religions have 
reported the "being of light" as being a  religious  personage 
or angel revered within their own faith.  However, there is 
one bothersome question: since almost every religion in the 
world teaches that  there is not only a RheavenS but also a 
"hell" (MoslemUs Jahanna, HebrewUs Gehenna, Tibetan 
BuddhismUs eight cold hells, HinduismUs 21 hells to burn 
away bad karma, etc.), why do all of the NDE researchers 
seem to only report positive experiences an no negative 
ones?  Is it because there are no  negative experiences?  Or 
because percipients of  a negative experience do not return?  
Or is there something more sinister going on  -- perhaps 
some deception?  Before addressing these interesting 
questions, let us  return for the "rest of  the story" in the 
Lynn case described above, which will shed some light on 
this issue.

     As related earlier, as soon as Lynn returned to her 
body she found herself in the hospital bed in excruciating 
pain.   Amazingly, this made her leave her body once again, 
this time by a sheer force of her will!  After all, Lynn had 
tasted the happiness of heaven, so why should she remain in 
her miserable state?  This time, however, as she floated 
above her body she did not see any heavenly sights but just 
the opposite.  She saw darkness and heard deep howling and 
roaring noises, like the screaming of wild animals in a zoo.  
Instead of feelings of warmth and protection, she felt cold 
and lifeless.  She then looked at her body and saw the 
doctors and nurses removing tubes from it.  She realized  
that this time she was not going to see her father in heaven, 
but would  go in the opposite direction. This frightened her 
terribly, and she began  to plead with God to let her go back 
to heaven and away from her pain.   She could still see the 
tunnel faintly, but the light seemed very much  further away 
than the first time.  After her pleadings, she still did not go to 
the light but instead the light seemed to come towards her.  
As the light got closer, she found herself going back into her 
body and coming back to life.  The doctors noticed signs of 
life and immediately resumed their efforts, which led to a full 
recovery.  Three days later she went into labor and gave 
birth to a healthy baby boy.

     Here  we have a negative NDE, perhaps prompted by 
Lynn's wanting to be in charge of her own ultimate  destiny 
instead of accepting that it was not yet her time to leave.  
This particular episode also has  parallels with accounts of 
frightening entities reported by UFO abductees.  If incidents 
like these are not reported in  the NDE literature, one 
wonders  how many more negative cases might be.
In his 1993 book "To Hell and Back," Dr. Rawlings 
claims not only that  there are many negative experiences, 
but that such data may have been held back by some 
otherwise  reputable researchers.  Dr. Rawlings is in a very 
credible position to state his case -- he is a widely known 
and respected heart specialist who specialized in teaching 
methods for the retrieval of patients from sudden death.  In 
fact, he  was General Eisenhower's personal  physician 
before he became President.  Dr. Rawlings has himself  
brought many patients back from clinical death, and was 
present at the moment of clinical death and at the moment 
when they returned.  In  his experience, he has heard 
negative as well as positive accounts.

     According to Dr. Rawlings, there are two reasons 
why negative NDE's have not been reported by  researchers.  
The first reason is that such negative accounts are usually 
suppressed over time  by the normal human tendency to 
forget the negative and recall the  positive.  Since most NDE 
researchers are not there at the moment  that the patient is 
resuscitated, they do not hear the negative experiences.  The  
second reason is of vastly more concern -- the  nature of the 
"being of light."  Dr. Rawlings hypothesizes (from a  
Christian perspective) that the  "being of light" seen in some 
positive  NDEs might not be God or a holy personage, but 
instead Lucifer   (whose very name means "light-bearer) 
masquerading as an "angel of  light."  If so, what would be 
his purpose?  Perhaps to deceive percipients into accepting 
the false belief that death is always a positive experience, 
regardless of the kind of life the person has lived, with no 
need for repentance and salvation.  In the end  everyone will 
go to heaven and be accepted with unconditional love,  
regardless of what they have done or believed in this life.  In  
particular, this philosophy runs counter to traditional 
religious belief that salvation comes through some type of 
atonement -- from Christ's sacrifice on the Cross to 
HinduismUs teaching that salvation is not automatic, but 
relies on the accumulation of enough good "karma" to reach 
"Nirvana."  But now we seem to be witnessing the creation 
of a Rcheap graceS religion in which heaven is guaranteed.

     Those proclaiming the advent of a this new religion 
often rely on claims such as Brinkley's prophesies to bolster 
their claims.  However, while we have no proof that 
Brinkley has purposely deceived anyone (nor do we have 
proof of his claims), it is impossible to ignore the fact that 
Brinkley's book is published in 1994, when he obviously 
had knowledge of the events that he claimed to have received 
as prophesies from the beings of light.  What about the 1995 
nuclear disaster prediction, whose truth or falsity we will 
soon find out?  It does not take a lot of research into the 
environmental literature to realize that this is a fairly safe bet.  
The Barents Sea and the Kara Sea off Russia's northern 
coast (shared with Norway) are atomic disasters waiting to 
happen because of the dumping of nuclear waste by the 
Russians over the years.  In fact, on April 7, 1989, the 
nuclear submarine Komsomoletz sank a mile deep in the 
Barents Sea after a fire and explosions.   The Komsomoletz 
carries a nuclear reactor and two nuclear torpedoes armed 
with plutonium that might leak into the ocean and thus get 
into the food chain.   Although the likelihood of that 
happening has been debated heatedly, Alexey V. Yablokov, 
environmental adviser to Russian Federation President Boris 
Yeltsin, stated that he considers the Komsomoletz as the 
most threatening potential source of nuclear contamination.  
Based on examination of the wreck by submersibles in 1991 
and 1992, a commission headed by Yablokov reported in 
March 1993 that the plutonium could begin leaking by 1995. 
Brinkley was certainly in a position to have read these 
reports and extrapolate from them.  Regardless of the 
seriousness of any leakage, Brinkley is in a position to claim 
success.  As far as Dr. Moody's having received these 
prophecies as long ago as 1976, the burden of proof is on 
him.

     Let us not, however, become distracted by these 
accounts and lose sight of the larger issue - the impact on 
society of these new beliefs.  As Dr. Ring admits, many 
NDE'ers and UFO abductees return with a psychospiritual 
transformation that causes  them to proselytize in the name of 
ecology and universal love.  Although both of these are 
important and noble concepts (as the Komsomoletz case 
illustrates), there is a subtle underlying assumption that is 
not often  noted.   This is the assumption that traditional 
belief systems are bankrupt and that mankind's salvation will 
come from  "space brothers" and "beings of light" that come 
in the name of ecology and universal brotherhood -- even if 
some of their methods are repulsive (e.g. UFO abductions 
and negative NDEs) or free of moral concerns (such as the 
unconditionally loving beings of light).  Accounts such as 
Lynn's, in which her psychospiritual transformation led to a 
confirmation of her Christian beliefs and a deeper and more 
devout Christianity, are not given the same weight when 
models of such experiences are constructed.  In this sense, 
perhaps not only is there a  similarity between NDE's and 
UFO abductions, but between an element of manipulation 
and deceit behind both types of experience.  And the 
consequences on society may be far deeper than we realize.

