I have two things in reaction to the back and forth about the appearance of a
"spiritual apparition" appearing and the child being snatched from the jaws of
death. As a matter of background, I was a Navy hospital corpsman for 5 years
and saw all sorts of unusual and unexpected events revolving around "miraculous
recoveries" and unexpected deaths -- both unexplained. I have been a
practicing clinician trained in CBT, RET, the new and improved RBT, and the
much maligned EMDR (among several other modalities of therapy) for 35 years,
and have dealt with death and grieving issues for much of that time as well.
So...
1) I couldn't see this mother ever seeking help since there is no problem in
her life. I doubt Ellis himself (God rest his soul - TIC)) would see her as
having a problem that interferes with her day to day life, so why would she
bother. Besides, she has a picture of the angel who came and had resolved that
it was the angel of death or the angel of life, and that was that (except for
the normal process of grief if the child had died - for which they were
apparently prepared since the decision was made to remove the life support).
2) In regard to the picture, the story reports that it was seen on the security
camera (which should have been recorded and saved) and that the picture the
mother took of the "angel" was taken from the security tape.
So, what is to be said except that there is no evidence either way and this
does become one of life's mysteries for which there is no explanation and for
which an experiment cannot be performed to attempt to explain what happened.
You believe what you believe in these matters. Just this past semester someone
in my class raised a situation similar to this and asked me what I thought of
it. I said that I had no answer to explain what had happened, but said that if
there were a God, that it is unlikely that He or She was a micro-manager. That
got me 5 very angry emails from students. But then again, retirement is near.
>
Bob Wildblood, PhD, HSPP
Lecturer in Psychology
Indiana University Kokomo
Kokomo, IN 46904-9003
[email protected], [email protected]
We have an obligation and a responsibility to be investing in our students and
our schools. We must make sure that people who have the grades, the desire and
the will, but not the money, can still get the best education possible.
- Barack Obama
We have in fact, two kinds of morality, side by side: one which we preach, but
do not practice, and another which we practice, but seldom preach. -Bertrand
Russell, philosopher, mathematician, author, Nobel laureate (1872-1970)
The race of men, while sheep in credulity, are wolves for conformity. -Carl Van
Doren, professor, writer, and critic (1885-1950)
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