Miracles of the Gods: A New Look at the Supernatural (413 page)

conceivable, even though not yet proved. But could converted forms of the energy of dead people perhaps be involved? That supposition is not so absurd as it may seem; if anything it is a logical continuation of the 'energy principle' into virtually virgin territory. If all forms of energy are convertible into one another - one of the few completely accepted and indisputable laws of nature! -

the conscious energies of dead people must also be convertible.

For thousands of years we knew nothing about what happened to consciousness after death, apart from vague philosophical and religious speculations. (The 'soul' goes up to heaven. Thus immortality was already ascribed to the consciousness = soul!) Modern research is on the point of carefully removing the dark cloths which were spread over a supposedly inexplicable mystery, and what it has already brought to light appears to show that the consciousness (ergo, conscious energy) of the dead is by no means 'dead'! Might the conscious energies of dead people have been active during the 'host miracle' at Carabandal on the night of 18th July, 1962, when a host-like object materialized on the tongue of the girl Conchita? What stage has the exploitation of these phenomena reached today?

Suspended animation occurs when the breath stops owing to paralysis of the breathing centre (asphyxia), in myocardial infarctions, in injuries resulting from accidents (traumas), in poisoning and after convulsions, etc. As Jean-Baptiste Dala-court[7] says, everyone who recovers from suspended animation testifies that during their temporary stay in 'the other world' they retained consciousness of a quite different kind from their 'living' consciousness. The other world is perceived as timeless, as a world of oscillations, harmonies and colours, as a world in which countless consciousnesses communicate with each other, carry on conversations with each other and, although incorporeal and without sensory organs, can see other people and swap memories with them. Everyone who has come back from the 'other side' has found their abrupt return to the harsh cold facts of mortal life burdensome and repugnant. Everything was so infinitely more beautiful 'over there'.

Doctors say that such descriptions by resuscitated persons are irrelevant and worthless as statements about 'another world', because levels of consciousness continue to function in the brains of those in suspended animation and dredge up into their consciousness illusory pictures of a fairy-tale world from the deeper brain levels.

If the doctors are right, I find it a terrifying idea. There am I down below in my wooden box; insects and worms are thriving on my flesh and my deeper brain levels are still active. How unpleasant! Who knows how long they stay active? Until the moment when conscious energies have been converted?

Thank heaven that would happen more quickly with a genuine death than in cases of suspended animation.

But what about the conscious energies of people who have been dead for many long years?

***

This phenomenon fascinated the critical parapsychologist Dr. Constantin Raudive, born in Latvia in