The John-Henry Westen Show - November 09, 2022


Dead for 2 hours, Man Returns Having Seen ＂Glorious White Light＂


Summary

What if a person dies for 2 hours, comes back, and talks about having met God? Well, we ve got one of those with us today. His name is Paul Zuccarelli, and he s the author of the book, "The Interior Voice" which details a near-death experience he had with God.


Transcript

00:00:00.000 And when I get to heaven, this white light fully envelops me, and I fall down in spirit.
00:00:06.940 I did not have a resurrected body, but I knew where I was.
00:00:10.780 There's total silence.
00:00:12.260 I didn't have a body.
00:00:14.220 We communicated spiritually.
00:00:16.240 I knew who he was, and he knew me, the creator and the creation.
00:00:21.940 And I just kept praising him and thanking him.
00:00:24.320 I said, I'm here.
00:00:25.420 I always wanted to be the least in the kingdom.
00:00:27.260 There's no time there.
00:00:28.320 There's total silence.
00:00:31.460 I was home.
00:00:33.580 If I had put one word to describe where I was, I was home.
00:00:38.460 You know, near-death experiences are all the rage.
00:00:42.380 The secular media talks about it.
00:00:43.760 They love finding these cases.
00:00:45.180 They talk about them.
00:00:46.780 But it's mostly from self-accounts and, you know, did it really happen?
00:00:52.560 Sometimes, though, it happens with the whole medical team there.
00:00:56.660 Imagine if it happened, not once, but multiple times.
00:01:01.440 We have a whole medical team, so it's all documented.
00:01:04.700 And not only that, what if the person dies for two hours and still comes back?
00:01:09.900 What if a person dies for two hours, comes back, and talks about having met God?
00:01:15.200 Well, we've got one of those with us today.
00:01:18.700 His name is Paul Zuccarelli.
00:01:20.580 This is the John Henry Weston Show.
00:01:22.460 Stay tuned.
00:01:22.920 Paul, so good to be with you and with you, Beth.
00:01:51.720 Pleasure, John Henry.
00:01:53.520 Let's begin, as we always do, with the sign of the cross.
00:01:55.500 In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.
00:02:00.140 Amen.
00:02:00.760 Paul, if you wouldn't mind, please tell us your story.
00:02:03.200 It's so fascinating what you've already told me, and I'd love for everyone to hear it.
00:02:06.800 I was basically a lukewarm Catholic.
00:02:10.160 Caught between Vatican I, Vatican II.
00:02:12.180 Very poorly catechized.
00:02:13.480 Born in 1959.
00:02:15.340 Clueless.
00:02:16.080 You know, I was told to go to church or you go to hell.
00:02:18.160 The old guilt trip.
00:02:18.940 So, basically, I love the Bible, though.
00:02:23.560 I had an affinity for the Bible.
00:02:25.740 And I remember as a kid, people would ask me, you know, who's the greatest person that
00:02:28.840 ever lived?
00:02:29.200 And I would always say Jesus Christ.
00:02:30.360 And my mother had a miraculous healing when I was about 10 or 11, and she had terminal
00:02:37.600 cancer.
00:02:38.620 And she was not Catholic.
00:02:40.680 She's Protestant.
00:02:41.600 Dad was Catholic.
00:02:42.260 And she went to a Catholic prayer service with women praying over her for healing.
00:02:48.300 She came home.
00:02:49.060 She said she felt energy go through her.
00:02:50.600 And she lived.
00:02:51.440 She was 41 at the time.
00:02:52.780 She lived to 83 and didn't have cancer.
00:02:54.260 And I took that healing for granted until what happened to me.
00:02:58.940 So, I'm living my life very successful in the world.
00:03:02.860 The Lord gave me a good intellect of reason.
00:03:05.600 I was very data-driven.
00:03:07.020 I had to have data to make decisions.
00:03:09.220 So, I became a businessman.
00:03:11.100 And we had married my childhood sweetheart here.
00:03:14.160 I had lost my crucifix, which you'll hear about.
00:03:17.160 She bought me another one.
00:03:18.120 But we ended up coming out to Arizona and had two children, two boys.
00:03:23.440 And life was great.
00:03:24.400 I mean, I had it all as far as the world was concerned.
00:03:27.600 You know, houses, cars, country clubs, friends, wealth.
00:03:33.160 And the more I got into the world, the more my spiritual life was, you know, faltering.
00:03:39.660 Although I read the Bible, I didn't practice my faith all in, if you will.
00:03:47.320 So, my mitral valve was leaking in my heart.
00:03:50.620 And it began to leak severely.
00:03:53.100 And I'd have all these symptoms.
00:03:54.420 And I went to the doctor on December 8th of 2016, down in Tucson, where I live.
00:03:59.560 And the doctor said, you know, your valve's leaking in your heart, but you'll die of something else.
00:04:03.600 Don't worry about it.
00:04:04.280 Here's medicine for this symptom, medicine for that symptom.
00:04:06.960 And I got in the car after that appointment, knowing that I was not feeling really well.
00:04:12.520 And I received my first locution.
00:04:14.340 And I didn't know what a locution was until I read St. Teresa of Avila's book, The Interior Castle.
00:04:18.800 What is a locution, just so that everybody knows?
00:04:21.220 Locution is an interior voice where the Lord speaks to you.
00:04:23.760 And to me, it's the Holy Spirit.
00:04:24.900 We're living in the final age.
00:04:26.560 And this voice just says, it wasn't audible.
00:04:29.260 It was just right in, like, your mind is blank.
00:04:31.720 And someone speaks right into it.
00:04:33.760 And the Lord said to me, get to the Mayo Clinic now.
00:04:37.260 It's the valve.
00:04:38.280 It's your valve.
00:04:38.820 And so I call the Mayo Clinic, and they said, we have one appointment left before the end of the year.
00:04:44.280 Get up here.
00:04:45.380 And they ran some tests, and they said, you're in mitral valve failure.
00:04:49.220 You're in heart failure.
00:04:50.760 Your valve's leaking so bad.
00:04:53.460 You have to go to the surgeon.
00:04:55.540 So I go to the surgeon, and he basically says to me that I have to replace it.
00:04:59.460 Your valve's shot.
00:05:00.380 He shows me the picture, and I said, it's not what I wanted to hear, doctor, today.
00:05:03.620 Total stranger, John Henry.
00:05:05.520 And I remember my mother, pray over the blood of the cross.
00:05:08.360 One drop of the blood of the cross can heal the world.
00:05:10.880 And I look at this stranger, and this was not Paul.
00:05:14.020 And I said, may I have your hands, please?
00:05:16.880 He said, what?
00:05:18.080 I said, I need to pray over your hands.
00:05:20.240 I said, Lord, you brought me to this man.
00:05:21.860 He's a total stranger in my life.
00:05:23.240 Grant him the patience and the precision in his fingers, the gift you gave him of healing
00:05:27.100 to repair my valve.
00:05:28.820 In Christ's name, amen.
00:05:30.660 So I go home, and I'm getting ready for the surgery, and Beth sees me really troubled,
00:05:35.380 because as I'm reading the word preparing for surgery, the Lord kept telling me, I suffered
00:05:40.920 for you.
00:05:41.360 You'll suffer for me, but I'll be with you.
00:05:43.880 Over and over.
00:05:45.160 And I am not a mental case.
00:05:48.080 This is hard for me, because I'm an intellectual.
00:05:50.040 And I told Beth, there's something going to happen to me.
00:05:54.200 There's something.
00:05:54.960 I may die.
00:05:56.100 Stop it.
00:05:56.580 You're perfectly healthy.
00:05:57.360 They do this all the time at Mailbox.
00:05:58.440 I said, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
00:06:00.560 I'm being prepared for something.
00:06:02.760 So as I prepare for the surgery, Beth sees me in trouble, struggling.
00:06:08.600 God, who wants to suffer, right?
00:06:10.880 But I finally got it, John.
00:06:12.220 And he was born to die.
00:06:14.720 Christ, my only way is through my own death.
00:06:19.540 And if I don't embrace the crucifix as my own autobiography, it's a rejection of Christ.
00:06:26.640 I have to go through this.
00:06:29.040 So Beth buys me this crucifix three days before surgery, seeing me troubled, and says, take
00:06:34.920 him with you for comfort, Paul, please.
00:06:38.280 Thank you.
00:06:39.500 I'll share with you and your audience where this ends up, in Bishop Olmstead's hands.
00:06:43.340 So we end up going in for surgery.
00:06:45.500 I said, Romans 5, 3 through 5, beautiful prayer for me.
00:06:48.760 Rejoice in your sufferings, endurance, perseverance, hope.
00:06:52.840 So I go in for surgery, and I survive.
00:06:55.980 And the doctor says, hey, I was in there five hours.
00:06:58.120 I repaired your valve.
00:06:58.900 You're good to go.
00:06:59.460 You'll be out in five days.
00:07:00.460 The Lord had a different plan for me.
00:07:02.920 The next day was Saturday, June 3, 2017.
00:07:06.120 And at 2.10 p.m., I died.
00:07:08.120 Reminds me of Ephesians 2.10.
00:07:09.480 And I die.
00:07:12.820 Cardiac arrest.
00:07:13.940 Beth's out having lunch with our sons, and my sister's at the foot of the bed.
00:07:18.300 And she starts praying over me.
00:07:20.380 No weapon formed against Paul shall prevail.
00:07:22.840 He began a good work, and Paul shall complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.
00:07:26.240 Then she said the fourth cup of a little prayer.
00:07:27.900 She had no idea what she prayed.
00:07:30.000 Paul shall not die but live to proclaim the deeds of the Lord.
00:07:33.480 Chastise him severely, but don't turn him over to death.
00:07:35.720 So, John Henry, when I die on Saturday, my soul separates from my body.
00:07:43.660 And I look down on the teams working on me.
00:07:45.800 It was total peace.
00:07:47.840 Recognize the body.
00:07:49.780 And then all of a sudden, this glorious white light comes.
00:07:52.160 Some people say it's a tunnel.
00:07:53.740 This is a brilliant white light.
00:07:55.340 It's brighter than the sun.
00:07:56.760 It would burn your sockets of your eyes.
00:07:59.620 And the light just beckons and takes me.
00:08:02.560 What I'm going to share with your audience is metaphysical,
00:08:05.040 and I don't think anyone has the intellect to describe God in heaven, but I'll try.
00:08:10.600 I couldn't tell whether I was moving forward into the light or the light was pulling me.
00:08:15.220 It was like absorption.
00:08:16.620 I'll use that term.
00:08:18.060 And I go straight up.
00:08:21.260 And when I get to heaven, this white light fully envelops me.
00:08:26.500 And I fall down in spirit.
00:08:28.360 I did not have a resurrected body.
00:08:29.680 But I knew where I was.
00:08:32.180 There's total silence.
00:08:33.660 I didn't have a body.
00:08:35.620 We communicated spiritually.
00:08:37.640 I knew who he was.
00:08:39.080 And he knew me.
00:08:40.900 The creator and the creation.
00:08:43.320 And I just kept praising him and thanking him.
00:08:45.720 I said, I'm here.
00:08:46.840 I always wanted to be the least in the kingdom.
00:08:48.660 There's no time there.
00:08:50.660 There's total silence.
00:08:51.780 I was home.
00:08:54.720 If I had put one word to describe where I was, I was home.
00:08:59.320 Then the Lord showed me my past and my conscience.
00:09:02.480 Everything I did, back to when I was a child, that harmed him, that he took offense with.
00:09:10.400 I wasn't judged.
00:09:12.560 But he showed me.
00:09:13.420 And he said, you have to go back.
00:09:15.600 Next thing I know, my eyes pop open.
00:09:17.220 And I look up, and the doctors are screaming at me, and I describe everything they did to me while they were working on me.
00:09:23.820 And they said it was an anomaly.
00:09:25.320 You died.
00:09:26.400 But we got you back.
00:09:29.140 Well, if the Lord wasn't done, the tumult had just begun.
00:09:31.820 The next day was Pentecost Sunday, June 4, 2017, at 8.49 a.m. at Pentecost.
00:09:36.900 I died again.
00:09:39.140 This time, the medical teams can't get me back.
00:09:42.140 I have eight cardiac arrests.
00:09:44.040 My lovely wife and our children had to watch this.
00:09:47.220 My whole family had to watch this from 10 feet away.
00:09:49.740 And they're electrocuting me and paddling me.
00:09:53.760 Finally, they get the chaplain ahead of the ICU, and they said, we're sorry.
00:09:57.440 What he has is fatal.
00:10:00.100 There's Purkinje nerve damage in his ventricle from the surgery.
00:10:03.180 They're not firing.
00:10:04.240 He has no electrical in his heart.
00:10:07.180 Upon hearing that, I said, Dr. Shervatsen's here.
00:10:09.600 He's the head of the electrophysiology department at Mayo.
00:10:11.400 Your husband has no electrical.
00:10:14.960 We're done.
00:10:15.620 The ICU teams, the crash teams, there's nothing more we can do.
00:10:18.340 If he wants to do something, enter the Holy Spirit, John Henry.
00:10:22.500 The Lord moves our 34-year-old son, Michael, at the time, our oldest son,
00:10:27.000 to go in my room, take the last thing he has left of dad, the cross.
00:10:32.960 It's hanging on the bedpost, the Mayo.
00:10:36.300 The Lord tells him, thank God he listened to the Lord.
00:10:38.820 The Lord said, take the cross, get to St. Paul's Church now, leave.
00:10:45.100 Beth's trying not to have him go anywhere because he's in trauma.
00:10:47.720 Dad's dead.
00:10:49.100 Takes the cross, and he walks out the hospital, and he drives to St. Paul's Church.
00:10:53.760 He gets there.
00:10:54.400 He didn't know where it was.
00:10:55.520 He walks in.
00:10:56.200 He thinks it's a priest.
00:10:58.880 It's Bishop Olmstead.
00:11:00.600 There's only four and a half million people in Phoenix.
00:11:02.820 The Lord connects two people on Pentecost Sunday.
00:11:06.580 You can't make this up.
00:11:08.880 Walks in, waits for Mass to be over.
00:11:12.520 Bishop Olmstead had chrism on his hands.
00:11:15.600 And Michael runs up to him, falls in his feet, and lifts up the cross and says,
00:11:18.960 please, save my father's life.
00:11:20.840 He's a good man.
00:11:22.500 Please, help him.
00:11:25.180 Pray for him.
00:11:26.900 Bishop Olmstead later told Beth and I, I have never seen an act of faith like that.
00:11:30.540 I clutched your crucifix, Paul, and I felt suffering.
00:11:36.580 And I prayed as hard as I could.
00:11:39.640 And I went back to my private chapel, and I prayed all afternoon into the evening into my vespers
00:11:43.940 for an anointing of the Spirit to heal you in the name of Jesus Christ.
00:11:50.140 And Michael said this complete peace came over him, that whether Dad was dead or whether Dad was going to live,
00:11:57.460 he was at peace.
00:11:58.480 You know, to me, it reminded me when I heard the story of the Roman centurion to say the word healing.
00:12:04.840 And it's one of the few miracles, as you know, that Jesus wasn't present with the man.
00:12:09.320 You know, what did he say to his apostles?
00:12:11.400 I've not seen faith like this in all of Israel.
00:12:14.700 So we know that John writes eloquently that God is light.
00:12:20.080 You know, I'm the light of the world, or 1 John 1 5.
00:12:22.740 John writes, what he declared to us, we proclaim to you, God is light.
00:12:27.220 While they're praying, the Lord sent a man that day, the electrophysiologist at Mayo.
00:12:33.520 He came in and he said, look, there's no treatment for your husband.
00:12:37.300 He sewed a generator in the side of my neck while the people are praying.
00:12:40.620 And he runs a wire down my juggler into my atrium to try to beat my heart with an external generator.
00:12:46.960 Goes up underneath my clavicle and my brainstem.
00:12:50.480 And the ganglion nerve, your autonomous bodily function nerve, when you sleep, you breathe, and your heart beats.
00:12:55.320 He anesthetizes it and kills me.
00:12:57.360 But he showed me my chart.
00:13:00.000 And he said, I want you to read this.
00:13:02.840 Right here, I cannot proceed with interrogating the wire in your atrium to beat your heart because you don't have a heartbeat.
00:13:08.520 I can't test the wire before I kill the nerve at your brain.
00:13:12.460 Right here, you're going to the morgue.
00:13:14.700 The next sentence in my chart, John Henry, praise be Jesus Christ.
00:13:18.460 Says, patient's heart spontaneously returns to sinus rhythm.
00:13:23.780 And we're looking around.
00:13:24.940 Your heart came back by itself.
00:13:26.060 We tested the wire.
00:13:27.860 I killed you.
00:13:28.980 It is exactly when Bishop Olmsted and our son, Michael, were praying.
00:13:33.160 Because everything's timed at Mayo on the clock.
00:13:36.040 Michael had his son.
00:13:38.000 So here we are.
00:13:39.640 A miracle occurred on Pentecost.
00:13:42.360 And the president of the American College of Neurosurgeons read my book and said,
00:13:45.920 I need to meet this electrophysiology cardiologist because what he did to you is a neurosurgeon's procedure.
00:13:51.580 And only the top 1% of neurosurgeons in the world would ever attempt a left stellate ganglion nerve block of the brainstem, which is what he did to you.
00:14:01.840 Who trained him?
00:14:02.760 So I asked Dr. Shcherbatsen, the EP, and he said, tell him I'm not a neurosurgeon.
00:14:09.520 No one trained me.
00:14:10.940 I read about it.
00:14:12.020 As I told you, when I came in that day, Paul, there was no treatment for you.
00:14:15.420 What I did to you is not treatment.
00:14:16.920 I just rested your heart.
00:14:19.380 That's all.
00:14:20.060 Here I am.
00:14:20.660 Praise be Jesus.
00:14:21.140 Two days later, I'm up walking around, John Henry.
00:14:22.840 And they told my wife, look, in two days, we wean him out of the cone.
00:14:26.360 We shut the wire off.
00:14:27.840 If his heart stops again, we leave the man.
00:14:29.580 He's dead.
00:14:30.300 But if he lives, be prepared for a man who's going to be brain damaged because I was dead for approximately two hours on Sunday in Pentecost.
00:14:38.320 So two days later, I'm up walking around praying over people, a new creation.
00:14:41.980 I mean, and literally, I quit the world.
00:14:44.160 I just quit everything.
00:14:45.480 I've seen and tasted.
00:14:46.780 But you're more blessed than I am.
00:14:48.060 You know, Jesus said in John chapter 20, blessed are you, haven't seen and believed.
00:14:53.100 You know, Archbishop Corteleone was kind enough to visit us.
00:14:56.220 And we showed him the medical records.
00:14:58.600 And I didn't realize his training as a theologian.
00:15:01.080 And he asked me all these questions.
00:15:02.700 And he said, everything you said is in conformity with the Catholic Church's teaching.
00:15:06.520 Bishop Olmsted is one of very few bishops.
00:15:09.920 He's, he wouldn't like to hear this, but he's a holy man.
00:15:14.080 And I had the privilege of meeting him personally once, just a very holy man who has struggled, as have so many faithful bishops, to, you know, do the right thing.
00:15:26.820 And what a, what a guy.
00:15:29.080 What a beautiful, beautiful story.
00:15:31.520 He was a stranger.
00:15:32.300 We've never met him.
00:15:32.980 We've become very, very good friends.
00:15:35.200 People have told me to go get the medical records at Mayo.
00:15:38.440 And I said, well, why?
00:15:39.680 It was, you know, something happened.
00:15:42.100 And he said, he said, you know, Paul, Bishop Olmsted, you're not the only one, priests have told me, where Bishop Olmsted's intervened.
00:15:51.060 And there's been incredible healings.
00:15:52.980 I agree with you.
00:15:53.820 The man's a saint.
00:15:56.880 Just a quick note before we return.
00:15:58.900 If you would like to stay up to date on LifeSite's coverage of the latest life, family, and culture news, subscribe to one of our many newsletters by going to lifesitenews.com slash subscribe.
00:16:08.780 And if you'd like to help us bring our truth-telling coverage to millions around the world, please consider making a one-time or monthly donation at give.lifesitenews.com.
00:16:19.320 And now, back to the video.
00:16:22.840 Well, I want to ask you, Beth, what your role was in all this as you were going through this and watching this.
00:16:29.400 How did it affect you and what happened with you?
00:16:31.940 Prior to the surgery, I would witness my husband sitting in his chair reading his Bible, which he always did.
00:16:38.080 But he's crying.
00:16:39.980 He's suffering.
00:16:40.980 And I had no clue what was going on.
00:16:42.800 I thought it was anxiety over the upcoming open-heart surgery.
00:16:47.000 But he never shared with me these locutions he was having.
00:16:50.580 So I'm just watching my husband cry and being very anxious about an upcoming surgery.
00:16:56.620 And so that's when I went out and I bought that crucifix for him.
00:16:59.940 I said, you know, he used to wear one when we were dating, when we were in high school.
00:17:05.160 And I thought, well, you know, maybe it'll give him peace.
00:17:08.360 Maybe it'll give him some kind of comfort.
00:17:10.240 So I just, I thought it was just, okay, just go buy him a crucifix.
00:17:14.280 Well, I think that was the Holy Spirit telling me to go do that.
00:17:16.980 And so I did that.
00:17:20.220 Well, that weekend when he had his cardiac arrest, I was not there on the Saturday.
00:17:27.200 I was out to lunch with our younger son, David.
00:17:29.620 And his sister was there because we were taking time turns being with him.
00:17:33.520 But my sister-in-law had texted me that said that Paul coded.
00:17:36.760 So my son dropped me off at the front door.
00:17:38.880 By the time I got up to ICU, they had already cardioverted him and he was, he was back.
00:17:45.040 So I did not have to witness anything.
00:17:46.940 And I told my sons, I said, you know, I'm not going to, I was staying in a hotel that's
00:17:51.560 right there in front of the Mayo Clinic.
00:17:53.380 And I said, I'm not going to go back to the hotel.
00:17:55.660 I'm going to spend the night in ICU with Paul.
00:17:58.100 I'm not leaving.
00:17:59.300 And I told the whole family that.
00:18:00.920 So they brought in one of those recliners and I spent the night with Paul in ICU.
00:18:06.000 And I asked my son, David, to stay in the hotel room so that he could come back in the
00:18:12.340 morning and be with me when the doctors did their rounds so that I had that extra set of
00:18:17.000 ears when the doctors told me what happened yesterday, you know, the day before.
00:18:21.680 So David agreed.
00:18:23.460 And so the next morning on Pentecost Sunday, it was myself and David and his sister.
00:18:32.720 And we were at the foot of the bed.
00:18:35.140 We're talking to him.
00:18:36.260 We're having just normal conversations.
00:18:39.280 When all of a sudden his eyes rolled back in his head and he had a cardiac arrest.
00:18:45.720 The alarms go off, the crash teams come in and I see my sister-in-law and she had already
00:18:52.680 witnessed this the day before.
00:18:54.380 So I told her that, you know, just go out in the waiting room, just go pray, Donna.
00:18:58.640 We'll stay here with Paul.
00:19:00.060 So David and I stepped out.
00:19:02.580 We watched.
00:19:04.340 And my son, David, was my rock.
00:19:07.140 As I'm watching my husband get cardioverted many times, going in and out of cardiac arrests,
00:19:13.640 my son, David, sat there and watched all the telemetry.
00:19:15.960 And he kept saying, mom, mom, they've got him back.
00:19:20.180 They got him back.
00:19:21.780 They got him back.
00:19:22.880 They got him back.
00:19:24.500 Well, sometime between the second and third cardiac arrest, I said to David, please make
00:19:30.940 sure, text your brother, make sure he gets here.
00:19:34.300 Because I didn't think my older son, Michael, was ever going to see dad alive again.
00:19:40.780 So he was actually on his way because he actually lived in the Phoenix area.
00:19:45.280 And within minutes, he came through the IC room doors.
00:19:49.940 And I told him, go to the head of the bed, tell dad you're here.
00:19:54.460 So he did.
00:19:55.980 He walked up to the head of the bed and he said, dad, I'm here.
00:20:00.900 I love you.
00:20:01.540 And right there in front of Michael, Paul had a cardiac arrest.
00:20:06.920 There's my 34-year-old son.
00:20:09.280 He's in complete trauma.
00:20:11.700 He's shaking.
00:20:12.740 He couldn't even stand up.
00:20:15.520 So I bring him out of the room and the three of us are huddled together and we continue to
00:20:19.800 watch this for another 40 minutes.
00:20:22.360 And I could tell by the looks on the doctor's faces that the news that they were going to
00:20:26.960 tell me was not good.
00:20:28.380 I knew things were not going well.
00:20:29.860 So they came out and Dr.
00:20:32.980 Shervatsen said that they were going, he was going to take him downstairs to the cath lab
00:20:36.460 and he was going to try something.
00:20:38.380 Of course, all the medical terms I didn't understand.
00:20:41.160 I signed forms and they took Paul away.
00:20:45.780 That's when Michael went back in the room and he grabbed that crucifix.
00:20:49.620 I saw him go back in the room, but I never knew why he did what he got.
00:20:54.580 I thought he went in for his water bottle or his backpack, but he got that crucifix and
00:21:00.200 he never told me.
00:21:01.500 So we're in the elevator on the way down to the lobby and he looks at me and he says,
00:21:08.820 mom, I need to find a church.
00:21:11.100 And I said, where do you think you're going?
00:21:13.540 I said, you're in no condition to drive.
00:21:15.340 I'm in no condition to drive.
00:21:17.540 I said, we'll go downstairs.
00:21:18.900 We'll play in the chapel.
00:21:20.820 He says, no, mom.
00:21:22.140 And I will never forget the look in his eyes.
00:21:24.740 He looked at me and he said, mom, I need to find a church.
00:21:28.600 I knew there was no stopping him.
00:21:33.140 I walked my son to the front doors of the Mayo Clinic and I watched him walk across the
00:21:38.440 parking lot and I looked up to God and I said, God, he's in your hands.
00:21:43.820 I can't protect him anymore.
00:21:46.740 So he left 20 minutes later, I actually called his wife and asked where he was.
00:21:51.360 And she said that he was sitting in a church somewhere.
00:21:54.700 And I said, praise God.
00:21:56.020 He got to where he needed to go.
00:21:57.360 I had no clue where he went and he never shared it with me.
00:22:00.940 He comes back and everything's fine.
00:22:03.300 Paul has the procedure done.
00:22:04.620 He's back in ICU.
00:22:05.700 And I spent the night in ICU with him on Sunday night again.
00:22:09.640 Well, then on Monday, the doctors told me that, you know, what they did and explained everything.
00:22:16.200 And he was re-intubated.
00:22:18.280 So he couldn't talk.
00:22:19.900 But at this point, they told me they didn't know what kind of neurological damage he was
00:22:22.900 going to have because of his multiple cardiac arrests.
00:22:25.140 So we just, the family was around him and we were waiting.
00:22:31.360 And eventually, they started weaning him off the anesthetic and all of the drugs he was on.
00:22:36.860 And he came out.
00:22:39.460 And so he seemed fine.
00:22:42.200 He was talking to us, answering the staff's questions.
00:22:44.920 And he seemed fine.
00:22:46.760 So I asked my son, David, I said, David, I haven't been back to the emergency.
00:22:51.100 I haven't been back to the hospital or back to the hotel room in two and a half days.
00:22:55.700 I'm going to go and I'm going to just take a quick shower.
00:23:00.520 And he said, no problem, mom.
00:23:02.020 Go and rest.
00:23:02.620 You haven't been sleeping in two days.
00:23:05.120 So I went over to the hotel room and I walked in that room.
00:23:08.520 And it's the first time I was alone since all this happened.
00:23:12.700 And all you women out there, all you moms out there, you know, you cry differently when you're alone.
00:23:16.700 I walked in that room and I just broke down and I just cried out to God.
00:23:24.060 I said, God, what is happening to my family?
00:23:26.460 What is going to happen to my family?
00:23:29.820 And I continued to cry and I continued to pray.
00:23:33.140 Before long, I went into the bedroom and I just threw myself on the bed just out of pure exhaustion.
00:23:39.660 The last thing I remember was this instantaneous thought of my son, David.
00:23:44.720 And there was an image of a black cell phone and on the cell phone was this message and it said, come back.
00:23:51.840 The next thing that happened to me was I felt this wind go through me, right through my core.
00:23:59.820 And I was out.
00:24:01.900 I woke up about 40 minutes later.
00:24:05.340 And being a Catholic school girl for 12 years, those nuns taught me about the Holy Spirit.
00:24:11.600 And I woke up and I'm thinking, was that the Holy Spirit?
00:24:16.280 I felt this wind.
00:24:17.560 Was that the Holy Spirit?
00:24:19.000 I woke up in complete peace.
00:24:21.420 I felt like I had rested for three days and I knew everything was going to be okay.
00:24:27.200 I never told anybody.
00:24:28.480 I think I told Paul like a day or two later and I had no clue what had happened to me.
00:24:33.000 So when we decided to move up to Phoenix and we met some good and holy priests, the Franciscan friars of the Holy Spirit, they helped me discern it.
00:24:42.620 And one of the priests said to me, after I told him my story, he said, yes, Beth, that was the Holy Spirit.
00:24:51.640 He came to give you peace.
00:24:53.540 And I said, I believe that.
00:24:55.080 I truly do believe that.
00:24:56.220 I said, but please help me make sure that I've discerned what was with the phone and what was with our son, David.
00:25:02.140 I want to make sure I've discerned that properly.
00:25:04.060 And he says to me, Beth, the Lord knows your prayers.
00:25:10.060 Now, if there was any a time prior to Paul's surgery that I was praying and I was crying, it was for my son, David.
00:25:18.280 He had fallen away from the church.
00:25:19.840 He was not practicing his faith anymore.
00:25:22.260 And I had cried fervently for him to come back.
00:25:25.100 So I know the Lord was hearing my prayers and he heard them because our son, David, is in the church.
00:25:30.160 He's back in the church.
00:25:31.400 Your son, Michael, a beautiful story with Bishop Olmstead there.
00:25:35.840 How's he doing right now?
00:25:37.300 He's doing very well.
00:25:38.520 He's on fire for the Lord.
00:25:40.360 And he's all in on the Latin Mass.
00:25:42.780 Doing Latin Mass.
00:25:43.640 That's what he's all going back to tradition.
00:25:47.240 That's where he finds depth in his faith.
00:25:50.060 Life is very different for you now.
00:25:51.900 You said you've left the world of finance and you were CEO of company.
00:25:56.600 You did walk away from all that?
00:25:59.040 Yeah, people think I'm certifiably nuts.
00:26:00.680 I had so many business acquaintances and friends and, you know, winning entrepreneurial fellow awards all over.
00:26:08.620 Now, people, I don't have very many friends left in the world.
00:26:12.540 They said, oh, you heard about Paul.
00:26:13.980 He's become a Jesus freak.
00:26:15.320 Well, that's a badge of honor.
00:26:18.160 You know, what I realized is they didn't love me or like me.
00:26:21.720 They liked my position of power, what I could do for them.
00:26:24.840 That was a very, very poignant learning lesson for me.
00:26:27.440 Now that I can't do anything for them.
00:26:30.040 But some big Catholic evangelists have said, you know what I really love about your story and your book?
00:26:35.340 Bishop Olmsted, by the way, wrote the forward to the book.
00:26:38.280 Said, every Christian can learn there's a living Jesus Christ in you and amongst us.
00:26:44.560 So what's interesting is, with me, is the walking away from the world, they said, you know, Paul, you never talk about what you did.
00:26:56.920 Said, it's irrelevant.
00:26:58.980 I had an I love me room with all my awards.
00:27:01.660 It is meaningless.
00:27:02.700 The only thing that matters is the salvation of my soul.
00:27:06.580 I didn't want to come back, John Henry.
00:27:08.580 I believe what happened to me was necessary for my own salvation, my family, and anyone else.
00:27:13.060 Because what's on my heart is the last two lines of the book of James.
00:27:16.720 If anyone that's you and me and everyone else can bring one person back to Christ, we'll not only cover over a multitude of our own sins, we'll save our own souls.
00:27:25.920 So what I try to do now is do what I can.
00:27:30.300 But again, people say, I look at what you did.
00:27:32.800 You could have done this the rest of your life and made a ton of money with very little effort.
00:27:37.580 Why don't you ever?
00:27:38.340 It's irrelevant.
00:27:40.140 I made a covenant with God that I wanted to be a beacon of light to many.
00:27:44.200 He answered my prayers.
00:27:45.820 I have to be faithful to my covenant.
00:27:48.640 This world is passing away.
00:27:50.680 And being so much in it, I became independent, which is a form of self-sufficiency, which is a form of pride.
00:28:00.060 And God gave me two things, my existence and my free will.
00:28:03.720 My own free will, John Henry, was getting in the way of a closer personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
00:28:10.800 Because if a major client wanted to go golfing at my fancy country club on Sunday because he wasn't Catholic, I would do that.
00:28:18.900 Again, I was the lukewarm Catholic.
00:28:23.680 What did Jesus say in Revelation 3?
00:28:26.080 So you say you're rich and affluent and have no need of anyone, yet you are poor, wretched, pitiable, and blind.
00:28:32.020 Repent and return.
00:28:33.620 Paul, how can people get your book?
00:28:35.440 What's it called?
00:28:36.440 And where is it best to get it?
00:28:38.680 It's called Faith Understood, An Ordinary Man's Journey to the Presence of God.
00:28:43.720 It's on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, anywhere.
00:28:45.460 It's on our website.
00:28:46.720 Our website's www.faithunderstood.org.
00:28:51.320 It's a nonprofit.
00:28:52.300 I couldn't take a dime.
00:28:53.600 We donate all the proceeds of the book and any speaking fees to the evangelization of Christ in the church.
00:28:59.500 So www.faithunderstood.org.
00:29:01.860 You can watch The Witness.
00:29:03.660 And if you'd like, anyone who's listening to your show, John Henry, we go everywhere.
00:29:08.140 We're leaving on a couple days to Pittsburgh and Steubenville to give our witness all week.
00:29:14.280 We just go where the Holy Spirit opens doors.
00:29:16.580 We give our witness.
00:29:17.320 We help people.
00:29:18.200 Because what's hope?
00:29:19.340 To me, you can't have faith unless you have to have faith in order to have hope in a dark world.
00:29:25.220 Hope is an acronym, hearing other people's experiences.
00:29:28.340 Absolutely.
00:29:29.740 As the world is fairly dark right now, not only in the secular world, also even in the church with so much consternation.
00:29:40.600 What's your message to the faithful right now?
00:29:43.280 Your conversion story is so stark, so powerful, particularly your encounter with the risen Lord, with God himself.
00:29:52.380 How do you see, with the eyes that you've been sort of renewed with, what we're currently going through and how people should survive it?
00:30:02.620 Whatever's happening in the church and in the secular world, God is allowing it for his glory.
00:30:08.200 Once we accept that as individuals that we're just creatures, God's allowing it.
00:30:14.080 Everything's working for his glory.
00:30:15.820 And I know some people on the far extreme will go right to the Cateacon and Thessalonians and get deep in it.
00:30:22.380 Other people are simply trying to figure out how to survive in this church right now.
00:30:27.620 So we have these two extremes going on.
00:30:30.280 And I would really encourage your audience to stay focused on the crucifix, on the cross.
00:30:38.200 Everything is answered there.
00:30:40.820 Everything.
00:30:41.860 We will all suffer, even if we're suffering inside the church.
00:30:46.180 But our only way home is through the cross of Jesus Christ.
00:30:50.560 So I meditate on the cross.
00:30:52.380 One of the things that has touched my heart that I shared with Bishop Olmstead, and he said to me, I love that.
00:30:58.120 I love that scripture.
00:30:59.780 It's the book of Sirach 736.
00:31:02.320 And he writes,
00:31:04.120 In all you do, remember your last days, and you will never sin.
00:31:10.160 Think about that, John Henry.
00:31:11.840 It doesn't say may not sin, might not sin, shall not sin, because everything's gray now, right?
00:31:16.180 In our church and in our world.
00:31:18.360 You will never sin.
00:31:19.360 If you and I knew we were going to die tonight or tomorrow, trust me.
00:31:23.760 You would walk in on eggshells trying to live in a state of grace.
00:31:27.060 So that's what I encourage people, because they look over here and look what this is doing.
00:31:31.240 Look, I said, focus on your salvation of your soul and that of your family.
00:31:35.800 And then one soul at a time.
00:31:38.060 It's got to happen at a grassroots level.
00:31:40.180 One soul at a time.
00:31:41.840 Paul Zacharelli, thank you so much for being with us.
00:31:44.000 Beth, thank you as well.
00:31:45.140 God bless you, John Henry.
00:31:46.080 Thank you, John Henry.
00:31:47.280 God bless you.
00:31:48.460 And God bless all of you.
00:31:50.700 And we'll see you next time.
00:31:53.900 Hi, everyone.
00:31:54.400 This is John Henry Weston.
00:31:55.540 We hope you enjoyed this video.
00:31:57.520 And to see more like this, be sure to hit the subscribe button below to get all the latest content from LifeSite News.
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00:32:15.340 Thanks for watching and may God bless you.