Are there modern cases (1900 - present) of heavenly visitations recognized and endorsed by a denomination?

score:9

Accepted answer

About the experience

At the outset, denominations would not automatically say that these experiences have no value to the people who experience them, but that they should be careful on how to interpret them. They would agree with numerous case studies where these near-death or mystical experience have a positive impact on their life journeys, which often turn them around toward God.

So let's say we ourselves or people we trust (like family members) have this "out of body experience". Critical thinking people will ask themselves:

  • Is this my imagination, since it's a given in psychological research how mind can play tricks on us?
  • Based on field reports in cross cultural and cross religion settings, can this experience be contaminated by some projection of existing beliefs that the mind does to make sense of the underlying (potentially stressful) bodily experience (if this happens in hospital / accidents)?
  • Even after ruling out the above, can demons have a role? Why should I assume this experience is facilitated by God?
  • Even if God allows this experience, what is the basis that my experience should be a norm for others, other than the message that God wants to give me personally for my own faith journey? Did God tell me to preach the content of my experience or did God restrict me (as in 2 Cor 12:4) to share my renewed faith by focusing on God as represented in the Bible only?
  • If God wants to give this experience to others, isn't better that God "tailor-made" the images, sensations, insights, specific evoked memories, people I met, etc. to match another person?

About what Paul taught

Note carefully how Paul himself framed this person's experience, who could have been himself speaking in the third person for rhetorical effect / literary convention. Paul intended, and the church agreed, that this letter is doctrinal, not simply a report like what we read in a book by people who on the surface may have similar experience.

Being doctrinal, we need to read Paul's framing in 2 Cor 12:1-10 as follows:

  • Paul said "there is nothing to be gained by it" (v. 1) but he just wanted to do counter-boasting (v. 6) to temper the Corinthian church members' tendency to value this experience higher than they should, either to give them a higher spiritual status, or worse, an additional revelation in addition to Paul's apostolic teaching.
  • Why to Paul this tendency was dangerous? I believe Paul anticipated the later Gnostic heresy which teaches that a person is spiritually more advanced ("enlightened") when the person has more "spiritual" experiences like this, experiences they consider as containing higher authority, or at least on the same level as the NT, by calling these "knowledge" (gnosis) just how for us Bible is "knowledge" since they are certified revelation by God to us.
  • In contrast, Paul said it's foolish to boast about these experiences. He wanted the Corinthians to imitate him (1 Cor 11:1), to do as he did:
    • to boast "of [his] weaknesses" (v. 5)
    • though he desires to boast he would not be a fool by doing so (v. 6a)
    • instead he "would be speaking the truth ... so that no one may think more of [Paul] than [what] he sees in [Paul] or hears from [Paul] (v. 6b) especially since Paul was forbidden to share the content (v. 4)

Answering your question: typical denomination response

Before answering, the immediate counter question is "recognized and endorsed by a denomination for what purpose"?

If your answer is "to give us something authoritative about what heaven looks like or what we can expect in the afterlife" then the answer is NO, because for all 3 mainstream branches, teaching of this sort (matters of salvation) is solely based on what God wants to reveal to the whole church via the Holy Spirit guidance:

  • For Protestants, even in the extremely small chance that a council or a church declares that someone's experience (which I think has to be vetted case by case) can be used as source of theology, they appeal to sola scriptura that this experience has lesser authority than scriptures, which taught what Paul taught as described above: "there is nothing to be gained by it."

  • For Eastern Orthodox, they highly recommend careful investigation as NDE tends to be morphed into New Age teaching which can be "one element of the emerging religion of Antichrist". The standard to be used is "Scripture, the Patristic writings, and Holy Tradition concerning death and the afterlife." (source: 1995 article from Orthodox Life Vol. 45 No. 4 pp. 16-31, The "Near-Death Experience" by David Ritchie).

  • For Catholics, the Church will need to investigate whether the experience/apparition really comes from God and secondly to assess (on a case by case basis) whether it is of value to the church as a whole. If approved by the church, these should be considered as "private revelations":

    ... she declares only that there is nothing in them contrary faith or good morals, and that they may be read without danger or even with profit; no obligation is thereby imposed on the faithful to believe them

    The Wikipedia has a list of private revelations approved by the Catholic Church which since 1900 include:

    Please visit each approval document and the related wikipedia articles above to read the "framing": how each apparition is interpreted by the Church and what messages can be discerned from each.

I believe Tim Challies speaks for how a Protestant denomination would comment about a person's claimed experience of heaven in his 2012 article Heaven Tourism responding to a spate of books by people who reported their out of body experience:

In the first place, we have no reason to believe or expect that God will work in this way–that he will call one of us to the afterlife and then send us back to our old bodies. The Bible says that it is for man to die once and then to experience the resurrection. ...

In the second place, the very idea of God calling a person to heaven and back and then having that person share his experience in order to bolster our faith is the exact opposite of what the Lord desires for us. We have no reason to look to another person’s experience of heaven in order to prove that heaven is real or hell is real. The Bible promises blessings on those who do not see and yet believe. ...

A question remains: How do I respond to a Christian who has read these books and who finds great joy or comfort in them? You point that person to what is true. You will need to be careful with tone and timing, but ultimately, it will be a blessing for any Christian to direct his faith to the worthy object of faith. Faith will be strengthened by reading the Bible and believing it. Faith will be weakened by reading the Bible and believing it only after reading 90 Minutes in Heaven. You can serve any Christian by directing him to the Bible and helping him to see that we are called to believe God on the basis of what he says in his Word, not on the basis of another person’s experience. 90 Minutes in Heaven and Heaven Is For Real and all the rest are not books that beautify the doctrine of heaven, but books that attack the doctrine of Scripture. The Bible insists that it is enough, that it is sufficient, that we have no need for further special revelation from God; these books insist that it is not.

Upvote:3

If this was an account of Paul's own experience, then he kept quiet about it (at least in epistular form) . . . . for fourteen years.

Presumably, such persons as are suited to such experiences are, likewise, discrete about talking about such things.

And even then, Paul says that what was heard is not to be uttered.

Thus I cannot see that such events, should they recur, would be well publicised.

Upvote:4

The Fatima visionaries had a vision of hell in 1917, but not as far as I remember, of heaven.

You can read about the apparitions in detail here on fatima.org

St. Faustina in 1936 had a vision of Heaven too. https://www.churchpop.com/2016/10/23/the-secrets-of-heaven-revealed-to-st-faustina/

All this should have the regular "private revelation" disclaimer as until the second coming, it's all going to be private revelation. But at least this is not quashed by the Catholic Church. i.e. It's OK, but not mandatory to believe.

Upvote:9

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has several cases of heavenly visitations that are recognized and endorsed, but only one comes to mind that is after 1900 (doesn't explicitly state heavenly visitation):

D&C 138

A vision given to President Joseph F. Smith in Salt Lake City, Utah, on October 3, 1918. In his opening address at the 89th Semiannual General Conference of the Church, on October 4, 1918, President Smith declared that he had received several divine communications during the previous months. One of these, concerning the Savior’s visit to the spirits of the dead while His body was in the tomb, President Smith had received the previous day. It was written immediately following the close of the conference. On October 31, 1918, it was submitted to the counselors in the First Presidency, the Council of the Twelve, and the Patriarch, and it was unanimously accepted by them.

As revelation is a core belief there may future visitations that are officially recognized.

The scriptures tell of different types of revelation, such as visions, dreams, and visitations by angels. Through such channels, the Lord has restored His gospel in the latter days and revealed many truths. However, most revelations to leaders and members of the Church come through the whisperings of the Holy Ghost.

This also means that other revelation received and presented, by the prophet may have been from visitation by angels, but the means by which revelation was received is rarely communicated (from what I have seen/read).

all emphasis mine

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