Sudden Death

Light to the Living and Lessons from the Dead

ACCOUNT NUMBER 168.

Once again, a dead man appeared to me, calling me by name, saying that he hadn’t come to frighten me, but to ask me to commend him to God, that he was Don N, doing penance in Purgatory. In his hand he carried a ball of fire, and his dry tongue protruded from his mouth. I asked: Why are you there? He answered: For the sins of ball-playing and partaking of cold refreshment. He made a reverence to the cross and disappeared, saying: Jesus be with you.

JUAN DE PALAFOX Y MENDOZA, Archbishop and Viceroy of New Spain, 1661