Calgarian Maureen Hason and her husband Rob were having a rocky time in their marriage in the early 1980s, and they decided to go on a weekend "marriage encounter" in the hope of improving their relationship. The theme of the last day of the retreat was unconditional love, and the advice given to the people attending the retreat was that they should try to love their spouses unconditionally, as God loves them. This advice struck her as difficult, impractical and even unfair, so she returned to her room to think about it. She sat quietly, contemplating the issue, when Jesus Christ suddenly appeared before her, dark and bearded, His face sad and His arms extended towards her in a gesture of compassion.

"He was clearly visible from the waist up," says Mrs. Hason. "But I could really only look at His eyes. His eyes looked right through me. He saw me, all of me, my entire pitiful character, but He looked at me with a love that cancelled any condemnation." Until then, Mrs. Hason had been a nominal Anglican, but at that point her faith became the centrepiece of her life. Ever since, she has asked herself, "Why me?" and her only answer has been the weakness of her faith. "Jesus doesn't give according to what we deserve," she suggests. "He gives according to what we need."

Maureen Hason's Christic experience is recounted in a new book, Visions of Jesus, by philosopher Phillip Wiebe of Trinity Western University in Langley. This book explores over 30 credible appearances of Christ among ordinary, contemporary Canadians and Americans. He compares these both to the scriptural accounts of Christ's post-Resurrection appearances and to the history of apparitions in the later church. In doing this, Prof. Wiebe gently challenges a persistent tendency in modern evangelical thought towards denying the possibility of bodily visits by Christ. He also inquires into the nature of these Christic apparitions and raises the intriguing possibility that such supernatural experiences are far more common than most people assume.

"According to Scripture itself, the Ascension certainly didn't put an end to Christ's presence on this earth," says Prof. Wiebe. "Most subsequent encounters are considered purely spiritual visions, not real encounters. But given what he says later, St. Paul's experience on the road to Damascus may have been a real presence. And Acts [23:11] says that Jesus 'stood at the side' of the imprisoned apostle to comfort him in his persecutions." In addition, he adds, the Book of the Revelation begins with a very concrete description of how Christ "laid His right hand" upon the prostrate John, who records the subsequent vision.

In I Corinthians 15:5-8, St. Paul records six encounters with the risen Christ after His tomb was found empty on Easter morning. "He appeared to Cephas [Peter], and after that, to the Eleven," he writes. "Then he was seen by more than 500 brethren at one time...he was seen by James, then by all the apostles. And last of all...he was seen by me." These biblical events share some similarities with the modern "Christic" visions and apparitions, says Prof. Wiebe. First, in both ancient and modern times, these extraordinary events are recounted with just the baldest details, as if their chroniclers were unconcerned about their historical credibility. Second, both the biblical and modern witnesses report doubting their experience while it was happening. Third, Jesus' physical appearance seems to change; yet these witnesses report no difficulty in identifying Him, usually because of the tremendous compassion in His eyes.

These days, Jesus appears variously with brown hair or blond hair, dark eyes or light, in white robes or suit and tie, sometimes speaking, sometimes silent. Compassion seems to be His only common identifier. However, when it comes to believing in the objective truth of these appearances, Prof. Wiebe points to criteria normally used in evaluating any sort of event. "First, both then and now, there are numerous experiences, far more than most people might expect," he says. "Second, many of these events are shared by a number of people at the same time, like the 500 on Paul's list." A half-dozen of his own modern examples were shared by two or more. "Third, they have small, puzzling details the witnesses themselves don't understand," he concludes. "That gives them the ring of a real, concrete event."

In Maureen Hason's case, in addition to a half-dozen purely private appearances, she has twice seen Jesus in the company of prayer partners. Once, He appeared behind the couch, arms outstretched, and her friend started shouting, "It's the Lord, it's the Lord!" Another time, during prayer in another friend's home, a hole appeared in the family room wall, fire flamed from the other side, Jesus walked through the fire into the room, and then vanished. "At first, I didn't say anything, and Cindy didn't say anything," she remembers. "But when she couldn't stand it anymore, she blurted out what she'd seen. And it matched what I'd seen perfectly." Yet Mrs. Hason has no idea why Jesus appeared in that manner.

When Pennsylvania native John Occhipinti, 49, was in Bible college, he shared his evening prayers with a chronically sick fellow student, Nathan. One night, he looked up to see Jesus (white-robed, long-haired and bearded) standing over his friend's bed. Nathan obviously saw nothing, but John was unable to speak. Jesus leaned over, touched the sick youth's forehead, and then vanished. Nathan, though still unseeing, felt the touch, leapt from his bed, and then ran up and down the dormitory hall, shouting, "I've been healed! I've been healed." Prof. Wiebe finds it "very peculiar" that one person should see this apparition, while another felt it; but he also argues that this peculiarity is evidence of its genuineness.

The Christian church has always been suspicious of visionary experiences, heeding Paul's warning that "even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light" (2 Corinthians 11:14). But some theologians, particularly evangelical Protestants, go from suspicion to scepticism, completely denying the possibility of bodily visitations to Earth by the Lord. "It's clear that people can be guided by the Holy Spirit," says theologian Darrel Bock of Texas's Dallas Seminary. "But there's no biblical warrant for supposing that Christ Himself has appeared on Earth since His Ascension. I'm inclined toward psychological explanations for these experiences."

The more austere Reformed theologians would agree. "Every Christian denomination insists that the revelation given the apostles is complete, that there's fundamentally no new doctrine about salvation, that God's direct revelation concludes in the canonical scriptures," says theologian Jonathan Gerstner of Knox Theological in Fort Lauderdale. "So it's far more likely that these experiences are either projections of a person's own mind, or demonic temptations. I don't doubt that such experiences can inflame devotion, like any pious dream. But they should be granted no greater authority in our lives than our dreams."

Against such scepticism, the witnesses themselves reply, first, that these events feel too "real" to be simply psychological, and second, that the result is no strange new gospel, but simply new devotion. Jim Link, now pastor of Spirit and Word Ministries in Keswick, Ont., had one such experience in late 1977. He, his wife and two other couples were gathered in his sister's kitchen for their regular Bible study. As 11 p.m. rolled around, they said a closing prayer and prepared to leave, when Mr. Link found he could not move.

"I was frozen, feet to the floor, hands to the tabletop," says Mr. Link. "When I looked up, all I could see was this face, a face from the forehead to the chin, with these penetrating eyes that saw everything about me. Yet they were filled with love and compassion." At least three times, Mr. Link looked away, for one or two minutes each time; but when he turned back, those eyes still stared. The others in the room knew only that something strange was happening. At 11:30, a worried Mrs. Link said, "We must go." He replied, "God won't let me." More worried, she threw his coat around his shoulders and pushed him toward the door.

"Halfway to the door, a wind hit me, lifted me off the floor, flipped me head over heels, and dropped me on my back on the kitchen floor," Mr. Link recounts. "Then the Lord's voice started interrogating me, over and over. Did I love Him? Would I give up my house for Him? Would I give up my car? The voice went through all my possessions, then it named all my children, one at a time. Then it asked, would I give up my wife for Him? Was I willing to be hated for His sake? Over and over—it was like the Lord was going through me with a scrub brush."

The others in the kitchen could hear Mr. Link's answers, but not the questions. When his brother-in-law tried to kneel beside him in prayer, a bright line appeared on the floor around him, preventing anyone from approaching him. Finally, around 3 a.m., the voice fell silent, the glowing line faded, and everyone went home. "I went to work the next day feeling great," he chuckles.

In Visions of Jesus, Prof. Wiebe distinguishes between imaginative "visions" or trances, which do not have a solid, bodily subject, and visual "appearances" or "apparitions," that seem to involve a normal human figure—if passing through walls or suddenly vanishing can be considered normal. Roughly eight of the 30-plus visions in the book are "trance-like" or insubstantial, like three of St. Paul's five. But the rest seemed to witness a solid, albeit "glorified," body. And that is a bone of contention, even among those who profess belief in Christ's bodily resurrection. For example, the liberal Jesuit theologian Karl Rahner (1904-84) argued that the glorified body of the risen Christ must be in Heaven with His Father, and that any appearances on Earth must either be mediated by angels or directly impressed upon the human imagination. However they occur, Fr. Rahner said, it is certain that they cannot occur just as a result of Christ's willing that His physical body simply be some place (or places).

"I call that intellectual imperialism," says philosopher Gary Colwell of Edmonton's Concordia College. "Imagine telling the creator of the universe and its laws what He can't do!" A Latin Father of the 5th century, Pope Leo I (the Great), argued precisely the opposite. (Leo is best remembered for persuading Attila the Hun not to attack Rome.) "Thus the Son of God enters this lowly world," he wrote in a letter. "He comes down from the throne of heaven, yet does not separate Himself from the Father's glory." Just as an author can be "two places at once"—written into his own book, and sitting at his desk writing it—Christ might manifest His body in the Resurrection and show it anywhere else He wants, says the professor, while remaining in His Father's glory.

Why would Christ want to show people His body? Peter Isaac, a retired English and geography teacher in Chilliwack, has some idea. In 1964, when Mr. Isaac was 44 years old, he was lying in the hospital with three-quarters of his stomach removed, and he was feeling sorry for himself. Suddenly, at the foot of the bed, he saw a man, dark but clean-shaven, smiling, with no shirt over his torso, and a broad, four-inch scar on his right side just below his rib cage. He was saying nothing, but was smiling sadly with love, understanding, forgiveness and reassurance. His wife, Lena, saw him staring toward the foot of the bed, "obviously transfixed," and suddenly he said that he had seen Jesus.

"I'd been lying there, wondering why Jesus hadn't healed me," says Mr. Isaac. "I'd experienced healing prayer a few years earlier, when I'd had some back trouble. So I was wondering why I hadn't been healed this time. Then, suddenly, there He was. He didn't say anything, He just stood there. But I understood. He could have healed me, but He wanted me to understand what He'd suffered."

University of Calgary religious studies professor Hugo Meynell believes that apparitions involving Christ's glorified body are not only possible, but may even be common. "[Theologian] Rahner really is taking a minimalist position on Christ's resurrection and the possibilities of His subsequent appearances," he says drily. "More minimal than may be compatible with remaining entirely Christian." The pervasive naturalism and technocratism of our age make it difficult for anyone to grasp the supernatural. "There is a ruling superstition...and it's hostile to the very possibility of the supernatural," says the professor. "So much of what is called rationality is just contempt for the common experience of common people when they open themselves up to God." Precisely because the ruling mindset denies the existence of the supernatural, it fails to see the supernatural surrounding it, Prof. Meynell concludes.

Trinity Western author Wiebe agrees. "I think these Christic visions or apparitions are far more common than people think," says the philosopher. The very fact that eight of his 30-plus examples come from within an hour's drive of his home in Langley suggests that they are very common. "All I did was advertise in religious periodicals, and they aren't widely read," he says. "I doubt I got any meaningful proportion of the people who have had a direct vision or apparition, even within the Lower Mainland."

Virtually all of the witnesses and commentators agree that their greatest confidence in these particular apparitions arises precisely because of the simplicity of the "message"—love and compassion for a particular individual, in a particular set of circumstances, that results simply in a more fervent fealty to Christ. "A demon wouldn't strengthen our faith in the Lord," argues Mr. Isaac's wife, Lena. However, though the world may be awash in supernatural experiences, all agree that not everything supernatural is good. The vast majority of Prof. Wiebe's witnesses have had only a single, inspiring experience of Jesus. But the half-dozen who have had repeated experiences have also all experienced demonic apparitions at some later point.

Since becoming a pastor, Mr. Link has often experienced the demonic, and he insists on the need to test any possible vision. "The first thing is, don't seek a vision and don't base your faith on one," he says. Mr. Link recalls the risen Christ's words to the doubting apostle Thomas: "You have believed because you have seen; blessed are they who have not seen, yet believe." He also offers a further warning. "If you base your faith on visions, you'll be opening up yourself to deception, simply because you want to. Check it out. If you're not sure it's from God, tell it, 'If you aren't from God, I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to be gone.'" The key, he advises, is caution. "Remember, if it's contrary to the Word, it's not of God."

That same note of caution about apparitions is shared by the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic traditions. Apparitions are not unknown among the Protestants. Salvation Army founder William Booth, for example, was propelled into his life's work when a vision of Jesus Christ rebuked him for his "nominal, useless, lazy, professing Christian life." But with their more integral notions of "church," the Catholic and Orthodox have tended to a more systematic study of this realm of human experience. Both traditions stress the foolishness of seeking visions and apparitions, and both stress the need to seek spiritual direction from an experienced pastor if one encounters them. From the earliest times, both traditions have learned caution regarding possible visions or apparitions of Christ that do not clearly manifest the five wounds of His passion and death.

But their styles do differ. The Catholic tradition has cultivated the expectation of the "Sacred Heart" as a common symbol of Christ's love and compassion. (As Protestant witnesses have observed, Christ presents Himself in appearances congenial to His observers.) And for their part, the Orthodox seem to stress the spiritual mayhem that can result when the demonic disguises itself as divine.

The Catholic devotion to the symbol of Christ's Sacred Heart was first promoted by St. Gertrude in the 13th century. The observance won recognition from the whole church with the apparitions to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque (1690). And its most recent, clear manifestation is the "Vision of Divine Mercy" entrusted to the Polish nun Sister Faustina in 1931. In the Vision of Divine Mercy, Sister Faustina was shown two light rays, one white and one red, proceeding from the heart of Jesus. When she asked the Lord what these meant, He said that they represented the water and blood that flowed from His side on Calvary, the one cleansing mercy, and the other saving love.

A favourite cautionary lesson of the Orthodox church is the story of St. Isaac of the Kiev Caves, who saw a great light and one he thought was Christ appearing before him. St. Isaac bowed down before the apparition without first making a protective sign of the cross. But because he was mistaken as to the identity of his visitor, demons gained power over him, and danced him about in a frenzy for many hours, leaving him all but dead. Chastened by the results of his rashness, St. Isaac went on to cultivate a more cautious sanctity.

—Joe Woodard

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