What We Know of Heaven by Gregory Ritter
Jesus’ earliest words about the afterlife and the reports of people who have experienced a near death-experience (NDE) have remarkable similarities. This book examines both. Dutch Cardiologist Pim van Lommel estimates from arandom poll in the U.S. and Germany that about 9 million people in the U.S., about 20 million people in Europe, and about 2 million people in the U.K. have had an NDE. Most of these people have been hesitant to share their experiences until recently for fear of disbelief or even ridicule.
About the Book
With clear language and inspiring personal stories, Gregory Ritter’s new book will bring most readers a joyous new perspective —and hope -- about death and dying.
What We Know of Heaven delves into the words of Jesus, near-death experiences of hospital patients brought back to life, and the “nearing-death” testimony of people in hospice care- all coupled with scientific research.
Clearly relishing his topic, Ritter, a retired Presbyterian minister, delves into the possibility that “Heaven is not as we imagine it to be,” that there may be cause for all of us to rejoice in a Heaven of indescribable bliss, beyond time and space and petty human turmoil.
The similarity of these descriptions seems to indicate that the world’s religions may have captured only part of the story about what is to come. Perhaps our previous descriptions are limited by our finite human experience on Earth.
This is a book that you likely will share with people you love. Almost certainly, you will read it more than once.
--Warren Wolfe, retired journalist at the Minneapolis Star Tribune, writing about aging, death and dying, medical care and religion.
Why People Give by Gregory Ritter
“I can’t ask people for money. Ask me to do anything else, but I can’t ask people for money.”
This book is dedicated to the community volunteers, nonprofit Board members, members of stewardship committees, members of associations trying to recruit new members, and non-profit staff expected to perform miracles, who found the courage to own up to these words.
Some of them have gone on to become superb fundraisers and recruiters, once they have learned the ingredients of effective asking.
About the Book
A different person should be writing this book, but he never will. When I asked my mentor Robert E. Nelson (from a Chicago consulting firm of the same name) why he never became an author, he replied, “Hell no! What if I change my mind about something?”
Now that my own tenure in development practice has passed its 40th year, I feel confident I will not be changing my mind any time soon about the insights I am about to share. They have been gleaned from thousands of campaigns, both failed and successful, from the time of Benjamin Franklin on, and from the efforts to systemize the development process that began in Colonial America at Harvard University. See Appendix A: How We Learned Why People Give.
These insights will help you to encourage others to act on their own best impulses to give of their time, money, or both, for the benefit of others. I thought I would have a leg up in development as a Presbyterian minister, until Robert Nelson squinted at me, took a long drag on his cigarette, which he held between his thumb and forefinger, palm toward himself, and intoned, “now Greg, this ‘ministerial background’ of yours is going to be a problem, but we’ll make a normal person of you yet.”
As for why people give, when I would ask my class at the University of St. Thomas (Minneapolis) why they themselves give, we would fill the whiteboard with their answers, ranging from “tax purposes,” to “I feel obligated” or “I want to be on the honor roll,” etc. “These are the trees…” I would say as we looked at the long list of reasons. “But the forest is that people give because they are asked.” Good asking, using the right words in the right sequence is at the heart of successful fundraising. The chapters of this book focus upon helping you to develop your most effective way of asking.