I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The Rev. Roberts has a subtle humour and his account of how traditional Welsh villages handled death gives a lovely insight in a type of society which is passing, if not already gone. his warmth and humanity are very apparent.
He came to his beliefs by the experience of working with a medium. As he says, the Bible gives little information on the afterlife and leaves priests who deal with the bereaved with 'not a lot' to say. He does not believe in the eternal damnation of the sinful or non-believers and can back this up with information derived from his conversations with spirits. He told his parishioners what he had had gathered from his contacts (some of which supplied information which checked out, so not just imagination)and it is a more hopeful account than delivered by some clergy. The message he preaches is that we are still ourselves in the afterlife and continue to grow whatever religion, or none, we had followed when physically alive. To some Christians this is heresy because they believe people are only 'saved' by believing in Christ as a sort of scapegoat for all the sins of Humanity. I think Roberts sees it differently. it is a message of hope.
But people continue to be people on the 'other side'. he gives an account of one spiritual contact which supplied him with information which he could confirm until he got to the last part where he found, or thought he found, that he had been duped by the communicator and reminds us that things are never simple.
