Passport from Pandemic to Paradise by Marian Casillas, Ed.D.
Dulce DeLaVida has died and finds she is standing in front
of the Pearly Gates. Soon Saint Peter arrives and methodically instructs her,
“All you have to do now is show me your vaccination passport.”
Dulce looks at Saint Peter and incredulously inquires, “I
thought what I needed would be my Salvation passport, not a vaccination
passport to get into Heaven. You of all people should know because you were the
first Pope; that being saved by God, with grace, through faith would get us
into Paradise.”
Saint Peter retorts, “That’s old school, all the rules have
been changed since the Pandemic occurred on earth. Now all that is required is
your vaccination passport. It is your “stay out of Hell” credential and your “get
out of Purgatory” permit, so that you can enter Heaven immediately and once in
there you can go wherever you want to go. As soon as your vaccination passport
has been processed and accepted, you get to collect your heavenly stimulus
check, and then you can go on a spending spree. You know there are all these mansions
in heaven and with your stimulus check you can upgrade to a bigger and more
beautiful mansion.”
Dulce responds, “But I thought this would be different when
I died.”
Saint Peter lets out a great big sigh, “That’s what
everybody says when they get here. Now
where’s your vaccination passport.”
Dulce sadly replies, “I don’t have one.”
Saint Peter laments and proceeds to lecture Dulce, “You had
ample chances to get vaccinated, so there is no excuse. We sent lots of people
to tell you that you needed to get vaccinated. We opened up lots of vaccination
sites. There were plenty of advertisements extolling the virtues of getting
vaccinated. But apparently you just wouldn’t listen. And we had several other
great offers that you also missed out on. We had a special offer during the
Pandemic that once you got your vaccine you could do the right thing and love
your neighbor by convincing them to also get vaccinated; and for every person
you got vaccinated a poor soul in Purgatory would be automatically released at
go to Heaven. Look at what extraordinary offers you missed out on by not
getting vaccinated. Not only would you go to Heaven, but all those you
convinced to get vaccinated would go to heaven and also you would free some
poor souls suffering in Purgatory. You can’t beat that!”
Dulce perplexingly counters with, “That’s not how it works. That’s not how any
of this works. You have it all wrong. You don’t understand.”
Saint Peter judgmentally sentences her, “Dulce you are
hereby condemned to hell where there is a special place reserved for all the
anti-vaxxers, all the vaccine hesitant and all those who don’t care about
killing others.”
A great cloud of the heavenly host majestically descends upon
her and they push her out of the Pearly Gates and she finds herself falling into
the great abyss below.
Dulce suddenly wakes up, shaken and stunned.
“Thank God that was only a bad nightmare” she thinks to
herself, “I must remember to stop eating pepperoni pizza before I go to sleep
because that always causes me to have bad dreams. Also I must cut back on my
time spent on social media, it’s all propaganda brainwashing me to get the
vaccine.”
Dulce can’t sleep so she reaches for her Rosary always to be
found on her nightstand. She gets about half way through praying the Rosary and
her eyelids start to flutter, “Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners,
now and at the hour of our death. Amen.” She drifts off to sleep, “O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us
from the fires of hell, lead all souls to heaven . . .”
Her Guardian Angel whispers into her ear, “Sweet dreams dear
Dulce!”
Marian Casillas, Ed.D.
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