Are Babies Really Close to Heaven?

It is said that babies are close to heaven because they have recently joined us here... from there.  I believe this to be true because I have found it to be true.   When my oldest son was just about one and a half, I heard him up from a nap babbling in his crib.  I stealthily creeped down the hallway just so I could sneak a peek of him through the crack in the door.  What I saw was him sitting up in his crib, looking up as if to someone, and speaking very clearly. I heard him say, "Okay God, I will."  I have to admit, it kind of freaked me out - especially since I had never heard him speak so clearly before.  I went into his room, he turned to look at me, and his face changed.  He was happy to see me, but it was if he "snapped out of it."  I asked him who he was talking to and he said he didn't know.

Several years ago, I was walking my second son to sleep as I always did at every nap and every bedtime.  I have a mirror on the wall with an engraved image of Mary in it.  I had passed that mirror with him countless times already, but at that moment, he lifted his head from my shoulder.  He looked at the mirror and said, "Oh, hi Miriam."  I had never pointed out that mirror to him, nor had I ever said it was a picture of Mary.

When my third son was about two, he saw a picture of Jesus and said, "Look Mom, it's God."  My baby girl is now about a year and a half, and last week she saw a picture of a girl angel.  She pointed at it and said, "Mary".  She said it with the sweetest voice and cocked her head to the side.  She kept saying it over and over - like she was pointing to a picture of an old dear friend.  I swear I couldn't make these stories up.  They happened.

Our babies are closer to heaven than we know.  I have often held my babies close while they sleep and stared at them.  I think, "What exactly do you know?  How little credit we must give you." Our babies know who their true Father and Mother are.  They know about Jesus and the angels.  I wonder what each of my babies has come here to teach me and our family.  It is important that we watch our babies and listen.  We would do well to mirror their innocence.   If you wonder what heaven is like, you might just get a little closer to a little one.  The answers might be as close as looking into the eyes of a baby and listening.