In March, 2003, we lost our youngest son, Max, in a horrific house fire. The day before the fire, I was watching Max shooting basketball, so I went and joined him. He suddenly stopped, looked towards the house, and said, "Look, Dad. There's Nana." [That's what he called my mother who had passed away several years before.]

When I looked, I saw a beautiful red bird on the kitchen window sill. It stayed for a while, and then a smaller baby-like red bird landed beside the larger one. Then the birds took flight together, did a spiral-like maneuver and flew up and away.

Shortly after his burial, his mother and I were having a very difficult moment. We were trying to find a place to live. We were outside, and just a few feet away a baby red bird landed in a mud puddle. I started really crying when a larger one joined the baby bird. I told his mother about the moment shared with Max just before his death, and she started sobbing and telling me that this beautiful big red bird had been coming to her kitchen window for about a week. It wouldn't move even while she worked at the sink and washed dishes. I told her about Max calling it Nana and about the baby red bird joining the bigger one. We truly believe it is a messenger from heaven. We have regular visits from them.

But a wild twist to the story is this. I told my father about this just before he passed away a couple of years later and I asked him if he got to heaven before me to prove that my red bird story was true. He became very ill and we took him to my sister's house to receive hospice care. I told my red bird story to my sister, but she thought I was imagining things.

Anyway, my father's time was drawing near, so my sister and I left Dad with my niece while we make his final arrangements. As we walked down the sidewalk, a large red bird landed just a foot or two in front of us. My sister looked at me and we laughed. When we arrived back at the house later, we walked into the den where his hospital bed had been set up. My niece was sound asleep on the couch beside Dad's bed. I looked at Dad and saw that he had passed away while we were gone. My sister ran to the bathroom sobbing, and then I heard her yell, "Come here, oh yes Jesus, come here now!"

I rushed into the bathroom and she was pointing at the window and crying and laughing at the same time. I looked and there, sitting on a tree limb which was almost touching the window, was an adult red bird, looking in as if he had something to tell us. And now my sister is also a believer in God's little messengers of comfort.

Cass Casto

Posted Jan. 16, 2011