Blog | Jakob Berr Photography

Joseph Snow, 78, is suffering from COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), an incurable, progressive lung disease that causes severe breathing difficulties. After several trips to the emergency room and a severe pneumonia that he only barely survived, Joe’s doctor told him that it was time to go on hospice, a recommendation that is usually given to patients with a life expectancy of less than six months. That was in June, 2008. Since then, thanks mainly to the competent and compassionate care he received from his hospice nurses, Joe’s condition has improved dramatically. Today, despite his still terminal condition, Joe is enjoying every minute of his life together with his wife Pat and their family. Besides their love, the great force that keeps him going is his unswerving faith. As one of Jehovah’s Witnesses, Joe believes that after his death he is going to be resurrected into a cleansed earth. “I have no desire to go to heaven. I don’t know what I would do if I went to heaven,” he says. “This is where I belong – on the earth. I don’t belong in heaven.”