Anthony DeStefano has never been to heaven, but he's written a travel guide for those who hope to get there.

Executive director of Priests for Life, DeStefano embarked on a 10-city tour at the end of October to promote his new book, A Travel Guide to Heaven.

DeStefano spoke with Register staff writer Tim Drake from Long Island, N.Y., about the book.

Tell me about your family growing up.

I'm the oldest of five children. There are four boys and one girl. I've lived in New York all my life. We grew up in Brooklyn and later moved to Staten Island, N.Y. When I got married I moved to Long Island. My father was an accountant and my mother was a homemaker.

Have you always been Catholic?

Yes, but my family wasn't particularly fervent or devout. My parents were down-to-earth, skeptical people with a lot of respect and loyalty for the Church. My father's mom died when he was 17 years old, and for a time he fell away. We weren't very good Catholics as far as taking the sacraments. We didn't always go to Mass.

As so often happens, one person in our family became more fervent and brought the rest of the family along. That was my sister Elisa. It took years, but now my dad is at the adoration chapel nearly every night. My sister and I both work for Priests for Life, and one of my brothers is in seminary at [St. Joseph's Seminary in] Dunwoodie, N.Y.

How did that happen?

I made my first Communion and confirmation at Holy Ghost Parish, but we moved to Staten Island and attended St. Charles when I was 16. Three years later my sister said to me, “Come on. You have to come over here to hear this young priest. He's brilliant.” She dragged me to hear a Latin Mass at St. Charles.

When I got there, here was this priest, fresh out of seminary, who looked younger than I was. It was Father Frank Pavone. When he celebrated Mass he bowled me over with his homily. I knew I wanted to ask him all of the questions I had about the faith, and so I made an appointment to meet with him. I went through a laundry list of questions and he answered them one by one.

I understand that the idea for A Travel Guide to Heaven came to you 13 years ago. Tell me about that.

I've always been aware of the disparity between the greatness of the teaching on heaven and the low level of enthusiasm for the subject. I always thought the greatness of the teaching wasn't being communicated as well as it could. Certain elements of the theology of heaven — those points that are most consoling and exciting — weren't being taught.

During Father Pavone's first year as a priest he gave an incredible homily on heaven. It was only 10-15 minutes long, but in that homily he summed up the Church's teaching on heaven, emphasizing that heaven is going to be physical as well as spiritual and there are certain common-sense deductions anyone can make. Using a bit of imagination and a lot of theology, you can come up with a very exciting idea of the hereafter.

Father Pavone's homily was enough for me to catch the vision. I didn't do anything with it for 10 years. One year I had a really bad year — attending 15 funerals over the course of several months. During that time I had the opportunity to hear all kinds of homilies and eulogies. It was as if God was hitting me over the head with a hammer. I tried to write a straight book on heaven but couldn't get excited about it.

Later, while on vacation with my wife, Kimberly, I surprised her by taking her to the Beverly Hills Hotel for our fifth anniversary. When we got there, they had lost my reservation. The only room available was the presidential suite, and they gave us the room for the night.

The room was incredibly opulent with a Steinway piano, his and her bathrooms, a gigantic kitchen, a fireplace in every room and a terrace that extended the length of the hotel. While on the terrace I made a comment about this being “heaven on earth” and knew immediately that this would be the way I could write a book on heaven and make it exciting and accessible to a wide range of people. I ran into the room and wrote down the title and some chapter headings. I wrote the book in three months.

So what will heaven be like?

If the world we're living in now is real, the life we're going to have in heaven is not going to be less real than this. If anything, it will be more real. It's going to be physical as well as spiritual. It won't be just clouds and disembodied spirits floating around. We won't enter heaven as Casper the Ghost. We'll have bodies, but they will be different. Because it will be real we can make deductions. All the things from the world that we love now will be there — oceans, mountains, grass and sky. There is no reason to believe that God will get rid of these.

There will also be a city there. It won't be just a nature preserve. We won't be resting in peace. We'll be more active there, not less active. In heaven, there will be more life, not less life. All of the people from our families who make it will be there and we will be able to have physical relationships with them. We'll see them and hear their voices again. There's no reason to believe that there won't be animals and new creatures as well. God is the God of creation. He won't stop creating things just because our world comes to an end.

How do you know?

I'm not a New Age guru and this is not the Gospel according to Anthony. I would never write anything that was not founded 100% on Scripture and correct Christian theology. Anyone reading it will see the Catholic influence. I used the Bible and the Church Fathers, and that's where it all comes from. I used my God-given imagination and indulged in some speculation, but it was all common sense.

Every single idea in the book comes right out of Scripture or commonly accepted Christian theology.

Do you think there's been an increase in things spiritual since Sept. 11, 2001?

These questions are always going to be talked about because as long as people experience death in their families and there is a fear of death, it goes to the core of our experiences. It's harder to live in denial about these kinds of questions in a post-Sept. 11 world. I can look out the window and see that 3,000 people died in 10 seconds. When you witness tragedy on a massive scale it's harder not to ask yourself questions about death and the afterlife.

The problem is that you have unscrupulous groups and individuals who try to take advantage of that by writing books and producing television programs where they claim to talk to the dead. People are so hungry to talk to their dead relatives that they will believe in anything.

While doing the research for the book, what surprised you most about heaven?

What I found most exciting was all the research in Scripture and the Church Fathers that confirms the physical nature of heaven. When we experience the resurrection we are going to get our bodies back and God is going to make them perfect. We're not going to get amnesia in heaven. When I looked at the writings of Justin Martyr and Augustine and Aquinas, I found so much theological evidence for that.

What do you have planned next?

I'm not writing a travel guide to hell. I'm through with the afterlife until I have to experience it. Doubleday has asked me to write a book on prayer. My next book will be 10 Prayers that God Always Says Yes To!

Tim Drake writes from St. Cloud, Minnesota.