Mediums

Nannysprout I hope you take comfort from the many posts on here describing how people have been helped by mediums and healers. It sounds as though your husband was a very good man and that many grateful people held him in high esteem.

This thread has made me think again, after all these years about the medium I visited. The more I think about it the more I remember and am more astonished. She absolutely described the house I was living in down to the details of the business that was run next door. She described me coming home and walking up a wide drive between tall stone pillars and a trees to a red stone house with a black door with bicycles in the hall. She said I felt glum returning to that house. It was all as though she had seen a picture of me. I just can't explain it but there it was....it happened.

Sorry for the garbled message and typo errors in my first comment but I felt so insulted and upset by some of the comments on here I just had to get my thoughts out.

Just to add my twopeneth on this topic. My late husband was a medium and he had quite a few mediumistic friends. None of them did it for the money I can assure you. Most didn't charge. My husband was also a good healer. He didn't charge anyone for his services he was only too pleased to be able to help people. They would sometimes buy him gifts because he wouldn't take money and they were so pleased with the result from both readings and healing. He had a firm belief in the after life and he never lost his faith even during his illness towards the end of his life I told him that I would miss his wisdom and he said I would still receive it from him on other side. I have many experiences from when he was alive and since his passing that ate too numerous to relate on here and to people who quite insultingly label all mediums as charlatans but he was a good person who never knowingly did anyone any harm he only tried to help. Feel I had to speak up for the people who are drawn to the spirits for whatever reason.

absence of proof is not proof of absence.
If someone had said to Henry VIII that big metal boxes would carry people through the air you'd have been ridiculed, but that is exactly what airplanes are

Bluecat:
'Why are mediums automatically dismissed as frauds but vicars, rabbis, Brahmins, imams, etc tend to be treated with respect and a certain amount of deference?'

I don't know - as it's all complete nonsense and fairy tales to me!

MercuryQueen

I'm far less concerned with mediums than Joel Osteen and those of his ilk.

I completely agree.

I don’t believe they have any special abilities. I have a number of American friends who go to their performances or pay for consultations.

To me, it’s all fantasy. I’ve never been superstitious or easily influenced.

One of our mutual friends recently died and this group of friends plans to hire a medium to communicate with him. I’ve been told I’m not invited. Fine by me! ?

Why are mediums automatically dismissed as frauds but vicars, rabbis, Brahmins, imams, etc tend to be treated with respect and a certain amount of deference?

If a priest tells you that God is listening to your prayers and a medium tells you that your granny is happy in the afterlife, neither of those statements can be be independently verified. Yet one is considered a respected member of the community and the other is regarded as a con artist.

Seems rather unfair.

After my husband died, and he died suddenly and unexpectedly I kept seeing adverts for mediums
I did not respond
However I heard of someone who friends told me was genuine but I remained sceptical
I decided to book an appointment
The medium was very normal, ordinary, she was a care worker and she knew nothing about me and she charged only £25
I wrote down what she said as she said it
She was 90% accurate, it was uncanny
For example she told me I was the middle child of 3 daughters
I said this was untrue but afterwards I recalled I had a sister who died before I was born
She told me I had 2 daughters and that my deceased husband was ashamed that my youngest daughter had not been more supportive My daughter had been quite cruel
There were numerous uncanny accuracies
I used to believe in god and an afterlife then I lost my faith
Now I don’t know

Bibles and tarot cards are much the same I'd say - attempts to find knowledge a different way either through a text you happen to believe in or through an intuitive reading of images which will stimulate the subconscious.
Replying to Ginny above, I have seen more than once, a cynical demand for a second reading from a pack of tarot cards turn up exactly the same cards!
There are enough genuine reports of foresight to make it difficult to reject all as false, surely. I have only occasionally had a psychic reading but have certainly been surprised by the accuracy of what I have been told.

I completely believe that there are such things as mediums and that some of them can give messages from the dead - not because of any personal experience, but because I've read about it in the bible. Have a look at 1 Samuel Chapter 28 verses 1-16. I also know not to tangle with such things - again because of what the bible tells me. Look at Leviticus 19 verse 31 and Isaiah 8 verse 19. Some people are dismissive of the Bible - but although trying to apply the teaching to one's life is often really difficult, it makes some decisions really easy! I'll never agonise about trying to get a message from a dead person, no matter how much I've loved them!

I'm far less concerned with mediums than Joel Osteen and those of his ilk.

I think most, if not all, are charlatans. However, a few years ago, we were sat next to a lady (a complete stranger) who told us that my Mum would have 4 children but only 2 would survive and that one had already gone before. My mother scoffed but, strangely enough, that was exactly what happened.

In the case of Tarot cards. I believe a certain amount of cards are turned over and the reading is based on this. If one did it twice in a short space of time , surely the result would be different. Serious question, am I missing something ?

When I was first working in London (many, many years ago!) I went to a Tarot reader with a friend - it was all just a bit of a laugh, I had no interest but my friend did.

I can't remember everything she told me but one bit stuck in my mind, mainly because it sounded weird. She told me she could see a network of lines spreading around the world and I was in the middle of them. It meant nothing to us and we laughed about it at the time, until about a year later I started work on a London Underground project and later worked all over the world on different train, bus and underground systems. I didn't remember the Tarot reading until a colleague was talking to me about 'the rail network' one day.

She did tell me I would have two sons, but failed to mention my daughter, something my OH and I used to joke about when my daughter was being especially awkward and I used to tell OH she must be all his as I wasn't having a daughter ?

There are alot of charlatans about who cold read, but I do believe some things cannot be explained as some strange things have happened to me.

Fraudsters.

I worked night duty in a nursing home with a lady who had "the gift".
One night we were taking a break in our little office/rest room when she told me that there was a man standing behind me. She described my grandfather exactly, she even said that his hair turned white at about age 40. I asked my mother the next day at what age her Dad's hair turned white. She said she was born when her was 40 and only knew him with white hair.
This lady was from a different part of the country to my family and had only known me for a few months. I had never spoken to her about my grandparents.

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There was a woman who lived in the same road as my mum, who would randomly, in the course of conversation mention things she couldn't have known.
She was known as 'Spooky'.

Two of my best friends (one following the other) have decided they are mediums, tarot readers and spirit listeners.

Sadly drawing our friendship to an end, as I struggle with our coffee with spirit meets. It is spirit this, spirit that. I feel they know a great amount about the people they read - or state the obvious. Such a shame.

I tend to believe that most of them are frauds although I could be convinced that some, rare, people do genuinely have ‘the gift’. What it is, how it comes about and whether it could help me I don’t know and prefer not to find out! I am a (rather bad) Christian and believe in the Bible’s teaching which warn us against these things. Many will disagree but I do sincerely feel we are perhaps not meant to know!

As a bereaved parent I understand how tempting it is to want contact with someone. But I’ve seen/ heard of too many people taken advantage of by di- called mediums.

I haven’t really had any experience with mediums, and I’ve never considered myself physic, but some years ago we were on holiday and I had the strongest feeling that my stepfather had died. We weren’t particularly close, but I couldn’t shake it. These were pre mobile days so I couldn’t find out, but I was right. So I do think that some people have a gift, if that is the right word. It’s never happened to me since.

There are certainly charlatans who prey on the vulnerable but also good people who really know their onions.

DH and I saw a very good one who'd been recommended by his workmate. The medium urged him very strongly to take his car to a garage - she was very worried for him. He did as bidden, not saying that a medium had sent him as he didn't want to be laughed at. They rang him later to say that his brake cable was almost sheared right through - he'd been driving a death trap. This medium wasn't just good - she saved his life.

The things she told DH and I were astonishing, things she couldn't possibly have known and there was no prompting she was the real thing. We paid for her services and I'd go again if I felt the need.

The above was a 'one-to-one' visit - I'm not keen on mediums as 'theatre' or a church setting as the former can be faked and the latter a bit embarrassing as it's a bit too public for me. With everything in life there is good and bad.