Mediumship demonstration

It's important to have a clear picture of what you believe- as the saying goes "If you don't stand for something you will fall for anything"

Many people claiming to be spiritual seem to promote taking DMT, opening up their pineal glands and all kinds of stuff that I am really not ok with. For me, having a faith helps because it has clear guidelines of things to and not to do.

What is it about religion? Why is every religious follower absolutely convinced that their religion is the only true religion and every other religion is descended from the devil incarnate and all their followers will burn in hell?
I repeat: you may not approve of Spiritualism but they've never caused a war, they've never (to my knowledge) been involved in child abuse and they've never called for the mass extinction of anyone who doesn't believe as they do. They seem to be a more tolerant lot.

DiscoDancer1975

fuseta

DH and myself were in London for the weekend a couple of weeks ago and got chatting to another couple in a pub garden. The woman mentioned that she was a spiritualist and that she worked in a hospice. After a while she said 'Who is George?' This was a surprise, as our very good friend called George died in April. She said that DH and George were like brothers and that I was his little Dolly Parton ( we all used to sing together ) Then she told DH that his Dad was asking about his medals. This made sense to him, as his Dad's second wife sold all his medals after he died and DH has often said that he would have liked to keep them. She also asked if I knew someone that was possibly called Laura, who I couldn't place at all. She also described this person in full. A couple of days later, I remembered my old friend whose surname was Lauder and she totally fitted the description. I hadn't seen her for 25 years and had lost touch with her. I managed to track her down online and she was very much alive and delighted to hear from me, however she told me that her Dad had passed away a month ago, so maybe he wanted us to get back in touch! I must stress that I had never met this spiritualist woman in my life and I certainly didn't go looking for it and I didn't give her any clues either. I didn't find it spooky or evil, just very interesting and it was uncannyjust what she got right!

The more accurate they are, the more dangerous. Please give them a wide berth.

Sorry, I meant some have the gift of tongues. My head is imploding! No one has the gift for talking to the dead, but Satan will trick vulnerable people into thinking they are talking to dead people. It’s the same with ghosts, it’s trickery, which he ( Satan), is a master of.
All I’m saying is, if you’re not sure, or it seems too good to be true, avoid it.
Hope that helps.

I don't trust these people who put on shows for money/collections/gifts. They do cold readings and are adept at using leading questions and reading body language. Derren Brown showed how to do it on one of his TV programmes and although the people were shown how he'd done it some were still convinced that he had a 'gift' because he was so accurate.

It's not that I don't think some people can communicate with the dead. I just think that most of them don't turn it into a cash cow form of entertainment and as you can't tell which are real and which are scammers.

Let's try an experiment. I don't know anyone on this site personally but I bet I can score a few goals.

Someone who's name begins with a W is talking to me. The voice is very quiet. Could it be William, Walter, Wilf, Wendy, Wilma, Winifred? Do any of those name mean anything to someone?

This person was quite ill before they died.

They say that it was something to do with their chest. Lungs/heart?

They used to like drinking tea.

I bet by now I've hit on someone you know. It fits my grandad. William died of pneumonia after suffering from chest problems his whole life due to being gassed in WW1. He used to sit by the fire drinking tea.

If a scammer was reading my body language too he/she would soon pick up on other points.

My son in law seems to have this gift, but he doesn’t like it much. He occasionally says things about seeing my dead husband and dog, he has nothing to gain whatsoever. He says it’s a feeling rather than a vision as such but he was able to describe my husband (he’d never met him), in an outfit that he loved to wear. It was very comforting. He has said if he gets those feelings now he blocks them as he is afraid of them, he says sometimes the feelings are frightening. Who knows?

Sorry Gill, I quoted on the wrong poster?, fuseta won’t know what I’m talking about! It was meant for you.
I think I need to lay down ?

But what harm would that be doing if it gave William, Walter, Wilf, Wilma's daughter a sense of peace or happiness? And as for money/collections.... doesn't every church pass the plate round for a collection? Don't some churches/places of worship/faiths expect their disciples to stump up a percentage of their income to support the church? My Catholic friends have "donated" 2% of theirannual income for as long as I've known them over 50 years. Are they being scammed?

I agree with everyone who steers clear of anything at all to do with contacting people who have died. I am Christian but as I have aged I feel more strongly than ever that I have no interest at all but if the Church warns us to avoid spiritualism it could be that it is uncharted waters and could possibly cause upset and even mental health problems.

As a pagan, can I just point out that satan is a christian invention, no such entity exists in spiritualism.

I have a relative who is into psychic stuff and is very mentally ill. Im not sure if they are mentally ill as a result of the DMT they were encouraged to take or as a result of the psychic trip they went on as a result of it.

Anyhow, their version of being spiritual is not mine and I am very concerned for them.

The thing is with churches is that you don't have to pay before you recieve a "service", In fact you don't have to pay at all, well I don't know about Catholics but 2% seems very low for what i would have thought. Its one thing to contribute, knowing you are supporting full time clergy and buildings that need maintaining and completely another to be paying for I don't know what.

Savvy

As a pagan, can I just point out that satan is a christian invention, no such entity exists in spiritualism.

Oh yes it does, you just don’t know it. He’s the father of lies and deceit, and he does it very well.

fuseta

DH and myself were in London for the weekend a couple of weeks ago and got chatting to another couple in a pub garden. The woman mentioned that she was a spiritualist and that she worked in a hospice. After a while she said 'Who is George?' This was a surprise, as our very good friend called George died in April. She said that DH and George were like brothers and that I was his little Dolly Parton ( we all used to sing together ) Then she told DH that his Dad was asking about his medals. This made sense to him, as his Dad's second wife sold all his medals after he died and DH has often said that he would have liked to keep them. She also asked if I knew someone that was possibly called Laura, who I couldn't place at all. She also described this person in full. A couple of days later, I remembered my old friend whose surname was Lauder and she totally fitted the description. I hadn't seen her for 25 years and had lost touch with her. I managed to track her down online and she was very much alive and delighted to hear from me, however she told me that her Dad had passed away a month ago, so maybe he wanted us to get back in touch! I must stress that I had never met this spiritualist woman in my life and I certainly didn't go looking for it and I didn't give her any clues either. I didn't find it spooky or evil, just very interesting and it was uncannyjust what she got right!

Fuseta When someone mentions something to us that rings a bell, we react. I t might be a very small reaction, but with practice, it can be detected and interpreted pretty easily.

The medium said 'Who is George?' We all know at least one George, and many of them are dead.
Your DH then reacted to the name in a way that conveyed to her that he and George had been "like brothers" but that George was now dead.
Do you, perhaps, have a figure like Dolly Parton? and was there anything previously in your conversation to suggest that you liked to sing?

Then she told DH that his Dad was asking about his medals. Almost every man of that generation received medals for each phase of the 2nd World War in which he was involved as either a conscript or a regular soldier, and his son would either have the medals safely put away or wished that he had them.. It was a safe bet to ask this question - if it didn't ring that bell, she would pass on to something else.

someone that was possibly called Laura - another safe bet, even with a description you would have forgotten about it if you had never known a Laura, or something near it.

She may have suggested other things that you forgot instantly. You may have mentioned little details in your conversation before you got on to the spiritualism, and forgot those things instantly too.

You don't think you gave her any clues, but a tiny flicker of a change of expression is enough to show that the arrow has hit near to the bullseye. It doesn't even have to be deliberately contrived. If she has been able to deduce things about other people from tiny reactions all her life, she will accept it as part of her personality, and using that ability repeatedly has made her very good at it.

Have you heard of "Clever Hans", the horse who could do maths? I shall search for information about him and post it.

Clever Hans - the horse who was famous for ansering questions - and how he so often got the right answer. www.futurelearn.com/info/courses/logical-and-critical-thinking/0/steps/9163

I know your post @15.32 was a question to Discodancer GillT so I hope you don't mind if I comment on it.

Mediums/spiritualists commune with the spirits of the dead. The gift of tongues is a gift from the Holy Spirit. The day of Pentecost was different because the disciples when they spoke in tongues, were speaking in a language that they themselves did not know, but was the language of other people. Those people understood what was being spoken.

Soon after that event and today, some Christians have the gift but their words are not of any language that we know, so if this happens in a gathering, needs to be interpreted by another and the ability to be able to interpret is another gift from the Holy Spirit.

Not wishing to engage with mediums and spiritualists, is not necessarily believing they are unable to commune with the spirits of the dead, it is because of the possibility of opening yourself up to deception. There is also the possibility of inviting in a spirit who decides to stay.

As C.S. Lewis once said "There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them."

Thank you Smileless, it always helps to have someone else’s understanding. You put it really well ?

I would generally call myself a wavering sceptic, but a niece of mine has been told extraordinary things - twice - by an acquaintance who was not paid, never does it for money, and did it only on a casual, off the cuff basis, from matters that arose during the course of an ordinary conversation.

The things she said were absolutely not anything that could apply to more or less anybody, or just be lucky guesses. But at the time they were very comforting.

I have never met any such person myself, but I do think some people have some sort of gift, which isn’t yet understood. I reject absolutely the idea that it’s anything to do with any entity called Satan! Honestly, hearing Christians say such things is enough to put anyone off ever setting foot in a church again.

Chewbacca

What is it about religion? Why is every religious follower absolutely convinced that their religion is the only true religion and every other religion is descended from the devil incarnate and all their followers will burn in hell?
I repeat: you may not approve of Spiritualism but they've never caused a war, they've never (to my knowledge) been involved in child abuse and they've never called for the mass extinction of anyone who doesn't believe as they do. They seem to be a more tolerant lot.

I don't know - but I recently stumbled across some occult cult thing that seemed to think they had the only truth. They advocate the taking of DMT, spread the belief that covid jabs are dangerous , that covid doesn't even exist and promote drug use for astral travel. They are spreading the myth that the vaccinated are dangerous because they will kill the vaccinated in the streets and claim to have seen the future. Hopefully they are not gathering in numbers because I feel they could harm many people. They might not have started physical wars, but there are other bad things that can happen to people. I don't know if this gang I mentioned are spiritualist but they claim to be "spiritual" and are not in any way tolerant of any view that's different than their own.

Referring to your post @ 15.50 Chewbacca, tithing first came about during the time of Moses in the second year of the Exodus. He told the Israelites to give a 10th of their seed.

Tithe comes from the Old English teogothian meaning 'tenth' and was adopted by the Christian Church to encourage lay people to give a 10th of their income.

I do know of one secondhand instance I can't explain. A mate of mine went for a Tarot reading. She doesn't believe in spiritualism and wants nothing to do with it. The tarot reader said I am sorry you aren't here for this but I am getting a message for you from a lady...and the message was something that she could not have known...I mean really could not....not the bad chest and drinks tea stuff but a thing this lady used to say to my friend. It arose out of the circumstances under which they met. For myself, I belive that if my lost beloved wanted to speak to me they wouldn't need an intermediary.

I still see no harm if someone gets comfort from being told their deceased relatives are happy. I think there is more than can just be explained away and I absolutely do not believe in Satan. Feeling a bit uncomfortable too about the smug certainty that only some Christians know the truth and the rest of us need to be protected. With apologies to those of you who have tried to justify your beliefs. As for the link with covid19 conspiracy.......well....

What is DMT?

It's a recreational drug GillT57. Official name is Dimethyltryptamine.

Thank you Chewbacca.

Chewbacca

But what harm would that be doing if it gave William, Walter, Wilf, Wilma's daughter a sense of peace or happiness? And as for money/collections.... doesn't every church pass the plate round for a collection? Don't some churches/places of worship/faiths expect their disciples to stump up a percentage of their income to support the church? My Catholic friends have "donated" 2% of theirannual income for as long as I've known them over 50 years. Are they being scammed?

It matters because it's fraud. It's scamming the desperate for personal gain.

It's not the same as the Church collection because they know they're donating to the upkeep of the church/parish funds.