SPIRITUALIST CHURCH

Evening Star, Issue 22383, 6 July 1936, Page 3

SPIRITUALIST CHURCH

In continuation of his mission at the Dunedin branch of the National Spiritualist Church, Air Reuben Webb spoke last night on the subject. Behold Ims Spiritualism! ’ Mr R. N. Ridd was in the chair, and there was a good attendance. Air Webb, speaking in trance, said that the Divine Spirt had given to man a continuous desire to search, to find out. This desire might be in abeyance occasionally, hut, sooner or later, it reasserted itself, and the search for knowledge and experience went on. Alodern Spiritualism provided a satisfying field in this search, for it was » religion not of tradition, not of yesterday, but a religion of to-day. with the prophecy of to-morrow; a religion of repeated evidences and experiences. “ To those who have not previously studied this religion,” said Air Webb’s control, “he lyould sav: ‘Behold this Spiritualism in the same way as you have been told to behold Hie Cross, to see in it a wonderful meaning and purpose. a great religious experience. The speaker wont on to explain boa? those in the physical body appeared to the inhabitants of the spirit world ; how tho former’s thoughts and psychic nature were made visible. It was always the desire of the spirit friends, however, to contact the “ real selves ” of those mi the earth plane in order_t,o direct tho thoughts and actions to higher things. Modern Spiritualism dated from the receiving and recognising of the rappings of a “ dead ” pedlar 87 years or so ago, continued the speaker, but, as a matter of fact. Spiritualism had been with men at all times; there had always beqn men and women with souls attuned to spiritual aspirations who had held communications with other souls beyond the veil. At the time or the Fox’ sisters, or just prior thereto, such people as Emanuel Swedenburg, Andrew Jackson Davis, and the memhers of the sect known as “ the Shakers ” were among the stalwart torerunuors of modern Spiritualism, and from that time on many great souls had, often in face of ridicule and persecution, brought knowledge and light to their fellows, and answered that question so often put forward, even in these days, with piteous earnestness: If a man die, shall he live again/ rot had not those so-called “ dead ’ people themselves sent the message: “ Me arc not dead; wo arc bore, alive, anxious to give comfort to our deni- ones who remain on earth, to give to them a great and loving teaching.” Most of the human mediums, said Mi Webb, were from the people, not Horn I he wealthy ami leisured classes, but

they had become cultured by reason of the gifts bestowed upon them by God—gifts of clairvoyance, clairaudience, speaking in tongues and thedikq. “ Behold. then,” said Air Webb (or rather his control) this Spiritualism as a product of the workers, and we ask you to search diligently, earnestly, not iiv a spirit; of disdain, but with a friendly desire to know the truth. This SpiriI tualisin is not merely a proof of the continuity of life; it is a teacher of ethics, for it is based upon the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man, not upon any creed, any book, any school of thought. Spiritualism is not "a destroyer of the joy of life, not a religion of grief, of ghostly and shucl-' dery experiences; on the contrary, it is full of joy, and its followers are able to be just as witty, as humorous, as happy as any in the land if such is their nature.” Air Webb, at the close of the service, delivered a number of clairvoyant messages to members of the audience.