PSYCHIC PHENOMENA.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18888, 14 October 1929, Page 9

PSYCHIC PHENOMENA.

To the Editor. Dear Sir,—“Bible Student’s” caricature of Spiritualism is—well, just silly, and many of his statements in reference thereto could be answered by a child from a Spiritualist Sunday School. Spiritualists know that there are both good and evil spirits, since everyone of us must pass over with our characters both good and bad, but they also know how to choose the .company they will keep in seances and elsewhere by obeying the Apostolic advice to “try the spirits.” His conception of a universe under dual control (God and the Devil), and in which the latter, from his point of view, is the more powerful, is not inviting, and I must refuse his attempt to prosletise me. I am glad that he admits one fact, that spirits do communicate, but that he should label them all demons is rather drastic, and were it true, all the spirit communications and spirit appearances throughout the Bible must come under the same category. It is enough to make us all shy about having to join this merry party when we pass over. Why he fails to understand “ why Spiritualists do not see through what he terms ‘this great delusion,’ ” is very simple. They have a suspicion that it is friend “Bible Student” who is the deluded one, and having discovered certain facts, are quite prepared to work and wait for those facts to be recognised. In “Bible Student’s” God there is too much judgment and not enough justice; too much cursing and not enough compensation; too much wrath and not enough wisdom; too much hate and not enough happiness; too much blood and not enough beauty. Spiritualists do believe in the Atonement, though probably not in “Bible Student’s” version of it, and also in evil spirits, whose realm to them is now more a republic than a despotic monarchy. They show so little respect to the supposed ruler that they spell his name with a small “s” instead of a capital one, and I am afraid upon provoking occasions, feel strongly tempted to tell certain people to go to his kingdom. I have one regret, and that is that I wish I had known of Spiritualistic thought in my childhood day’s, and yet I may not have experienced sc much joy and confidence in eternal things as I do to-day. I must conclude with a story I read the other day. A lady belonging to the S.D.A. sect which, like “Bible Student.” thinks that all spirit communion is of the devil, was telling her fellow church members that the spirit of her dead mother constantly appeared to her. which annoyed her very much, and it was only when she pronounced the magic formula “Get thee behind me, Satan,” that she got rid of the thing. Comment is needless.—l am, etc., E. F. OWEN. Clifton Terrace, Sumner.