Development circles

A development circle is a group in the Spiritualist tradition that meets regularly so that people who may become mediums can develop their psychic abilities together. Such groups are often also called "classes". The anthropologist Matt Tomlinson describes the development circle as the place where mediums train with others in small groups, before going "on platform", that is, giving public demonstrations at church services.

Description

Circles in Spiritualism

Spiritualist practice has two main settings: the public service, and the séance or "circle". Circles are mostly private gatherings of people who come together to contact Spirit or to raise what Spiritualists call spiritual power. Spiritualists name several kinds of circle, told apart as much by who runs them and where they meet as by what happens in them. Gillen described:

• Home circles, held in a private home, which people attend by invitation only
• Open circles, held at a church or other public meeting place, which in principle anyone interested may attend
• Development circles, for developing the abilities of potential mediums
• Healing circles, in which one or more mediums give spiritual healing to the others present

Kinds of development circle

Some development circles are open to anyone who hears of them and wants to come, on the view that every person is a potential medium. Others are formed by an established medium for students he or she regards as less developed, and who accept that role. The Spiritualists National Union of WA describes its open circles as a place where everyone, from beginners to advanced students, can practise and develop their mediumship: members sit facing inwards in a rough circle, take turns to practise, and learn a new technique each session.

What happens in a circle

Gillen attended an open development class in Sydney several times in the 1970s. It met weekly and usually drew twenty to thirty people. The room was lit only by electric heaters and a blue light bulb. Each meeting began with the Lord's Prayer and readings from Spiritualist literature, followed by a long period of silent meditation. Members were pressed to go into trance, and a few usually showed signs of doing so. Those who did not were pressed to describe what they had "seen", and the leader would discuss whether these images might be clairvoyance. Each meeting closed with a test of psychometry, in which members tried to "read" an object such as a piece of jewellery, a set of keys or sometimes a flower, without knowing whose it was.

In a home circle he attended, the lights were turned off and the leader said the Lord's Prayer; the group then sat in silence for about fifteen minutes before a medium spoke as a spirit. The evening ended with thanks to Spirit, and the group talked about what had happened over cups of tea. Circles often asked sitters not to cross their arms or legs, which some believed could "stop the power", and some tried to seat men and women alternately.

How students develop

Meditation is the basis of development in a Spiritualist class; the other methods used depend on the medium who leads it. The nineteenth-century circle instructions that Gillen found reprinted in a Sydney church magazine held that the mediumistic faculty is present in everyone to some degree and can be cultivated, and warned that a new circle may need several sittings before anything happens. This is why regular, patient attendance is stressed. Gillen also noted that mediums often advise people seeking development never to "sit" for spirit contact on their own, but always in a properly formed circle, because of fears about possession and attachment.

Development usually moves step by step, from the circle to the platform. One Canberra medium told him that his clairvoyance grew while he attended a Spiritualist church in England, and that joining a home circle formed from that church's members let him develop it further.

Learning to stop is part of the training too. Gillen quoted a British Spiritualist newspaper columnist who described a "closing down" exercise: a person whose clairvoyance or budding mediumship is causing discomfort can be taught to close the channel until they are ready to use it.

Scope

What it includes

• Group meditation, prayer and readings
• Practice in trance, clairvoyance and psychometry under a leader
• Healing, in some circles

What it is not

• A development circle is not a public service. The public demonstration of mediumship at a Spiritualist service is a separate activity.
• It is different from a private reading, in which one medium gives a consultation to one client.

Traditions and lineage

Circles date from the early years of Spiritualism. After the Fox sisters of Hydesville, New York, said in 1848 that they could communicate with a spirit, people formed "circles" across the country to investigate the claims of the many new mediums. A nineteenth-century set of instructions for forming a home circle, reprinted in the magazine of the Sydney church Gillen studied, advised:

• between four and twelve members, chosen to get on well together
• a fixed meeting day, with regular attendance, once or twice a week
• where possible, a room kept for the circle, with each member keeping the same seat
• that only those taking part should be in the room

The term "open circle" goes back to the days of "physical" mediumship, when it usually meant a paid gathering to witness phenomena such as spirit voices or materialisations. By the time of Gillen's study, it had come to mean in practice any circle not held in a private home.

Context

Within Spiritualism

The development circle is the usual training ground for Spiritualist mediums. J. Gordon Melton describes the Spiritualist development class as existing to develop and train psychic abilities, and especially mediumistic ones. The National Spiritualist Association of Churches in the United States holds that mediumship is a natural ability of every person, and offers education and certification in it. In Britain, the Spiritualists' National Union says mediumship exists to give evidence that life continues after death, and is not meant for foretelling events, advising or counselling; it also runs an accreditation scheme so that the mediums who represent it are experienced and trained. That purpose shapes what a circle trains students to do. Home circles also served physical mediumship: in England the Noah's Ark Society (1990–2004), whose members were mainly Spiritualists, encouraged home circles to develop it.

In Australian Spiritualism

Circles appear in Australian church records well before Gillen's 1970s fieldwork. A history of St John's Spiritual Church in Adelaide says that by 1920 more than 90 people attended the development classes of the Reverend Lily Lingwood-Smith; the Brisbane Spiritual Church held a Sunday afternoon circle in 1933; and a Canberra medium led a weekly circle in Civic in 1979.

Today the Spiritualists National Union of WA runs fortnightly open circles and a psychic awareness and mediumship development class; St John's Spiritual Church in Adelaide lists mediumship, psychic, healing and trance development groups; the Centre Christian Spiritualist Church in Subiaco has a Tuesday development group for adults; and the Spiritual Mission of Noarlunga meets on Fridays to develop "psychic and mediumistic" gifts. The Canberra Spiritualist Association lists among its goals high-quality training in evidential mediumship and psychic awareness.

A Spiritualist perspective

Most Spiritualist mediums would say they learned their craft in a circle, and many would add that they are still learning. The circle is where patience, discipline and discernment are formed: sitting regularly, meditating, learning to tell one's own thoughts and psychic impressions from communication with spirit, and having the results tested honestly by others.

A good circle leader carries real responsibility. From a Spiritualist point of view the circle should feel safe, settled and unhurried. No one should be pressured to go into trance or to produce something to describe; development happens in its own time and cannot be forced. The leader opens and closes each sitting with care and makes sure people leave settled. Wellbeing matters too. Someone who is distressed, struggling or unsure what they are experiencing deserves kindness and, where needed, encouragement to see a doctor or counsellor, rather than having their troubles put down to spirits. As the Canberra medium described below found, steady mentoring and high standards serve students far better than learning alone or going on platform too soon.

Development circles in Australia

Development circles are a long-standing part of Australian Spiritualism. Gillen's study of a Sydney church in the second half of the 1970s describes open development classes, home circles and healing circles connected with it. Tomlinson, in his study of the Canberra Spiritualist Association, recorded the stories of people who developed in circles, including:

• a woman who began attending a Spiritualist church at St Marys in 1980 to find out about Spiritualism, and who went on to join a mediumship development circle, wary at first that it might be "silly nonsense"
• a medium who trained for several years in a teacher's private development circle in Perth before moving to Canberra, where she began running a circle in her own home. She told Tomlinson that learning without a mentor had been hard, and that it had taken her about twenty years to feel confident as a medium.

Australian Spiritualist churches that run development circles include:

• the Victorian Spiritualists' Union in Melbourne, which holds development circles at North Melbourne and Ringwood East. Its circles are open only to financial members who have completed its Spiritualism course or similar, and people apply to the president of each church to join. It also runs a closed meditation class, by invitation, for members with some preliminary training in mediumship who may later join a circle.
• St John Spiritual Church, Port Adelaide, whose development circle includes meditation and healing

Safety and good practice

• Gillen observed strong pressure in the Sydney development class he attended: members were urged to go into trance, and those who didn't were pressed to describe what they had "seen".
• He also recorded that, in circles, behaviour that would usually be seen as a sign of mental disturbance was sometimes put down to "earthbound" spirits, and that some people were given that label when there was no sign of disturbance at all. He noted that a person so labelled who was not coping with everyday life would most likely end up in the care of psychiatrists. Gillen added that Spiritualists themselves are keenly aware that the "psychic sense" a medium sets out to develop can be hard to tell apart from mental illness.
• The Centre Christian Spiritualist Church in Subiaco does not allow anyone under 18 to attend or take part in its training or development groups.
• The National Spiritualist Association of Churches' Code of Ethics, which covers its teachers as well as its mediums and healers, asks members to keep appropriate professional boundaries, to state their level of training honestly and work only within it, to make only realistic statements about what mediumship can do, and not to exploit the trust and dependency of others.
• The Canberra medium who learned largely on her own told Tomlinson she would not recommend it, and that ongoing mentoring pays off. She also believed that being held to a high standard early on had kept her from going out on platform too soon.

Related modalities

• Spiritualism
• Mediumship
• Meditation
• Clairvoyance
• Psychometry
• Spiritual healing

Further reading

• Gillen, Paul. The Spiritualists: Gnosis and Ideology. PhD thesis, Macquarie University, 1981. Chapter 4, "Circles".
• Tomlinson, Matt. Speaking with the Dead: An Ethnography of Extrahuman Experience. punctum books, 2024 (open access).