Spirit rescue

Spirit rescue, or rescue work, is the Spiritualist practice of helping spirits of the dead who are believed to be "earthbound": still attached to the physical world, often unaware that they have died, and in need of guidance to move on. It is usually carried out in a circle, with a medium through whom the spirit is said to speak. The aim is to help the spirit, not to drive it away: Spiritualists believe an earthbound spirit needs to be "talked round" and shown love.

Description

What rescue work sets out to do

The Encyclopedia of Occultism and Parapsychology explains the thinking behind rescue circles. Earthbound spirits are said to remain nearer the material world than the spiritual one, and many of them are thought not to know they have died, so they live in confusion. Spiritualists hold that once such a spirit is shown its true situation, and prayers are said for it, it will move on to a higher state. Rescue work is therefore a kind of service: the spirit is treated as a person who needs explanation and comfort.

Three kinds of rescue work

In his study of a Sydney Spiritualist church in the late 1970s, Paul Gillen described three fairly distinct kinds of rescue work:

• Rescuing a spirit through a medium. This was by far the most common. A medium allows an unhappy earthbound spirit to speak through them so that it can be helped.
• Rescuing a living person. Sometimes a person was believed to be troubled by an earthbound spirit, and was "rescued" through prayer and discussion, either in a circle or in a private session with a medium. Gillen found this rare.
• Clearing a place. Rescue work can also mean removing earthbound spirits said to linger in particular houses or places and frighten people, either by rescuing the spirit or by doing or saying something to make it leave.

An example

Gillen quotes an account from the Sydney church's magazine. At a Sunday service where the speaker had given a talk on rescuing earthbound spirits, an experienced medium stood up and let an unhappy spirit, which she said she had picked up on her way to church, speak through her. The congregation prayed silently while the speaker "talked him over". The writer described the experience as deeply rewarding, a feeling of "serving". The account shows the usual shape of the work: a medium who gives the spirit a voice, someone who speaks with it, and a group that supports both with prayer.

Rescue circles

Some Spiritualist circles have specialised in rescue work. The Psi Encyclopedia records that Air Chief Marshal Hugh Dowding, head of RAF Fighter Command in the Battle of Britain, belonged to a Spiritualist circle that carried out rescue work, and that his book Lychgate (1945) included transcripts of conversations in which dead servicemen were given guidance and reassurance.

Scope

What it includes

• Helping a spirit believed to be earthbound, usually through a medium in a circle or service
• Clearing houses or places of spirits said to linger there

What it is not

• It is not a treatment for mental illness. Some practitioners of "spirit release" treat people they believe are affected by spirits, but even Edith Fiore, a psychiatrist whose work the Psi Encyclopedia describes as a contribution to the development of spirit release, held that possession cannot be proven.
• It is not exorcism. Spirit release practitioners, as the Psi Encyclopedia describes them, communicate with what they regard as an earthbound spirit and encourage it to move into "the Light". In Spiritualist rescue work the spirit is talked round and shown love, although Gillen recorded that expulsion was sometimes more abrupt. The reasons for this difference are explained under Rescue, not exorcism below. See also Exorcism.

Traditions and lineage

The Encyclopedia of Occultism and Parapsychology traces rescue circles back to the Shaker communities of America. It says the first such circles were held by the wife of a Colonel Danskin of Baltimore with other women, and that the best-known early work was done by a circle in Buffalo, New York, between 1875 and 1900.

In 1924 the American physician Carl Wickland published what the Psi Encyclopedia describes as the first book by a medical practitioner on releasing spirits. With his wife, a medium, he spent some thirty years working with spirits he believed were earthbound; Wickland held that most of them did not realise they had died. The Encyclopedia of Occultism and Parapsychology also lists the Wicklands among the best-known rescue workers. Later "spirit release" practitioners describe encouraging an earthbound spirit to move into "the Light" so that it can continue its spiritual journey.

Similar work is found in the Spiritism of Allan Kardec. The Psi Encyclopedia notes that "group soul rescue", in which several practitioners work together, is common in the Brazilian Spiritist movement. Kardecist Spiritism also has a ritual called "disobsession", which aims to help both a troubled person and the spirit thought to be interfering with them, chiefly by helping the spirit see that its behaviour is holding back its own progress. See Spiritism.

Context

Within Spiritualism

Rescue work is a Spiritualist practice, traditionally carried out in circles. The Encyclopedia of Occultism and Parapsychology defines rescue circles as groups formed by Spiritualists to "wake up" the dead and free them from an earthbound state.

Rescue, not exorcism

Rescue work rests on a particular view of who the troubled dead are. The National Spiritualist Association of Churches in the United States rejects the term "evil spirits", describing such spirits as unenlightened people who have also lived on earth, and says spirits "from the darker spheres" may visit a Spiritualist circle to learn and begin to progress. The same source teaches that no being is bad by nature, that evil comes from ignorance, and that simply leaving the body does not change a person's character.

This matters for practice. If a troubled spirit is an ignorant or confused person rather than an evil force, the right response is to teach and comfort it, which is what a rescue circle does, rather than to fight it, which is the logic of exorcism. Kardecist Spiritism reaches a similar position by a different route: it does not believe in demons or in spirits that are evil by nature, and it has no exorcism rituals.

In Australian Spiritualism

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, writing of his 1920–21 Australian tour, described a Melbourne rescue circle run by Mr Tozer, whom he called the chairman of the movement there: the circle opened with prayer and hymns, a medium went into trance, and a spirit control introduced spirits who were then reasoned with and consoled. For rescue work in Sydney in the 1970s, and a later book linking Tozer with a "Spirit Rescue Circle", see Spirit rescue in Australia below.

A Spiritualist perspective

Rescue work grows from one of Spiritualism's gentlest convictions: that life continues, and that those who have passed are still people. A spirit thought to be earthbound is approached as someone lost or confused, to be talked round with patience and love, never driven out in anger. That is why Spiritualists have been uneasy with the language of evil spirits, and why a student should learn early that rescue and exorcism are different in their starting point, not just in their methods.

The same care is owed to the living. Rescue work belongs to an experienced, settled circle, not to anyone frightened or unwell. A wise teacher would never tell a person that a spirit is troubling them, and would never use rescue work to explain away distress, unusual behaviour or trance in someone young or vulnerable. Gillen's account of people labelled in this way is a warning worth taking to heart. Anyone who seems unwell should be gently encouraged, and helped, to see a doctor or mental health professional. Nothing in this work should ever involve force, restraint or fear.

Spirit rescue in Australia

Gillen's study shows rescue work as part of Sydney Spiritualism in the 1970s, including in services as well as circles. A book recommended to the anthropologist Matt Tomlinson by Debby Walker of the Canberra Spiritualist Association, E. Stanley Brookes's My Four Thousand Ghosts (1968), describes a long series of sittings in which the master of ceremonies in the spirit world was said to be Edgar Tozer, a late president of the Victorian Spiritualists' Union, assisted by a "Spirit Rescue Circle" of 49 spirit helpers.

Safety and good practice

• Gillen found that behaviour which would usually be seen as a sign of mental disturbance was sometimes put down to earthbound spirits, and that some people were labelled this way with no sign of disturbance at all. Being "rescued" meant accepting a stigmatising judgement, and a labelled person who was not coping with everyday life would most likely end up in psychiatric care.
• In one case Gillen observed, a medium decided that a young woman who went into trance at a home circle was in the grip of evil powers; Gillen suggested the medium may have felt challenged by her, and another member later told him she had not thought the young woman's behaviour evil.
• In 1993 a woman died in western Victoria after a week-long attempt by four people to rid her of demons; a coroner found they had contributed to her death. In England, the Department for Education has reported that where a child is believed to be possessed, the people abusing the child may believe they are saving them. See Exorcism.

Related modalities

• Mediumship
• Trance mediumship
• Exorcism
• Spiritism
• Development circles
• Spiritualism

Further reading

• Gillen, Paul. The Spiritualists: Gnosis and Ideology. PhD thesis, Macquarie University, 1981. Chapter 4, "Circles".
• "Spirit Release Therapy". Psi Encyclopedia. Society for Psychical Research.