Religion Beyond Death

I am definitely not one for religion anymore. My only belief that I know for sure to be true, is the fact that nobody knows for sure what comes after life. There are thousands of religions around the world and I hate to break it to you guys, but they can't ALL be right.

I grew up living next door to a Southern Baptist Church, attended Bible camp, Sunday school, and played Mary in the Nativity Scenes. Once I started actually thinking for myself, I decided that this was just not for me. What kind of church give children "comic books" showing them people burning to death in hell for eternity if they said "Oh my god" instead of "oh my gosh", chastised 13 year olds for attending a Jr. High dance, and was told they were evil for believing that dinosaurs existed. I was taught not to question any logic, and I just had too many questions.

Until the last couple of years, you couldn't get me to step into another church service. I couldn't bring myself to open my mind to any religion (especially not Scientology. What the eff is that crazy shit). A friend of mine told me about what she had found to help her....Spiritualism. I can't say that I believe everything this religion talks about, but it's closer to making sense to me than anything else ever has about the afterlife.

Although Spiritualism was founded in 1848, and Abraham Lincoln was even on board with the belief system, still hardly anyone has any clue what it is about or even heard of it. It's not on any "what is your religion" checklists and there are only 95 Spiritualist churches in the entire U.S. With it being so unknown and misunderstood, I thought it was time to share some alternative ideas.

Spiritualism is defined as "The Science, Philosophy, and Religion based upon the principle of continuous life, demonstrated through medium-ship. Spiritualism embraces the concept of individual responsibility and the belief that the door to reformation is never closed"

I know many of you think this just sounds nuts, but the definition doesn't do it justice. When I first visited "Fifth Spiritualist Church" Of St. Louis, I felt immediate peace and was welcomed with open arms. There was no judgment for what I chose to believe, how I dressed, even my sexual orientation...because they didn't care.

Their Declaration of Principles is even peaceful.

Please read them at: http://www.churchspirituallifenh.org/spiritualism/declaration-of-principles/

I've learned about spirit guides and heard from my grandparents. The spiritualist ideas have helped me through some of the rockiest parts of my life.

I think to get a true understanding of what this religion can do for you, I asked a close friend of mine to share her story with me:

My journey to Spiritualism began a few years ago, with my daughter leading the way.

When my daughter was about one, it was pretty clear that she had a certain ability that was both fascinating and terrifying at the same time. She could see what spiritualists call, the so-called dead. She was laughing and talking with spirits while she played, when she was in bed, even while we were out in public.

As she grew older, she started to tell me about the spirits and the other things she was seeing. When she was about two her laughter and smiles started to turn into cries and fear. This spirit seemed to follow her where ever she went. She saw this thing at the babysitter’s, in the woods, at the store, and at home. She began to literally run away from it, crying that there was a scary man. She could only describe this being as a dark man, dark eyes, and a dark face.

It was about this time that physical haunting began in my home. Faucets began and lights started turning on and off, doors started slamming, knick knacks started moving, family member’s started getting ill.

One day my daughter started crying and screaming. She told me that a black monster was on my back.

Shortly after this event was an encounter that changed my life. I was taking a nap one Saturday afternoon and was awakened by a blood curdling scream coming from my daughter. I jumped up and realized she was in the basement. She had somehow gotten through the childproofing and walked herself down the stairs. She had never done that before. I ran down the steps to see my daughter, screaming, looking at the corner of the basement. I asked her what happened. She said “daddy is scaring me!” as she pointed to the corner. My husband came running behind me after coming from the bathroom. My daughter looked at him and looked at the corner in sheer terror. That was it for me, it was time to figure out what to do.

I called a paranormal team to come and investigate my home. My entire life I have always been intuitive and have been able to sense things, but this was out of my league.

They encountered the lights turning off and on by command and a person crying on my stairs, but nothing more than that.

I looked in to mediums online and someone reached out and told me that there was a man that visits my daughter that was killed in a fire. He appears as he did when he died. He wasn’t trying to frighten her but he liked that she could see him.

I went to the library and started to read about these things and what to do. One of the books I read said that I should talk with a Spiritualist Church. I thought “What the hell is that?” After doing a little bit of research, I found that was a Spiritualist Church less than a mile from my house.

I went to the church and during their service they had a clairvoyance portion. I was given a message that my grandma was there with me. The woman told me that she did not want to be called granny (which was true) and described her personality perfectly.

After the service a woman named Lou stayed to talk with me. I didn’t say anything about the situation or the reason I was there. She knew. She told me that I had this black monster growing on my back that was negative energy, she also told me that my daughter was very open and she sees things that are very scary to her and told me how to get rid of all of it.

I did everything that Lou told me to do and over the next several weeks my daughter started to get back to her normal happy self, she was still seeing spirits but she was laughing again.

Six years later and I am now a member of that Spiritualist Church. I’ve taken classes to develop my own mediumship skills. Like Lou told me that first time, I am now that woman giving messages at the service and I am still turning to Lou for advice.

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http://5thspiritstl.com/home/

http://nsac.org/

#truestories #spiritualism #religion #spirits #Death #haunting