WikiTap

Spiritualism

Spiritualism is a religion that began in the United States and flourished from the 1840s to the 1920s—especially in English-language countries. By 1897, it is said to have had more than eight million followers in the United States and Europe, mostly drawn from the middle and upper classes. Spiritualism is theistic, believing in God, but the distinguishing feature is belief that spirits of the dead can be contacted by "mediums" and provide information about the afterlife. Developing for a half century without canonical texts or formal organization, the religion attained cohesion by periodicals, tours by trance lecturers, camp meetings, and missionary activities of accomplished mediums. Many of the most prominent Spiritualists were women, and most adherents supported radical causes like abolition and women's suffrage. By the late 1880s credibility of the movement weakened, due to accusations of fraud, and formal organization began to appear. Spiritualism still exists, primarily through the Spiritualist Church in the United States and United Kingdom. (more)

Genres: religious

Related Videos


Related Wiki Articles

  • Mediumship: Mediumship is a form of relationship with spirits that is practiced in religions such as Spiritualism, Spiritism, Espiritismo, Candomblé, Louisiana Voodoo, and Umbanda. http://skepdic.com/medium.html Skeptic's Dictionary by Robert Todd Carroll, on Me
  • Spiritualist Church: The Spiritualist Church arose from the Spiritualist movement which began in the 1840s in America. Spiritualist Churches are found around the world, but are more common in English-speaking countries. In North America, many churches are affiliated with
  • New Thought: The New Thought Movement or New Thought is a loosely allied group of organizations, authors, philosophers, and individuals who share a set of metaphysical beliefs concerning healing, life force, Creative Visualization, and personal power. The New Tho
  • Necromancy: Necromancy [nek-ruh-man-see](Greek νεκρομαντία, nekromantía) is a form of divination in which the practitioner seeks to summon "operative spirits" or "spirits of divination", for multiple reasons, from spiritual protection to wisdom. The word necroma
  • Spiritism: Spiritism is a spiritualist philosophical doctrine, established in France in the mid-nineteenth century. Spiritism, or French spiritualism, is based on books written by French educator Hypolite Léon Denizard Rivail under the pseudonym Allan Kardec re
  • Harry Price: Harry Price (January 17, 1881 – March 29, 1948) was a British psychic researcher and author.
  • Michel Eugène Chevreul: Michel Eugène Chevreul (August 31, 1786 - April 9, 1889) was a French chemist whose work with fatty acids led to early applications in the fields of art and science. He is credited with discovering margarine and designing an early form of soap made f
  • Lily Dale: Lily Dale is a spiritualist community of the Modern Spiritualist movement located in Chautauqua County, New York, USA. It is in the Town of Pomfret at the north end of Cassadaga Lake, next to the Village of Cassadaga. Located in Southwestern New York
  • Spiritualism in fiction: This article provides a list of fictional stories in which Spiritualism features as an important plot element. The list omits passing mentions.
  • Thomson Jay Hudson: Thomson Jay Hudson born Windham, Ohio, USA, February 22, 1834, Chief Examiner of the US Patent Office and Psychical researcher, known for his three laws of psychic phenomena, which were first published in 1893. Refusing his father's wish to become a
  • Harry Houdini: Harry Houdini (March 24, 1874 - October 311926) whose birth name in Hungary was Erik Weisz (which was changed to Ehrich Weiss when he immigrated to the United States), was a Hungarian American magician, escapologist (widely regarded as one of the gre
  • Fox sisters: Sisters Kate (1838-92), Leah (1814-90) and Margaret (or Maggie) (1836-93) Fox played an important role in the creation of Spiritualism, the religious movement.
  • Andrew Jackson Davis: Andrew Jackson Davis (11 August 1826 – January 13, 1910), American Spiritualist, was born at Blooming Grove, New York. He had little education, though probably much more than he and his friends pretended. In 1843 he heard lectures in Poughkeepsie on
  • Spiritualists' National Union: The Spiritualists' National Union (SNU) is a Spiritualist organisation, founded in the United Kingdom in 1901, and is one of the largest spiritualist groups in the world. Its motto is Light, Nature, Truth. Over its history, it has organised test case
  • Cassadaga, Florida: Cassadaga (a Seneca Indian word meaning "Water beneath the rocks") is a small unincorporated community located just north of Orlando, Florida. It is especially known for having a large number of psychics, also known as "Mediums", and as such is somet
  • Eusapia Palladino: Eusapia Palladino (alternate spelling: Paladino; Minervino Murge, 1854 – 1918) was a famous Spiritualist medium from Naples, Italy. In her early life, Eusapia Palladino was married to a traveling conjuror. In Italy, France, Germany, Poland and Russia
  • Wonewoc Spiritualist Camp: Wonewoc Spiritualist Camp is a Spiritualist Church community, of the Modern Spiritualist movement, located in Wonewoc, Wisconsin. The camp is open every summer.
  • Emma Hardinge Britten: Emma Hardinge Britten (1823-1899) is known for her work as an advocate for the early Modern Spiritualist Movement. Due to the publication of her speeches and writing on the spiritual movement, and an incomplete autobiography which was edited by her s
  • Lake Pleasant, Massachusetts: Lake Pleasant is a village in Montague, Massachusetts, United States, and the site of an early and prominent American Spiritualist campground. It claims to be the oldest continuously-existing Spiritualist community in the United States. Lake Pleasant
  • William Stainton Moses: The Reverend William Stainton Moses (born Donnington, near Lincoln, England, in 1839, died 1892), was an English clergyman and Spiritualist. Educated at Bedford School, University College School, London and Exeter College, Oxford, he was ordained as
  • Seybert Commission: The Seybert Commission was a group of faculty at the University of Pennsylvania who in 1884-1887 investigated a number of respected spiritualist mediums, uncovering fraud or suspected fraud in every case that they examined.
  • Cora L. V. Scott: Cora Lodencia Veronica Scott (1840–1923) was one of the best-known mediums of the Spiritualism movement of the last half of the 19th century. Most of her work was done as a trance lecturer, though she also wrote some books whose composition was attri
  • Stanisława Tomczyk: Stanisława Tomczyk was a Polish Spiritualist medium in the early 20th century. Tomczyk was the subject of experiments in 1908-9 at Wisła, in southern Poland, by the psychologist, Julian Ochorowicz. Reportedly Tomczyk was regularly hypnotized by him f
  • Achsa W. Sprague: Achsa W. Sprague was one of the best-known Spiritualists during the 1850s in the United States. Primarily a medium and trance lecturer, she also wrote articles and poetry for Spiritualist publications such as the Banner of Light, the Green Mountain S
  • Robert Owen: Robert Owen (14 May 1771, Newtown, Montgomeryshire, Wales - 17 November 1858) was a Welsh social reformer and one of the founders of socialism and the cooperative movement. Owen's philosophy, which Karl Marx would later name utopian socialism, was de
  • Séance: A séance ( ) is an attempt to communicate with spirits. The word "séance" comes from the French word for "seat," "session" or "sitting," from the Old French "seoir," "to sit." In French, the word's meaning is quite general: one may, for example, spea
  • Davenport Brothers: Ira Erastus Davenport (1839 - 1911) and William Henry Davenport (1841 - 1877), known as the Davenport Brothers, were American magicians in the late 1800s, sons of a Buffalo, New York policeman. The brothers presented illusions claimed to be supernatu
  • Espiritismo: Espiritismo (Spanish for "Spiritism") is the Latin American and Caribbean belief that good and evil spirits can affect health, luck and other elements of human life. Helping Elderly Hispanics Manage Health Problems, The University of Kansas School of
  • Amy and Isaac Post: Amy and Isaac Post, were radical Hicksite Quakers from Rochester, New York, involved in the struggles for abolitionism and women's rights. Among the first believers in Spiritualism, they helped to associate the young religious movement with the polit
  • National Spiritualist Association of Churches: National Spiritualist Association of Churches One of the oldest and largest of the Spiritualist churches in the USA is the National Spiritualist Association of Churches (NSAC), which formed in 1893 in Chicago. Among its leaders were Harrison D. Barre



vtap logo Have you tried vTap yet? See everything, miss nothing!
Corporate Home  Corporate Home  News  FAQ  About Contact Forums