The Church's Attitude.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXX, Issue 11, 13 March 1902, Page 2

The Church's Attitude.

The position of the Catholic Church with regard to Spiritism is soon told, (1) The Church recognises the fact that intercourse between disembodied and non.embodied intelligences or spirits and people living in the body upon the earth is not alone possible, but has actually taken place, as is proved by many passages of the sacred Scriptures. But (2) the Church strictly forbids the practices of Spiritism. She requires her children to take no part in them, forbids them to be present at stances, or to consult mediums. These things, be it known, are but the modern counterpart of the old pagan Greek practice ot necromancy and of those attempts to conjure up the spirits of the dead which were condemned with such severity in the Old Dispensation. 'Neither let there be found among you,' said the great leader of Israel, ' any one that consulteth soothsayers, or observeth dreams or omens; neither let there be any wizard nor charmer, nor any one that consulteth pythonic spirits [the ancient name for mediums] or fortunetellers, or that seeketh the truth from the dead. For the Lord abhorreth all these things ; and for these abominations he will destroy them ' {Deuteronomy xviii., 10-12).

Moreover, Spiritism, as a theory of religion— as expounded some time ago at a convention of Spiritism in Rochester (U.S. A) — is mere Pantheism, a denial of a personal God, the Creator. 'It cannot tolerate/ said one of the speakers, ' the ignominious belief of salvation through Jesus Christ.' The author of a Treatise on Modern Spiritualism, published in 1897, when travelling in search of materials for his book, came

across ' over 200 cases of minds injured or driven to insanity by it. Add to this the fraudulent nature of the mediumbusiness, and our young men and maidens will find sufficient reason to keep away from the dingy parlors in back streets where fraudulent and vulgar female or male necromancers hang out their card and catch the silly, curious, and the unwary. They are of the race who can fervently repeat Pudd'nhead Wilson's maxim : ' Let us be thankful for the fools ; but for them the rest of us could not succeed.'