Raising the dead
Credit: Javier Zayas Photography / Getty Images.
Research into spiritualism – a belief system based on the idea that human souls endure beyond death and communicate with the living through a medium or psychic – probably seems slightly at odds with one’s picture of contemporary science.
But there’s growing interest in it worldwide. In Britain, several organisations support, train and offer the services of practising mediums. One of the largest, the Spiritualists’ National Union (SNU), claims to serve at least 11,000 members through its training college, churches, and centres.
There are even definitions for the different sorts of communications experienced by mediums. Mediums who “hear” spirits are said to be experiencing