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‘Angels Seen Today’. The Theology of Modern Spiritualism and its Impact on Church of England Clergy, 1852–1939

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 March 2016

Georgina Byrne
Georgina Byrne*
Affiliation:
Romsley, Worcestershire
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Extract

In 1852 an American medium, Maria Hayden, crossed the Atlantic, landed in London and began offering séances in fashionable salons. From this point on, and certainly well into the twentieth century, spiritualism proved attractive to many. What spiritualism offered was, primarily, an extravagant claim: that it was possible for the living to communicate with the departed. By various means, people from all classes, religious traditions and geographical locations ‘tried’ the spirits, seeking to make contact with famous characters from history or departed family members. Spiritualism offered, sometimes, spectacular signs and wonders: flying furniture, levitating mediums and ghostly presences, all of which attracted the attention of journalists. Fashions for such signs came and went; the claim to communicate with the dead, however, remained at the heart of spiritualism.

Type
Research Article
Information
Studies in Church History , Volume 45: The Church, the Afterlife and the Fate of the Soul , 2009 , pp. 360 - 370
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 2009

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References

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