Why are there mediums?

By Valdir Aguilera

Are mediums useful to humanity? Why do they exist? Do they receive any training before incarnating? Three questions we find interesting. Let's get to them. Let's start with another question: What is a medium?

In spiritualist circles, a medium is a person who can mediate between disincarnated and incarnated spirits. By having this faculty, he serves as a connection with the spiritual world, thus enabling a spirit to manifest itself in the physical world. But a medium may have the capacity to do more than merely intermediate communications. He may be serving a purpose or a goal, as we shall see.

This faculty is given the generic name of mediumnship. Why generic? Because, in general, each medium has a "speciality," for there are different types of mediumnship. The most common ones are explained in the book "Christian Rationalism". [1] Even though mediumship is an important subject, we will not deal with it in this article. We refer the interested party to the book just mentioned.

In its constant and inevitable journey towards spirituality, every (reincarnated) spirit is faced with various situations. All of them necessary for the improvement of their psychic faculties. Not only does it encounter diverse situations, but it also creates, with its attitudes and some peculiar activities, opportunities for the improvement of others. Unique activities? What do you mean by peculiar activities? Let's just mention one as an example.

Science advances thanks to the work of men and women who observe nature and try to explain, by means of theories they elaborate, the phenomena that occur in it. Although often incomplete, these theories throw some light on natural laws. There are some phenomena that occur even without human intervention. For example, gravitation. Other phenomena need special situations to be created to provoke some specific type of phenomenon. The chemical reactions caused in laboratories are examples.

The phenomena are there to be observed, or provoked, but... But what? Let us explain: there are phenomena that do not occur naturally. As an example we can cite levitation, which consists of people or objects raised and moved in space without the help of forces already known to science, contrary to the law of gravity. For this reason, it does not even occur to researchers to try to provoke them in the laboratory. Without being revealed, these phenomena would not offer the opportunity to be studied, to the detriment of science and, therefore, to humanity.

How to fill this gap? With mediums, for example. Throughout time, and with special mention of the nineteenth century, mediums have produced remarkable phenomena which do not usually occur in nature. Many of these phenomena are discussed in the literature. Among the many researchers who have devoted themselves to studying them, we cite William Crookes and Ernesto Bozzano. [2][3]

Before incarnating, a spirit is not trained to be a medium, but is prepared by more evolved spirits. A medium of physical phenomena, such as levitation, for example, is not capable of provoking the phenomenon by himself. He is only an instrument used by disincarnated spirits. Imagine a guitar. It is incapable, by itself, of producing a sound without being manipulated by someone.

Besides being useful to humanity in the form we have mentioned, a medium can be useful only to himself. How so? Well, let's see.

The evolution of a spirit is made with many, many comings to Earth. Some of those comings (reincarnations) can result in failure, causing much pain to the spirit. When failures occur very frequently and continuously, the spirit decides to reincarnate with the mediumistic faculty manifested. In these conditions he knows that at all times it will be in contact with the spiritual life alerting him to this reality. Thus the chance of losing another incarnation diminishes.

Anything left to say? Yes, there is. The decision to be a medium can be made by a spirit after it has incarnated. At some point in his (physical) life he may decide, for example, to develop his mediumship in order to work in collaboration with the Superior Forces in their activities in a Christian rationalist house. It is a respectable, altruistic decision, and of great value.

[1] "Christian Rationalism" Available in Portuguese as Racionalismo Cristão, 45th edition, chapter 10, edited by the World Headquarters of Christian Rationalism, Rio de Janeiro, 2015.

[2] "Facts and Mysteries of Spiritism", William Crookes (available in Portuguese as "Fatos espíritas" at the library of valdiraguilera.net)

[3] "Transport Phenomena", Ernesto Bozzano, (available in Portuguese as "Fenômenos de transporte" at the library of valdiraguilera.net)