Beyond the grave

These were the reassuring words from the president of Blackburn Spiritualist Church before opening a meeting with a hymn, prayers and a short introduction to the medium for the night, Janette Hodgson.

"Everyone has the psychic gift," insisted Janette, as she rose to her feet, her eyes scanning her audience. "When you walk into a room and sense an atmosphere, that is psychic ability."

A man called Jack in the spirit world was pulling her to one side, she claimed.

"He will just have to wait," said Janette with a chuckle.

She took a deep breath and began using her psychic ability to link people in the spirit world with their loved ones in the packed congregation, made up of people from every walk of life - middle-aged businessmen, teenagers with dreadlocks, housewives, frail pensioners. She went to the gates of death, each time returning with a message of hope and love from beyond the grave for someone. Some people, arms crossed, refused to accept that the message was for them, despite the medium's insistence.

"Don't be so negative," she said to one man, who insisted he didn't know anyone called Martha.

Others scoured their memories, desperate for any link with a "John" or a "Grace".

"He used to live on my street," said one.

But vague links were swept away in favour of something more solid.

"I'm not going to give him to you," said Janette, as though she was playing a game of Snap, matching spirit people with earthly beings.

She took pains to display evidence that the soul of the communicating spirit was present.

"Was there something wrong with her head? . . . He's saying you have a boat . . ." The scene wasn't at all morbid. It was more like a court of law, with the medium trying to prove beyond all reasonable doubt that life exists beyond the material world.

The people believed her. Not one or two, but a packed hall of people, with few exceptions, all nodding in agreement to a life everlasting.

Scores of bereaved people found comfort in the belief that the dead live on in more than just memory.

But the solemnity of this visit to the land beyond the veil of death was broken by one lady.

"I'm dying for a pee, I wish she'd shut up," she told me.

Two hours had flown by in conversation with these spiritual entities.

Hordes of people left the hall. The mass exodus was in stark contrast to the situation at more conventional churches, many of which are recruiting priests with pierced ears and devising trendy posters in a desperate attempt to boost their dwindling ranks. The Spiritualist Church is bursting with believers.

President Ursula Read said: "The number of members are increasing. People love to come. We are more educated today. We have all got questions and maybe orthodox the religions are not giving people the right answers. They want proof positive that there is life after death."

For centuries people have been fascinated with life beyond the grave and the immortality of the human soul. Death comes to us all. Few would not take comfort from the acknowledgement that life goes on and you may still be able to contact your friends and family from afar.

These encounters with loved ones they thought they had lost forever are credited with helping people move forward, free to carry on life in the reassuring knowledge that death is not the end.

Mediums can see, feel or hear spirits and some take on the voice or characteristics of the deceased person. Occasionally some work in a trance. Their work is not fortune-telling but proves the reality of survival after death and passes on practical help and understanding. Spiritual healing is also practised and claims to cure illnesses which cannot be combated by medical science. It is administered by the laying-on of hands or "absent" healing through thought and prayer. Ursula said spiritualists believed that by communicating with the deceased they could come to a better understanding of the law of God and of themselves.

The religion takes a "scientific" approach by querying whether communicating spirits are who they purport to be:

"Spiritualism helps people find out who they really are. It comes from the heart and not out of a book. The onus is put on the individual to find the truth. Spiritualism teaches freedom of thought and personal responsibility for our actions."

But the religion is frequently criticised for having phoney mediums who use trickery to produce their phenomena.

Spiritualist medium Denise Grundy, 36, from Blackburn, said: "We are answerable by personal responsibility and law. The Fraudulent Medium Act means we can be prosecuted or imprisoned for falsehoods. Mediums take their work very seriously. If I didn't have faith and belief in spirit, I wouldn't use my gift. It is not about hocus pocus. If I can comfort or guide people, replace tears with a smile, then it gives me great joy."

People were left to make up their own minds at the end of the meeting. It is undoubtedly difficult to grasp anything which goes beyond the rational or material but spiritualism does seem to offer some people purpose and meaning.

The movement has battled hard for years against ignorance and prejudice. But judging from its swelling ranks, at last it seems to be winning the fight.

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