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God and his causes III: unfolding a new image of the Universe.

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I n a series of previous posts, we saw that the Creation and the idea of God as described in " The Spirit's Book"  (1) is significantly distinct from the commonly accepted notion of a personal God (according to most religions). The Spiritist notion is an alternative for those ideas in which God is not necessary (Atheism, for example), since the notion of God as a person - which make him an image of the human nature -  is not accepted by Spiritism. We explored the meaning in the concept of "primary cause" that can be applied even to the simplest phenomenon. Very often, the scope of scientific theories is the treatment of causes directly linked to phenomena, but scientific development can also lead to the discovery of more fundamental causes that should be regarded as primary ones. The existence of a fundamentally distinct element in the Universe (the intelligent principle) has a complementary and paramount rule to play in the understanding of many phenom...

Academic study about the mediumship of Chico Xavier

T he journal  Explore  (1) has recently published an article by Alexandre Caroli Rocha, Denise ParanĂ¡, Elizabeth Schmitt Freire, Francisco Lotufo Neto and Alexander Moreira-Almeida containing an interesting study about the mediumship of Chico Xavier. Entitled " Investigating the Fit and Accuracy of Alleged Mediumistic Writing: A Case Study of Chico Xavier’s Letters ", the work performed an analysis of 13 psychographic letters and searched for the degree of information accuracy in each of them against the chance of "normal" access by the medium to that information. The article abstract reads: We identified 99 items of verifiable information conveyed in these 13 letters; 98% of these items were rated as “Clear and Precise Fit” and no item was rated as “no Fit.” We concluded that normal explanations for accuracy of the information (i.e., fraud, chance, information leakage, and cold reading) were only remotely plausible. These results seem to provide empirical...

Spirit Messages: Studies on Reincarnation (The Spiritit Magazine, February 1864)

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The Spiritist Magazine, February 1864, Spiritist dissertations. Spiritist Society of Paris, Medium: Mrs: A. C. Limits of reincarnation Reincarnation is necessary when matter dominates the spirit. But, from the moment the spirit has mastered matter and annulated its effects on moral, reincarnation has neither use nor reason to exist. In effect, the body serves the spirit in his progressive work, until he learns to manage the body, and project his will upon matter when the work is accomplished. Then another field of action is necessary for the spirit advancement toward the infinite way. Another circle of study is required, where gross matter of inferior spheres is unknown. Having purged and experimented all sensation on Earth or on similar worlds, the spirit is mature enough for a spiritual life and other studies. Having elevated himself above all bodily sensations, the spirit is free from all desires or necessities applicable to bodiliness: it is a spirit and lives only spiri...

Spirit Message: Rebirth (by Urbain Grandier)

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"Stop weeping, for she has not died, but is asleep." (Luke, VIII, 52) H umankind, to you I address these words! To you, who say lost, those who try to read you future! To you, annihilated by unbelief, frozen by skeptical selfishness, befogged by doubt! On you, poor daughter of Jairus, many exclaim: "No use calling, the girl is dead !!!" But the Master gets in the house and moving closer says: "Stop weeping, for she has not died, but is asleep!" Humankind, near this deathbed, where passions bind you, the Master has deigned to approach and, followed by some of his dear ones, has extended to you his divine hands and said: "My child, get up and walk! Leave this lethargy, this apathy so common to those approaching death, get up and walk!" Get up Humankind and leave this deathbed of agony, the cause of your sufferings! Leave selfshness that restricts and smothers your noble passions; leave your pride, the thirst of gold erasing the ...

The Spiritist Magazine by Allan Kardec in English

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A s announced in the blog NWSpiritism , we can now read some historic editions of " La Revue Spirite" (originally published in French, 1 ) by Allan Kardec in English . The formal name of the work in English is " The Spiritist Magazine - Journal of Psychological Studies ". This achievement is just the beginning of a monumental translation work still under preparation by IPEAK (Allan Kardec Institute of Research) and carried out by Luiz A. V. Cheim. IPEAK website is a bilingual page (in Portuguese and French) which we hope will bring more content in English in the future. This is surely a relevant endeavor, since A. Kardec was one of the pioneers of the psychic research but he is widely unknown to English speaking people. There are several cases of hauntings and psychic communications analysed by Kardec as a first read through "The Spiritist Magazine" can reveal.  The Magazine also was a key tool in the beginning of Spiritism, since it contains m...

God and his causes II - Primary and secondary causes

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“We allow satellites, planets, suns, universe, nay whole systems of the universe, to be governed by laws, but the smallest insect, we wish to be created at once by special act.”  ― Charles Darwin, Notebooks O ur study here addresses the debate between "Creationists" and "Evolutionists" on regard to the origin of species and life. We notice that the conflict between "Darwin and God" is sometimes devoid of fair argumentation. It is somewhat fabricated by both a religious fundamentalist view of the world and the way science has established itself in opposition to traditional views of this same world. Today, the last vestiges of dogmatic theology are billeted around controversies on the evolution of life. If the life forms that we know today were not the product of several direct interventions of a man's made God then,  he at least possibly gave birth to these forms at a single time in the beginning.  So, we continue our study to get ...

God ans His causes I

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“ It took less than an hour to make the atoms,  a few hundred million years to make the stars and planets,  but five billion years to make man! ” George Gamow, "The Creation of the Universe". T he present scientific image of creation - supported by modern cosmological theories and having as scope the material phenomena only - concedes that our Universe was created in a single instant in time, the so-called "Big Bang" (1).  The Big-Bang is associated with the origin of the material element . But matter is far from being the only ingredient that exists in the Universe - even from the academic of view. There are also "laws" and "principles" that help to organize matter and give the Universe its shape and structure. These principles regulate how matter interacts with itself and with other elements in order to produce everything we can see with our ordinary senses and mainly all that we can't see . Without the laws, the Universe woul...