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Has Religion Failed?

Has religion failed? The spirit world are strongly against war. They regard it as wholesale murder, and more venal than the most horrible crime punished by the gallows. They urge us with all the force at their command to forgo it. They tell us how the mutilated spirits of the slain come into their world unprepared, many of them thirsting for revenge, seeking blood, and helping to augment the passions of their fellows left on earth. They tell us that if we could see, we should never allow a child of ours to go to battle. But there is a stronger reason than this why the world should disarm. Wars cost money. The last war left the world bankrupt. Seventeen shillings in every pound earned in this country goes to pay [text cuts off here]

Spiritualism has historically been connected to progress movements and beliefs, such as opposition to war. The Spiritualist belief in life after death was interpreted by many as an argument for social change. However, note how the article emphasizes the economic cost as a more important argument against war than human death. While many Spiritualists held progressive ideas, it is important to note the Eurocentric and Western cultural attitudes that shaped Spiritualist belief.

“Has Religion Failed?” in “A Thousand and One Events” Published Monthly at Erlestoke Park, Wilts, Editor: Clifford W. Potter, in Survival, vol. IV, no. 26, 1932, pg. 301, Box 34, Eileen J. Garrett Parapsychology Foundation Collection, Collection 331, Special Collections, University of Maryland, Baltimore County (Baltimore, MD).

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