December 16, 2003

SVATY JUR, Slovak Republic/GENEVA - Spiritualist practices are not only widespread outside the churches. They represent a reality within churches. Dr Harald Lamprecht, Evangelical Lutheran Church of Saxony in Germany, made these remarks at a Lutheran World Federation (LWF) European region seminar on spiritualistic movements.

Many people who are involved with spiritualist movements also consider themselves Christians. Therefore, the churches have the task of translating the gospel anew for a "post-rationalist age," said Lamprecht, responsible for world views and sects with the Saxon church.

Lamprecht was among 24 delegates from Lutheran churches in 15 European countries who gathered mid-October in Svaty Jur, Slovak Republic, as part of an LWF study program, "Spiritualistic Movements as a Global Challenge for the Church." The participants noted that the increasing importance of spiritualistic movements pose a major challenge in Europe, and particularly called for more emphasis on the pastoral care of bereaved persons.

With various references to Luther and the confessional writings, General Bishop Dr. Julius Filo, head of the seminar's host church, the Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession in the Slovak Republic, elaborated on the place of the Holy Spirit and spirits in the Bible.

Dr Johan L.F. Gerding, professor at the institute of parapsychology, Leiden University in the Netherlands, explained that extraordinary human experiences are the subject of parapsychological research. Although millions of people have had experiences with the spiritual world, he said, they rarely dare to talk about them. But, he noted, a simple conversation is often much more helpful than the usual psychotherapeutic or pharmacological interventions. He pointed out that extrasensory perception and psychokinesis have become very plausible events, as shown by parapsychology experiments, "and such experiences need to be accepted as part of human reality, even though we cannot completely explain their causes."

Dr Matthias Poehlmann, representing the Protestant center for ideologies in Berlin, Germany, explained that the phenomena of new revelations had led to the development of "post-Christian belief systems" which seek to renew or overcome church Christianity. He noted that in the experience of "channeling" - communication with the spirit world through a medium - there is a tendency to mechanize religion or the religious. Thus, he noted, spiritual evolution is becoming the inner space "hope for salvation." Dr Theo Sundermeier, a missiology professor at the University of Heidelberg, Germany, warned against impoverishing the diversity of biblical faith: "We have lost the contact and communication with the realm of heaven taken for granted in the Bible."

Efforts to Build Bridges between the Church and Spiritualistic Movements

Rev. Ole Skjerbaek Madsen from Denmark called on the seminar participants not to meet members of the neo-spiritualist movements primarily with dogmatic arguments and judgments, but to listen to them. Christian prayers and acts of blessing, he said, would produce their own effect, so that doctrinal discussions do not need to be the first stage of an encounter. In his efforts to build bridges between the church and the spiritualist movements, Madsen has been holding worship services under the title, "In the Master's Light" (IML) since 1995.

In the seminar's plenary and small group discussions, participants agreed that it was indispensable to find out, in personal conversations with people, what their spiritualistic experiences meant to them. This would reveal the lacunae in the church's work and proclamation of the gospel, which are currently being filled with spiritualistic content. It was proposed that the church's teaching and practice need to pay more attention to elements of faith that are somewhat neglected - such as the Resurrection, Christian hope in connection with individual and general eschatology, angels and the gifts of the Spirit.

The goal of the LWF program is "to provide assistance to Lutheran churches all over the world in view of the growing influence, even within the churches, of spiritualistic movements," explained the study coordinator, Rev. Dr Ingo Wulfhorst, the Study Secretary for the Church and People of Other Faiths, LWF Department for Theology and Studies.

A compilation of experiences shared in the seminar will be presented to the churches in the region for consultation. Similar meetings are planned for all LWF regions by the end of 2004. A document on the global experiences under the LWF program will be published in 2005, and will serve as a guide for the churches on the subject of spiritualistic movements.

Lutheran World Information