Pain and its valuable effects

 
Defined by Léon Denis as the law of balance and education, either the physical pain or the moral one has the objective of taking the human beings to a higher level of evolution.

As well know, some people can’t perceive the superior reality of life unless they go through pain, and there are many examples showing that.

In other cases, the pain constitutes a kind of shortcut, to invoke or motivate a change, as says Ana Maria Brito Leal Previato, this week’s interviewee.

Brought to Spiritistm due to a period of health treatment, Ana Maria declared to her interviewer: “I can affirm, without hesitation, that I sought the Spiritist Doctrine because of the pain, blessed pain that enlightened my path”.

In addition to pain, the Spiritist phenomenon has also been an important factor leading people’s conversion. Many famous mediums and researchers in the Spiritist circle reached the Doctrine taken by either one or the other. The example of Benedita Fernandes is, in this sense, extraordinary, as are also the conversion cases of Jésus Gonçalves, Cairbar Schutel and many others.

In Brazil, three examples deserve to be remarked. We’ll mention them here without exposing people’s names on purpose.

A certain woman, while attending to her friend’s wedding at the church, fainted right at the moment when the fiancées were kissing each other. In the following day, she was already in one of psychiatric hospitals of her city. The obsessive process had become intense and the family was facing difficulties to cope with the treatment until the day some friends took her to a Spiritist House. There, the woman could recover and then the process finally came to an end, giving to the local Spiritist Movement of her city a new medium and a very devoted worker who much has done for the Gospel.

Teacher and honourable writer, endowed with admirable intelectual resources, was resistant to accept the existence of God as taught by traditional religions and, because of that, he used to keep himself away from any religion or natural concerns of Christian workers. In a certain afternoon, after having lunch, his father-in-law – who had passed away years ago – appears. The phenomeon ocurred again for days with neatness, which made the materialist individual turn into a Spiritist, who now writes books and publishes the Spiritist principles about the Creator and His laws.

Catholic parents of two young boys, a couple collapsed facing the loss of their youngest son, 15 years old, found dead in mysterious conditions, apparently indicating a suicide. They went to a psychiastrist who recommended them to visit a Spiritist House. By attending to the Spiritist meetings and studies frequently, the couple could find a different balance, an unknown peace of mind and, amazingly enough, the mother’s mediumship faculty came up. Thanks to her new faculty, she could feel the presence of her son, then becoming his instrument as a psychographer medium and being able to help many people who recently experienced the same loss she did.

When Iraq broke free from its dictator, who used to rule the country until being deposed, mediums started appearing. According to the press, some mediums specialized themselves in the field of finding out the destination of disappeared people, while others dedicated their time to healings. And that took place in a Muslim country, where the Christian influence isn’t predominant, showing that nothing can be done against the facts, because the phenomena are part of God’s Laws – they are neither a result of teachings nor belong to any religion.