Talking to the spirits

Young Chang

For congregants of the Mystical Spiritualist Church of South Orange

County, Sunday mornings are a time to get in touch -- with the dead.

Members of this Costa Mesa church try to contact late family members,

friends, teachers, guides and angels through weekly services and healing

times.

The religion, founded in the 1800s, is called Spiritualism. Five

ministers brought the church to Costa Mesa in August.

“We thought we’d have more of an opportunity to talk to more people,”

said John Kohlenberger, a minister at the church. “And be another

resource for more education and information.”

Spiritualism started in 1848 in Hydesville, N.Y. Two teenage girls of

the Fox household are said to have noticed rapping sounds in their house.

They started communicating with what they considered “spirits” by asking

for a certain number of raps as answers to their questions. The spirits

supposedly responded.

Soon, others began trying to communicate with the dead in their own

homes. Seances were held. Spiritualism became an organized religion and

grew throughout the 20th century.

Though Spiritualism does not have a fixed creed, there are a number of

commonly held beliefs including personal responsibility, communion with

the spirits and angels, the continuous existence of the human soul and

the fatherhood of God.

Sunday services at the fairly new Newport Boulevard church start with

a half-hour spiritual healing session. For the rest of the morning, the

congregation speaks to spirits the way people in Christian churches might

pray.

“It’s a two-way communication so that we can get information messages

from those who we might call the other side of life, but we also

communicate to them,” Kohlenberger said. “That’s how prayers work.

Meditation helps in this process too.”

No spirits are evil because the Bible says God is everything in

everyone, and he is also everywhere, Kohlenberger added.

“Sometimes spirits are playful and we take that as evil or bad, not

understanding it as just playful,” the minister said.

The results are everything from comfort and inspiration to healing.

Kohlenberger cited Albert Einstein to explain.

“That if we’re going to try to solve the problem using the thinking

that created it, we’ll never solve it,” he said. “We need to come up with

some new ideas, a new way of thinking.”

That’s where the spirits and religious reference books come in. Church

leaders use the Bible, the Koran, the Torah and other religious and

philosophical texts for guidance. But during the spiritual healing

services, congregants draw upon a force that is called universal energy.

“We use it everyday,” Kohlenberger said. “It’s a universal life force.

If I had to describe it with one word, it’s love.”

Healing also requires using forces of intention and inspiration.

Intention directs the flow of universal energy and inspiration is a

product of the healing, whether it’s physical or spiritual, he said.

John Hirano, also a minister at the church, said the process focuses

on bringing positive energy into people.

“The healing in itself is just a transference of energy,” Hirano said.

“And I think everyone needs healing.”

FYI

WHAT: The Mystical Spiritualist Church of South Orange County

WHEN: Services are held at 10 a.m. Sundays. Spiritual healing starts

at 9:30 a.m.

WHERE: 2482 Newport Blvd., Ste. 3, Costa Mesa

CALL: (949) 581-2290