Books (Sept 2011)

Spiritism and Mental Health: Practices from Spiritist Centers and Spiritist Psychiatric Hospitals in Brazil

by Emma Bragdon

Emma Bragdon, PhD (Editor). Spiritism and Mental Health: Practices from Spiritist Centers and Spiritist Psychiatric Hospitals in Brazil. Philadelphia, PA: Jessica Kingsley 2011.  352 pp.  $99.95

Emma Bragdon, PhD, has been studying Brazilian’s Spiritist treatments for enhancing health for the past decade. She has brought together a very interesting collection of essays that explore these fascinating alternative views on treating mental health issues.

Many Spiritists are highly trained as mediums and can communicate with spirits that have attached themselves to living people, causing various physical and psychological symptoms. Through varieties of interventions addressing the spirit possession (subjugating communications that express the will of the spirit through the person being possessed) or spirit obsession (adversely influencing the mind 
and body of the person), the mediums are able to help free people of their problems.

While Spiritists can be found in many countries around the world, Brazil is unique in integrating Spiritist treatments with conventional hospital and clinic care in their Spiritist Hospitals. This integrative care appears to hold great promise for improving treatment outcomes, while reducing the need for reliance on psychiatric medications. In Brazil, Spiritist mediums and healers work without compensation. They come from all walks of life, giving of their time and healing presence to help others through difficult times in their life journeys.

This book is well organized. An introductory section introduces readers to concepts of Spiritist healing. The settings and procedures of Spiritist healings are described in the second section. A third section shares views and experiences of a variety of clinicians and researchers exploring how Spiritist healings are in line with current clinical practices and research in consciousness and bio-physics.  This includes a review of the research validating the existence of survival of consciousness after death and of spirit communications. The fourth section discusses extensions and implications of Spiritist healings in many countries around the world. The last section considers issues of research in this fascinating frontier field of treatments and explorations of these aspects of the human condition.

The materials vary from personal observations, through clinical studies and theoretical discussions on to considerations of the important implications of the continuation of consciousness after physical death, with spirit interactions continuing with those who are still in their physical existence.

The mental and emotional problems of the living are not all attributed to spirit intrusions. There is clearly a place for psychotherapy, family therapy, medications and social supports. The awareness of spirit involvements adds an enormously important dimension to addressing issues of mental health and illness.

Clinicians who are open to exploring transpersonal aspects of mental health and illness will find this book absolutely fascinating. This book will also be of interest to anyone who is exploring the deeper processes and meanings of life and the human condition.

Review by Daniel Benor, MD
Editor-in-Chief, IJHC