Kardecist Spiritism and passe healing

Domain XIV · Western esoteric, divinatory & new spiritual movements · Allan Kardec (Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail) · 1857 · Paris, France

What it is

This is a religious and healing movement, not a psychotherapy. Spiritism was codified by Allan Kardec (pseudonym of Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail, 1804–1869). The Spirits' Book (Le Livre des Esprits, Paris, 1857) is the first of a five-book canon. It is written as questions and answers attributed…

Format

• Mediumship: study and practice of mediumship as preparation. Mediumship meetings (reuniões mediúnicas) give assistance to disembodied spirits described as needing guidance. Communications from "spiritually ill" spirits are kept to private meetings, not public sessions.
• 2b. The psychotherapist's work: phases. No source gives session counts for this work. Pace it to the presenting problem.

Who practises it, and how they are trained or regulated

• The published sequence for a newcomer runs: welcome, then a private dialogue, then referral within the centre to the Gospel explanation meeting, passe, study and Evangelho no Lar. FEB states that all doctrinal activity must be free of charge. It discourages bingo and raffles, and it prohibits collections during doctrinal meetings. The movement's sources give no session counts or durations for passe. Training…
• Version followed: Brazilian Kardecist Spiritism (Espiritismo) as the Federação Espírita Brasileira (FEB) sets out centre activities in Orientação ao Centro Espírita (FEB, 2021, approved by the Conselho Federativo Nacional on 6 November 2020, revising guidance from 1980 and 2007), Allan Kardec's own works as Spiritist training texts cite them, and scholarly accounts of Spiritist psychiatric hospitals (Moreira-Almeida…
• This is a religious and healing movement, not a psychotherapy. Spiritism was codified by Allan Kardec (pseudonym of Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail, 1804–1869). The Spirits' Book (Le Livre des Esprits, Paris, 1857) is the first of a five-book canon. It is written as questions and answers attributed to spirits, with Kardec's commentary. Its core teachings, as the movement states them, are belief in God, the survival…

Evidence status, as the guide reports it

• Meaning-centred work on the presenting problem, using the client's frame where helpful (charity, moral progress, continuing bonds), alongside an evidence-based treatment for any disorder. Move on once symptoms or goals are improving.

Questions to explore with your client

• What drew you to it, and what are you hoping it will change?
• Is there physical contact? Was it explained beforehand, and do you feel free to say no or stop at any point?
• Does it involve any substance, plant preparation, remedy or supplement? Has your doctor or prescriber been told, especially about any medication you take?
• Is it a group, retreat or community? How do they respond if someone wants to leave or raises a concern?
• How do you and the practitioner understand what is happening, in spiritual or cultural terms? Is that a source of comfort, worry, or both?
• Who runs it, and what training or registration do they hold?
• What actually happens in a session or meeting, and how often?
• What does it cost, and is there pressure to commit to more?
• How do you feel afterwards, in the hours and days that follow?
• Does it fit with, or clash with, the work we do here?

What practitioners of it watch for

• substitution for medical care. Route physical health questions to the client's doctor.
• overstepping the client's consent, and treating the community leader as a co-therapist.
• refusal of urgent care, a child frightened of spirits, and a child asked to act as a medium.
• rigid use of doctrine to suppress grief or anger ("I shouldn't cry, he's in a better place").
• a family member using spiritual explanations to control another, and teenagers pressured to attend.

When to involve someone else

• New or worsening physical symptoms, or advice to stop or change prescribed medication: involve the client's doctor or prescriber.
• Signs of coercion, isolation from family and friends, escalating costs or secrecy: discuss openly and consider safeguarding.
• A crisis or thoughts of suicide: follow your crisis protocol. In the US, call or text 988; in the UK and Ireland, Samaritans on 116 123.

Drawn automatically from the guide's own sections. Stay curious: neither endorse nor dismiss what the client values, and check anything that matters against the full guide and its sources. Not medical advice.