Sonda do života spiritistů na příkladu Pěčína, obce v Orlických horách
The Life of Spiritists: A Case Study of Pěčín in the Orlické Mountains

Summary/Abstract: The paper summarizes the basic literature about this issue with the emphasis on Eastern Bohemia. Furthermore, it outlines primary sources available for the topic (funds of public administration, regional government, church administration, and personal funds). Despite the fragmentary preservation of documents, kept in various institutes and personal collections, the sources provide opportunity to describe the situation of the rural community from the end of the nineteenth century to the second half of the twentieth century, when the Spiritistic movement arose in Pěčín, the village situated at the foot of the Orlické Mountains. The diversity of sources points out at the various approaches of the Spiritism’s adherents. Recorded mediumistic speeches, which draw attention to the religious character of the movement, are complemented by practical information from the correspondence of female participants who visited mediumistic meetings. Parish documents also enable to observe the antagonist party of the Catholic Church, which perceived Spiritism such as a dangerous and hostile rival in spiritual matters. That could described through various strategies of church administrators concerning emerging séances in the parish – from the quiet toleration, via active attempts to change the situation, to open fight via complaints to superior institutes or “the punishment” of parishioners by the absence of sermons. Finally, the conflicting community of the country was solved by the history itself, which in the first half of the twentieth century brought another problems and marginalized Spiritism from the rural community through oppressions.

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