Spirit and Science

Welcome to the website of the Spiritist Society of Miami

The Spiritist Society of Miami is the successor of The Spiritist Society of Cuba and represents a group of organizations that appeared in Cuba during the second half of the XIX century and the beginnings of the XX century when the ideals of Spiritism (based on the works of Allan Kardec) and the phenomena of Modern Spiritualism arrived in Cuba from Europe and North America.

These societies had many different names and structures, from small spiritual centers to national federations that organized international events, but as a general rule, they were non-profit organizations devoted to the spreading of the ideals of Spiritism through education and charity work.

After the political events of 1959 most of the members of the Society began emigrating to the United States, where many of them continued their spiritual labor in Miami, Florida, and in several other cities. These initially small groups eventually evolved into more organized centers. Today these centers exist as independent organizations with members from many different countries, including people from Cuba, Brazil, Venezuela, Puerto Rico, and of course Americans, all sharing a common philosophy of life we call Spiritism.

The first purpose of this website is to recover and maintain the history of the Spiritist Society, including all documents related to spirit communications received through the mediums that worked there. The book The Cuban Spiritist Society (La Sociedad Espiritista Cubana) is a selection of these spirit communications, which contain timeless lessons about the application of the Spiritist Doctrine through the life of some of the members of the Society. These teachings can help all seekers of universal spiritual truth by providing hope in life and answers to perennial questions.

Our second objective here is to present the scientific evidence that support the philosophy we call Spiritism or Spiritist Doctrine. Regarding the Spiritist Doctrine, oftentimes we as Spiritist are asked questions like, what is the essential message of Spiritism, what is actually new in Spiritism compared to the other philosophies and religions, and so on. Well, a full understanding of Spiritism would require reading what we call the Spiritist Codification, which are the five books written by Allan Kardec, but for the reader's convenience, we have come up with an ultra brief summary of the essence of Spiritism in just three lines:

Spiritism in three lines (the essential message):

	The spirit world is real. This is the dimension where spirits dwell. The community of all spirits connected, form a greater unity, which is the Spirit.
	Spirits R Us. We are all spirits having a human experience. In other words, humans are incarnated spirits. We have been spirits before we were born, and will be spirits again when we cross over into the spirit world through the process called death. Some people living on Earth have the ability to communicate with spirits in the spirit world; whether they are called mediums, intuitive psychics, or channellers, the name doesn't matter, but in many cases the phenomena is real, subject to natural laws.
	Reincarnation happens. Reincarnation is soul evolution. We have free will and we live on a planet of free choice, although we are subjects to the natural laws including the Law of Cause and Effect. When we are in the spirit world we have the option to return to Earth for another life lesson. Most of us have chosen this option many times before.

We sincerely hope you find this site interesting, informative, or at least intriguing. If that is the case, we invite you to please continue reading the other pages of this website and judge for yourself. Just follow the menu on the upper left side of the page or continue here: What is Spiritism.

The Spirist Doctrine of Spiritual Evolution seen through the metaphor of the Nautilus

Oliver Wendell Holmes, a century and a half ago, saw the metaphorical significance of the chambered home of the Nautilus. These fascinating seashells are spiral in shape and consist of a series of ever-larger chambers in each of which the sea creature lives for a season until it outgrows that particular space. The Nautilus then enlarges its shell by the addition of a new chamber suitable for the next stage of its life.

Holmes wrote, in a poem entitled The Chambered Nautilus, "Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul….Let each new temple, nobler than the last, Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, Till thou at length art free, Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea!"

What a perfect image for spiritual evolution! In order to begin a new stage in our growth, we have to think "outside the box." Yet, every time we abandon an old worldview for a new and wider vision, we merely find ourselves in a larger box. And while each box serves its particular function for a time, we are always in danger of claiming that the chamber we currently occupy is the ultimate one.

The spiral shape of the Nautilus shell suggests that it can keep growing forever. There is no design for a "final" chamber. The creature must keep building new chambers as long as it lives. It cannot go back to the previous ones; they no longer fit. It cannot stay in its present space or it will die. It has no choice but to move on. And on.

Perhaps one day we might be able to create for ourselves a box so large that it would encompass all of God. But that space would then include everything, even those realities which we now purposely exclude by limiting the size of today's chamber.

Nautilus

This site was last updated 01/17/07