Letter from C.W. Leadbeater to Annie Besant
about the Healing Service.
Sydney, May 25, 1923.
A demand was made by a number of our own congregation of the Liberal Catholic Church that the number who had been disappointed should be allowed to avail themselves of the Healing Service according to our ritual. I therefore held one on Sunday last, at which seventy patients were treated. We had no instantaneous cures, but nearly every patient testified to very marked improvement. If patients desire it (and I think they will) I shall probably continue these services at intervals, as I am reasonably certain that in many cases their diseases would yield to repeated treatments. There is evidently an exceedingly interesting field of study there.
I think that this question of what I suppose we must call spiritual healing has hardly been approached in the past in a scientific spirit. Men have regarded such cures as direct interpositions of the Almighty, defying the natural action of His own laws; and so either the patient has been cured instantaneously or condemned as not having sufficient faith to allow a cure to be effected. It seems to me that this is one of the many methods of curing diseases - a method which may be instantly effective in some cases, but only gradually effective after what we may call repeated doses of the force in others; and perhaps not applicable at all in yet other cases.
Our Healing Service calls for a "Healing Angel"; in response to that there came a colossal and most dignified Angelic figure whom I have never seen before. Beyond a kindly smile of greeting, he took very little notice of us, but appeared to be pouring streams of force not only upon the patients, but upon other members of the congregation.
The power which other brought to bear was tremendous - so much so that two people fainted, and many others were affected in various ways. I shall endeavour humbly to make his acquaintance, if he will permit me to do so, because I think he could give us much valuable information, and possibly show us how to use his tremendous outpouring of force more effectively and economically. When I have collected enough facts to be able to say anything definite, I might perhaps make a useful article out of it.