To answer Terry's questions as best I can right now:

First, I went in and edited my last response so that it did not cut off mid-sentence.

Next, I agree that some of these spirits no doubt are downright malicious, and seeking to harm people, or perhaps even mold people to their own ends.

Also I think it is rare that any entity so driven by their own agenda (and only that) is going to be forthright about their malicious intents. No doubt entities seasoned in evil, and in practicing evil, will ACT like they have a person's best interests at heart, and I think that is what the cults do.

Yes I am leery of everything out there. Maybe it is like a child who is taught to be leery of strangers. It is sad we cannot just trust people and we don't quite exactly want to become paranoid. But on the other hand the best candidates to have a child's best interests at heart are his or her own parents and family.

Likewise, I have come to know what I personally can trust in life, such as prayer when I have questions. Then I might have to be patient, but the answers seem to come right when I really do need them.

Someone who wrote a book or who is just out there preaching some agenda of course must be taken with a grain of salt, and ideally I only incorporate what they say into my own life after some of my own personal experience with it.

As for any "test" of good and evil, all I can think of to draw on for myself about that is the advice Jesus gave, where he said, "by their fruits ye will know them." (Sorry I don't know exactly where that is but it is in one of the four gospels, somewhere.)

And as I think about experiences with people in my life, that is definitely a very good test.

From my own experience, I have to agree with you that some of these channelers are on an ego trip when they have a "captive audience" and decide to do their thing. I've also participated in group meditations where and experienced this. I guess they need to do this to make themself feel important... it is relatively harmless though, to those participating. Perhaps a bit annoying.

I think that some of these "channelers" start out with egotism as a underlying motive, and others of them don't, but that even the ones that don't sometimes become too dependent on their supposed psychic revelations.

I know of one individual who used to do something along the line of "channeling" (but has mostly quit), and he means well but I think sometimes he makes judgements about situations of which he does not have all of the concrete facts.

Some of these "channelers" get overly dependent on a notion that they can intuit (sp?) everthing, and then they will not ask people for all of the facts when a situation comes up, and their resulting assesments and judgments sometimes can be very skewed because of this.

Edward's ego motivation is money. He charges unbelievable amounts of money to "channel" for people.

Sylvia Browne, another TV psychic, has started a "new religion". This is the same woman who was on Larry King Live on Sept. 10 and had no predictions to make about anything special happening the next day. Afterwards, however, both she and Edward talked about 'having a feeling something big wa going to happen'. Phuleeeeeze ...

EDIT: It's been a long time since I've been on this board, but let me say that John Edward is paid millions to do the show (like Montel and other TV show hosts are) and he charges a fortune for his "private sessions". It is interesting to note that the clients are not permitted to tape record their sessions.

I didn't realize John Edward charges the people he "comes through" for. I thought they just had a ticket to be in the audience.

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Note: I am coming back in to edit this and want to say that I have checked around, and I understand that tickets to John Edward's television audience are either free, or for a nominal fee. Also I heard that so many people want to be in the audience that names are picked --- something like out of a hat, I don't know exactly how they do it --- but you "win" a place in his audience. Apparently this enables him to keep his audience small, and if that is what he wants, that's his business as far as I am concerned and I cannot judge him for that.

Also I have personal hesitations about judging people by how they personally spend or manage their money. This is because one of the most judgmental people I've ever come across about how other people use their money was herself a drug addict who wanted to control other people's money herself.
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On Sylvia Browne, I don't know very much about her but have a friend who at one time thought a lot of her. At that time I VERY BRIEFLY glanced over one of Sylvia Browne's books and there was something in there I disagreed with, and so I was not very impressed with her and decided not to follow up on her. I wish I could remember exactly what it was she said that I disagreed with. I think it had to do with the subject of cloning --- I can't remember if she said clones would not have souls or just what but I believe she was entirely against cloning, and I am not necessarily against it, although as with anything there is potential for abuse. To explain my view on cloning --- I am no more against it than I am against "sex." Certainly "bad" things like rape and incest and adultery are things which conceive children who have souls nevertheless. That is my view on this subject. I would much rather be concieved as a clone than through something like rape or adultery, etc.

It is one thing for people to disagree and that is not necessarily bad. But these people who "channel" and are "psychic" often convey that they have a hotline to God, and so to disagree with them can tend to have connotations of being either "bad" or a "lesser being" inherent, if one disagrees with them.

It is one thing for a channeler or psychic to say this is what I think, but when they start proclaiming things like what is "right" and what is "wrong" they start taking the place of God, and to use a very old fashioned term, that is what "I cannot abide."

Normal human disagreements are another thing entirely.

I am not necessarily against channeling.

Channeling can easily be a very convenient ploy for those wishing to control or manipulate others.

Naive others who hear channelings often presume channelers have a hotline to God.

If anything spiritual is going on at all (any more than any conversation anytime, anywhere is spiritual) --- then the spirit entity being channeled is not necessary God.

Also the spirit entity being "channeled" does not necessarily have the best interests at heart, of those hearing the channeling --- I suspect even though their "agenda" might not be all bad, either.

People need to keep these things in mind if they are going to take heed to channelings. People can be unnecessarily hurt (and/or warped) if they take channeling too seriously, or as the only way the spirit world communicates with the "living."

Channelings often have no more credence than one's own inner instincts.

and psychic talent doesnt guarantee infallibility.

From what I have read, it is quite hazardous to develop psychic talents unless the person 1) has gone through normal milestones of psycho social development and has a good 'functioning ego' 2) has learned how to earn a living by honest means 3) can form and maintain friendships and intimate partnerships through normal adult communication.

If a person activates psychic talents (including channelling) but has not learned how to function as a normal adult, he or she will be very tempted to dodge areas of personal immaturity by using psychic talents in ways that are dishonest and manipulative--using psychic talent to con people into giving access to their money and or their bodies.

A reputable psychic (who is a Benedictine monk) mentioned in a discussion on Google that genuine psychics he has known find their talent a heavy responsiblity and do NOT flaunt their talents in public. In fact, he said he was struck by how many of these genuine psychic 'go to ground" (seek privacy) as they get older.

Someone who puts his or her powers on display is either a poorly trained psychic or a crook who is pretending to be one.

A I would always ask before a meditation evening 'What format will this follow?' If they dont tell you the truth and you find you've been lied to, you have every right to stand up in the middle of it and loudly announce that you were given misleading information, that this is unethical, and then walk out.

Just want to say that I very much appreciate Corboy's comments.

Regarding radio waves --- no they are not the work of "Satan" -- but suppose someone used radio waves to PRETEND like they were God, and speak over them. THAT is what I am getting at.

Like say we came across primitive people, or any people that are somehow ignorant of the "magic" of radio waves.

It would be easy to seduce and use these people by pretending the radio waves were the voice of God.

Please understand that THIS is what I am getting at --- a pretense of God for the convenience of using and manipulating people --- or trying to over-ride their own consciences or better instincts with this sort of pretense.

Thanks for considering this, and that THIS is what I find abominable --- not JUST radio waves or channeling, but how they are used and abused by people who don't care about other people, except to exploit and use them for their own agenda/s.

That is when it can become a "molestation," of a sort anyway.

This is a copy of an e-mail sent to lyara@ operationterra.com .

Are you smart boys? Then investigate this:

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First I beg your benevolence with my poor english.

I´m trying to advice other channeled persons, but by the moment with little or no success. I hope you , at least, spend a few minutes of rational thinking on the following lines.

As you and many others I´ve been for years transmitting messages received from unknown entities. Basically all of these messages share the same purpose. I don´t know if you are a genuine medium or simply are recycling the material from "Ra" or "cassiopaeans" or the spanish sources, but this have no importance at all, because the final effect is exactly the same.

I inform you that you are being manipulated against your will with the goal of defeating the society as we know it and create a new order in which the reason, the freedom and the right to decide our destiny will be erased. You can call it "the kingdom" "the new age", "the golden age" or whatever. I call it a farm, and our destiny be the cattle. Consider the III Reich simply an advance.

I talk with the voice of the experience with no other objective than fight as long I could for the sake of our race and try to rectify the damage that, by ignorance, I´ve contributed to make. You are free to believe in what you want, but please consider the following:

1.- For every channeled person there are a different kind of entities -or so appears-. Why the same entities don´t contact with different persons?

2.- They are smarter than us , but it doesn´t imply than they are better than us. The law of nature is: the stronger feed with the weaker. And the same law could be applied in the relations between intelligent beings.

3.- No matter the mask they have adopted, they aren´t a new phenomena. They have been manipulating us for ages. Please study carefully human story and the effect that the messages "from beyond" have provoked.

4.- All these entities say the same: "do not entrust your science, do not entrust your laws or your government, put your faith in us" . But they never give a single proof that they deserve this confidence.

5.- You are broadcasting a message from an unknown entitiy, and as long you can´t be sure of its identity, you can´t be sure of the purpose. It could be the spirit of a deceased person, or an ET, or a demon, or a traumatic scission from your unconscious or from the collective unconscious, or worse. And you can believe me: it´s worse.

I do not pretend you stop channeling, it´s up to you. But if you don´t try to verify beyond any reasonable doubt who or what is in the other side of the line, you could charge over you guiltiness for the future consequences. As myself.