Spiritual church movement

Many of them owe their origin to the evangelical work of Leafy Anderson, a black religious leader of the early 20th century who was born in Wisconsin and in 1913 founded the Eternal Life Christian Spiritualist Association.

In 1920, she relocated to New Orleans, Louisiana, where she demonstrated mediumship by bringing messages from her spirit guide Black Hawk, a historical war leader of the Native American Sauk tribe, who had lived near where she was born.

It spread quickly throughout America during the 1920s, and one impetus for its diffusion was that in 1922, the National Spiritualist Association of Churches expelled or made unwelcome all of its black members.

[2][3] During the decade preceding World War II, the Spiritual churches of New York City were well documented in print and film.

This naming convention is found in mid-20th-century books such as How To Conduct a Candle Light Service by Mikhail Strabo and Rev.