Our history
With uninterrupted activity, based in Lagos, she is the founder, together with the Spiritist Association of Portimão, of the Spiritist Union of the Algarve . Implanted in the social environment in which it is inserted, it leaves the four walls and shows the spiritism to society. What is the Spiritist Association of Lagos? Come and meet her from there.
It was born within the walls of the Headquarters at the time existing in Lagos. At the end of the last century, a colonel, a dental surgeon, who was working at the Military Hospital, organized the first mediumistic study and research group. Other soldiers followed him – Captain Lázaro, Captain Paula Santos, Sergeant Beles, among others – and Sergeant Narciso Vieira was the first president of what is now the AEL. The oldest minutes of its meetings date from 20 October 1913. From then onwards, it operated with authorization from the Civil Governor of Faro.
Its history includes numerous visitors, such as Divaldo Franco (1967) on his first visit to Portugal, Jorge Rizzini, Newton Boechat, Ariston Santana Teles, Dr Francisco Thiesen, Dr Raul Teixeira, among many others.
The most notable thing is that it was one of the rare Spiritist centers that Salazar's dictatorship did not end. Strange fact. Why? An unusual psychic medium, who collaborated in the AEL before 1974 (did incarnate in the meantime), through this inquiry he concentrated a little and then described what had been shown to him: the process of AEL it was under a huge pile of files that, first they were finalized, there was a lot to wait.
At that time, before the 25th of April 1974, it was an association with poor material resources, albeit with valuable human resources. It should be noted that to remain in business they had to have a license issued by the Mayor; to give soup to the poor, a humanitarian act, they had to have written authorization from the Santa Casa de Misericórdia Ombudsman to whom the hostel belonged.
the near past
After 1974, with freedom of expression, it was possible to draw up statutes, whose notarial deed took place on July 7, 1977. There were many requests for help, mainly on a spiritual level, but also on a material level. At that time, the Association had about 15 employees.
At AEL there was a group of workers who, with people who had psychological and spiritual problems, did beautiful work, in an occupational therapy process. It also happened that an English citizen ministered, on Sunday afternoons and Mondays, a support meeting within the Alcoholics Anonymous program. It all started when this man, who lived in the marina in Lagos on his boat, started to support some of his fellow countrymen. As the group grew, they had to look for a bigger space. He went to different churches (Catholic and Evangelical) and received no. One day someone told him about AEL and the doors were opened for him to continue his help.
The headquarters itself was the result of a generous donation of Fortunata Leal Forçado, who does not have his own house and lives off his job, upon receiving the house through inheritance, soon donated it to the AEL .
Faced with the question – what did the Association live on, as it does not take money to the people who land there, Julieta Marques, President of AEL replied:
- The Association lives from the subscription of its members, who pay a symbolic fee and from the donations of some generous hearts. Of course, we do not take money to people who come looking for help, but on the contrary, we help in cases of distress, as well as distributing the grocery basket at Christmas and Easter to 41 needy families and monthly to five or six families.
A library with about a thousand books (some of them rare) encourages people to read and have their own library at home. There was a concern to equip the Association with up-to-date audiovisual means that would respond to the needs of the new times.
Several projects were developed, such as drama, singing and poetry. Painting exhibitions were also held annually, with works carried out in psychopictography meetings.