The Family Forest

Healing Across Time

by Roger Grainger

The personal narratives in this book were collected by the author over a period of four years, with the aim of allowing some of those who have had personal experience of a particular kind of healing to report their story. This is what Dr Kenneth McAll has called “Family Tree Healing”. It concerns the possibility of a special kind of relationship between the living and the dead — one which can be either therapeutic or harmful to those affected by it. The author himself became aware of its effects when he was working as chaplain in a large psychiatric hospital. His own story is given here as an introduction to those of six other people, whose backgrounds are very different from the author's — a teacher, a doctor, a shopkeeper, a poet, an evangelist and a speech therapist. The author now works as a counselling psychologist. What all the narratives have in common is something strange and unexpected that happened ‘in the family forest’.

“Round objects somehow magnifying in sight. A strong smell of sulphur in unexpected places. The bedside light appearing brighter than the sun. The young teacher who had had repeated breakdowns at college, and ‘heard voices’ angrily fighting with swords, with blood everywhere. Schizophrenia? Spirit possession? No, said Dr Kenneth McAll, but an ancestor of the teacher was an Elizabethan sea-captain who died on the Spanish Main in 1596 during a violent battle. Still earthbound somehow, he was waiting for some descendant to pray for his release.

“Those who know Dr McAll’s Healing the Family Tree will welcome this in-depth study of six cases, in which prayers for the dead, in particularly Requiem Eucharists, brought healing. They will also recognise the book’'s title. The Revd Dr Grainger himself suffered for many years, being variously diagnosed as schizophrenic or manic depressive, until a wise counsellor realised that he was in some strange sense trying to atone for the death of his brother at the age of six, who died before the author was born – many of the tantrums, black moods and so on would be typical of a six-year-old. His own healing was completed when Neil Broadbent (a member of our CFPSS Council, who carries on the work of Dr McAll) held a quiet Requiem, strong and loving, for the brother.

“Another study features an agnostic GP who attended an annual family memorial service purely out of loyalty. The names of family deceased were read out at Morning Prayer. At one such event, he became acutely aware of a grandfather who had died in an air raid a year before he himself was born. The family males tend to be shy, uptight persons, not given to weeping. But now, there was a vivid experience of the grandfather, as a frightened, lonely soldier, in floods of tears, so much so that the storyteller dissolved in tears too – healing tears, which created a much more open and loving personality.

“Why does God wait for descendants to ask for forgiveness and love, before granting rest to certain departed? Possible theories are explored, but in the end, ‘Tis mystery all!’ But the prayers work: a pragmatic approach like that of Jesus who, when asked why the man was born blind, simply went on and opened his eyes.”

The Revd Keith Denerley, Chairman of CFPSS, in ‘The Christian Parapsychologist’ June 2004

“Roger Grainger is an Anglican priest and chartered counselling psychologist, widely published in theology, psychology and therapeutic studies. This book uses seven real-life case histories to show how each person's need for spiritual healing has been met through the experience of the Eucharist.

“The book has perhaps not been commercially published because of the challenge within these stories, that the need for healing and the subsequent experience of healing can cross the boundaries of time. In some cases, a present-day person is healed from the effects of trauma suffered by a dead relative. In others, the present-day person effects the healing of the dead but still suffering relative. Either way, healing is experienced through the Holy Communion, in a ministry practised by the late Dr Kenneth McAll.

“Each story is followed by the author's analysis, but an introduction outlining the claims and benefits of this ministry would have been helpful.”

From ‘Candle and Keyboard’ August 2004