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Samaritans’ founder dies… to be born again
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 ENGLAND. The Rev Dr Chad Varah, who in 1953 founded the Samaritans organisation
(known worldwide as Befrienders International) to offer a sympathetic
ear to those contemplating suicide, died on 8 November at the age of 95. Despite being an Anglican priest, he was a staunch believer in reincarnation, even titling his autobiography, Before I Die Again.
Though it is unusual for an Anglican priest to declare his belief in the concept of having many incarnations on Earth, it is not unique. Rev Chad Varah’s death comes just a couple of weeks after that of another pioneering priest, the Rev Martin Israel, whose spiritual beliefs also embraced reincarnation.
Rev Chad Varah explained his belief on the very first page of Before I Die Again, in these words:
“I am in a condemned cell, awaiting death. (Not for the first time.) All around me are other cells. You are in one of them. That makes a bond between us. We are in the same boat – I mean, situation.
“You will have guessed that the condemned cell I am in is my body, which I must be taken from on a date unknown to me but certainly within the next 25 years. Then my corpse, useless to me but useful to the teachers of anatomy to medical students, will be whisked away for dissection. I hate waste.
“If you wish to treat the mortal remains of your dear ones with reverence, or have your own so treated, that is up to you. If I am taking the funeral or cremation I will be considerate to your feelings, but I cannot regard a dead body as he or she. Only an ‘it’ can be burned or buried without qualm.
“When I say in the Creed that I believe in the resurrection of the body, I do not mean the revival of disintegrated corpses – gruesome idea. I mean I believe that we shall live again in a body which comes to earth in the only known way, through the birth-canal of a mother.
“Whenever I say the Creed, I assert my belief in reincarnation.”
And it is very much as a reincarnationist that he poses, in his autobiography, the questions: “Why did I choose [my mother] to provide me with the body with which I was born into the world? Or why was she chosen for me?”
His father was Vicar of Barton upon Humberside for 35 years, until his death in 1945, and clearly was not an influence on Chad Varah’s remarkable philosophy, which seems to owe as much to Buddhism or even Spiritualism as it does Christianity.
Take, for example, this comment on his childhood and the way boys and girls were treated differently:
“If fact, I soon discovered, and still believe, that with certain exceptions it is boys who have it easy: presumably most of them will have to make up for it by being born girls in their next incarnation, especially the ones who can justly be described as male chauvinists. The really vicious ones should be reborn as Asian or African Muslim women. It will, of course, be their own higher self which chooses this destiny – karma is not a punishment, but a consequence and an education.”
 A number of obituaries (see links below) have made a passing reference to his belief in reincarnation but majored, and rightly so, on the enormous contribution Chad Varah made to humanity through the setting up of the Samaritans, and his crusade as a sex therapist, including support for homosexuals and his campaign against female circumcision in some cultures.
Those interested in synchronicity will be intrigued by the following anecdote about the early days of the Samaritans. Having become the incumbent of St Stephen Walbrook church in London, he decided in 1953 that its crypt would be the perfect location to establish a suicide prevention telephone helpline for desperate people who were close to taking their own lives. All it needed was a memorable telephone number.
In those days, UK telephone numbers began with three letters (an abbreviation of the area to which they were assigned) and four numbers. The church was in the Mansion House district of London so Chad Varah decided MAN 9000 would be perfect.
All he needed to do was to call the Post Office, which was responsible for telephones in those days, to check that the number was available. He found a dusty phone in a corner of the crypt and called Post Office sales to enquire.
The clerk asked him what number he was calling from, so Varah took his handkerchief out and wiped it across the telephone’s grimy dial. To his astonishment, the number it revealed was MAN 9000.
Check out these obituaries of Chad Varah from The Daily Telegraph, the Daily Mail and the Washington Post.
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Posted on Sunday, November 11, 2007
Category: Reincarnation
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