I was recently nudged to check out Edgar Cayce. I suspect many on this forum know him and his works very well, but until now I have heard his name only in passing. So I started out by checking his Wikipedia page:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Cayce
There has apparently been written a lot by him and about him, but let's start there. It is clear that he worked as a medium, a reader, a channeler, a healer, a writer and was a devoted family man.
I want to underline first of all that I am not starting this thread to promote, recommend or embrace him and what he did. He lived in a different time and saw from a different, earlier, common understanding of things. But I think I am correct in calling him one of the grandfathers of modern spirituality, responsible for quite a bit of the wide popularity of spirituality today. He should be a more than worthy study object. Of what to do, and what not to do.
Second though.... based on what I have just read, I deeply admire Edgar Cayce as a person. He spent his entire life trying to help people, to stand upright while being ridiculed and face life hardships, to understand his gift and spread the message that there is more to life than the eye can see. That is a very honorable life lived, right there.
There is so much to poke into but I want to start with his ethic that he was not to earn money on his craft. Ever. Many wanted to earn money on him, then and later. I have heard the same from others, great spiritual helpers who refused pay their whole life. And of a few others who were great, until they started to cash in, and then the talent dwindled into nothing. I don't think is a moral thing for each of us to choose, but a standard the spirit world holds us to. All this world's talents for creativity, for art, for a million skills, is available for us to earn money on. All but this. I think, because it is not of this world.
One of my country's great healers passed away not long ago. Vast numbers of people had sought his help in his lifetime and he always gave if it was possible for him. He never asked for a cent. However on his outdoor wall there was a box people could put money in, and I think most did. Every time it was full he emptied it and gave the entire contents to iirc Red Cross. Instead he made his living from first regular work, and then as a church servant until he was pensioned.
On the aspect of money my personal opinion is that perhaps it need not be the utter decider. Do not churches receive a steady income? Do the priests work for free? I believe it is a matter how the money are asked for and how it is spent, rather than spiritual ruin because some money has moved. If I ever get to a place where people want to give me money for this craft, which is rather unlikely, then the passing on of the money to a good cause is what I want to do.
After all it is not a service sold (unless you ask for money up front and then all bets are off) but someone showing their gratification for what was done for them, and if that becomes a way to help someone else in turn then even the spirits seem to be happy.