‘There are so many . . . things available to the condition of mankind that are not accepted.’

Crystals to amplify energy, brightly polished gemstones for healing, and a deck of cards adorned with symbols drawn in felt pen are the tools of John Burchard’s trade. Burchard, 49, can be found every Sunday afternoon seated at a corner table in The Visionary, a Mission Hills restaurant that offers psychic readings along with its menu. He is one of the in-house psychics who conduct readings, and he also participates in psychic fairs, leads workshops and lectures, and performs aura cleansings. Burchard stepped up his spiritual activities after serving 21 years in the Navy, but his spiritual training began much earlier when, as a 7-year-old, his mother took him to an Indian “learning cave” to teach him about his Indian heritage and about rocks and crystals. Times staff writer Caroline Lemke interviewed him and Barbara Martin photographed him.

While I was in the Navy, I read Tarot cards. Now, I don’t do Tarot readings. When I was in the military, my focus had to be in this combative state of mind because I went through the Vietnam era and all that stuff. I had to be geared to go that way at any given time.

When I retired from the Navy and no longer had to go to that particular aspect of myself, and when I started growing in this caring and nurturing aspect, I found that I could not tolerate the visual display of violence and negativity that is symbolic on some of the Tarot cards.

So I was groping around for some other means for divination, and my wife said to me one night, “Why don’t you make your own set of cards?” Initially, I kind of got into this ego-bound snit and I thought, “Oh, it will take me 10 years to make one card.” But once I finally got off of that and opened myself up, all the information I needed just kind of poured right into me. That was a Wednesday night, and by Sunday evening I had in fact developed this set of cards.

It’s scary, because sometimes the readings are so accurate it not only blows the querist’s mind, it blows mine as well, because basically I have always been kind of a bottom-line skeptic. If I can’t see it, touch it, taste it, smell it or hear it, you’re going to have to go a long way to prove to me it exists.

But when you get the kind of positive confirmation that this kind of thing gives you, that slaps you right in the face, you can’t deny the fact it is in existence.

I was raised Catholic, and my father had gotten in the habit of getting us up at 5:30 Sunday mornings and taking us to 6:30 Mass. It was the first Sunday after my seventh birthday; I got up and was getting ready to go to Mass, and my mother took me by the hand and said, “You’re not going with your father and brothers today.”

Initially she explained to me that she wanted to teach me my true heritage, the heritage that came from her side of the family. Then she started telling me the story that she had been descended from a long line of Seneca Indian medicine women. She started teaching me about rocks and crystals and doing different layouts.

There were times (in the Navy) when I just played the standard, red-blooded sailor on liberty. I didn’t devote all my time to this. In fact, for quite a few years all the teachings were just kind of on a back burner. I wouldn’t open myself to very many people in the Navy at all. They would have carted me off to the loony bin.

I carried maybe a couple pocket crystals in my sea bag when I went overseas and things like that. I would find quiet time like at zero dark thirty (12:30) in the morning and go out on one of the catwalks and sit and do my meditation or my “prayer work.”

As far as the crystal healings and all the other things I do, I also preach kind of along with them because my belief is they should not be used in lieu of medicine, but in addition to.

I’m of the feeling that there are so many tools and things available to the condition of mankind that are not accepted and not used--massage, chiropractory (sic), herbs. And the American Medical Assn. won’t recognize most of them, and I think the AMA should be kicked right in the pants because I think they’re self-limiting. If they can’t make a profit at it, they don’t want to be involved in it.

There is a place for herbs. There is a place for acupressure. There is a place for massage. There is a place for psychology, chiropractory, surgery. We should utilize all the tools available.