The Popularity Of Spiritual Doctor Healing

By Elaine Guthrie


When most people get sick, they turn to the official practice of medicine, in the form of a licensed doctor or nurse. One step beneath them in prestige is alternative medicine, which usually comes in the form of practices accepted by those outside the Western world, but which has official acceptance somewhere else, or during some other era. With these options open, it is worth exploring why people choose spiritual doctor healing, which has less respect than either of them.

Spiritual healing is the umbrella term for attempted treatments depending wholly in help from beings that don't register to human senses, beings whose very existence must be taken on faith. It is frequently the last stop for patients who are desperate, having tried everything sanctioned medicine can attempt. Often, the patient is also more interested in the touch of God than he or she is in getting healed as such. The malady might well be most important as a chance to witness the miraculous.

Supernatural assistance is often sought for the relief of pain, which even today is little understood by standard medicine. It can be sought out for acutely personal issues, such as sexual problems. Psychological problems and plain bad luck also drive the afflicted to the spirits.

Some people who look to help from the spiritual plane are not seeking cures for health concerns, at least not in any sense most would recognize. They seek shielding from what they understand to be malevolent spirits. If the spirit has gained control of the patient's mind, it could be decided that an exorcism is the only solution.

People seeking cures from the spiritual world need to understand that what they seek has no recognized scientific basis. Both are subject to scorn from those whose passion is to debunk dubious claims. This scorn is broadcast throughout the media, a broadcasting supported by the enormous prestige of the medical establishment, and the even more enormous resources of the pharmaceutical industry. The former is motivated by legitimate interest in health, along with a desire to defend its professional turf against the faith healers. The latter is motivated by maintaining its profits.

It is no surprise that spiritualists cater to those largely uneducated about the sciences, as well as those who are convinced that they simply know better. There will always be those who distrust legitimate medicine and its institutions. Spiritual healers rely upon good referrals from former customers along with innate charisma and sales talent.

There are many techniques resorting to the supernatural. Faith healing is a staple of many charismatic church services. Usually this is accomplished by the minister's laying on of hands and appealing to the holy spirit. This is a highly public act, and is at least as much performance as therapy.

Long relegated to the shadows, witchcraft performs its magic through its practitioners' expertise with stones, herbs, and the most humble objects. Now it is not only largely freed from centuries of oppression, it is among the most rapidly growing religious paths in the Western world. Voudon has its roots in West Africa and Haiti, and carries the appeal of exotica. It draws upon assistance from a menagerie of gods, saints, and lesser entities, all called upon to defend against beings still lesser.




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