John of God and the Casa de Dom Inácio : Westerners at a Brazilian spiritual hospital

This chapter draws on participant observation (in the healing center in Brazil, meditation circles in Australia, and healing events in New Zealand and Germany) and in-depth interviews with foreigners and Brazilians conducted since 2004. It explores John of God's healing practices, and argues that while the arrival of this large influx of foreigners has had an impact on the Casa de Dom Imácio, Westerners themselves experience change and take Spiritism and Jolm of God's healing practices, sacred objects, and cosmology to their homelands. In particular, it demonstrates that if they undergo surgery, they may become healers and channel John of God's entities. Overall, this chapter shows that global flows emanate not only from the West. For Appadurai, the global cultural economy does not spread from one particular center, but moves around like a rhizome2 in a chaotic and unpredictable pattern.3 While Spiritism originated in France (as an offshoot of Spiritualism), Brazil has become a center for its spread around the world, carried mainly by Brazilian migrants and the John of God movement.4 In the latter case, these multidirectional and flexible networks of followers, healers, tour guides, and the ill can be described as a rhizome, given that they connect the Casa, the international healing events, their lives in their own homelands, and other alternative healing practices.