IngentaConnect SPIRITUAL TRANSFORMATION, HEALING, AND ALTRUISM: INTRODUCTION TO ...

Abstract:

This essay introduces the five articles that follow, whose aim is to show how altruism emerges out of spiritual transformation and is integral to healing process in four kinds of ritual healing systems—popular, folk, an indigenous religious healing tradition, and complementary and alternative medicine represented by consciousness transformation movements. In this introduction I situate these largely marginalized religious and spiritual practices within the context of the religion-science discourse, which has focused for the most part on the relationship between the established, mainstream religions and the dominant biomedical system. Antecedents of two of these types of religious practices, Spiritism and consciousness transformation movements, were part of the development of the psychological sciences in the nineteenth century but lost ground in the twentieth. Despite discrimination and persistent negative attitudes on the part of the established religions and biomedicine, these healing traditions have not only survived through the twentieth century but appear to have gained both followers and interest in the twenty-first. In future decades, at least for complementary and alternative medical practices and perhaps also for spirit healing centers, there may be a reversal in status through greater acceptance of their unique combination of scientific and religious perspectives.

Keywords: altruism; complementary and alternative medicine; curanderismo; religion-science discourse; ritual healing; spirit healing; Spiritism; spiritual transformation

Document Type: Research article

DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9744.2006.00784.x

Affiliations: 1: Professor Emerita of Anthropology at Arizona State University and Research Professor of Psychology at George Washington University, 2753 Bon Haven Lane, Annapolis, MD 21401;, Email: jdkoss@gwu.edu.

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SPIRITUAL TRANSFORMATION, HEALING, AND ALTRUISM: INTRODUCTION TO THE SYMPOSIUM