About John of God
As stated in the book, The Miracle Man from Brazil, John of God provides free treatment from his small hospital-style sanctuary in the town of Abadiania, Goias, Brazil - 130km from the capital Brasilia. The center, known as Casa de Dom Inacio, is open three days each week; Wednesday, Thursday & Friday.
The Medium João loses consciousness when he incorporates elevated spirit entities who then use his body to perform operations, treatments and cures of the physical and spiritual bodies. He will scrape away cataracts and eye tumours with a knife, remove breast cancers with a small incision and cause the crippled to walk with just the touch of his hand. In a meditation room a ceiling high stack of discarded crutches, wheelchairs and braces pays silent testimony to his success. He is acclaimed as the greatest healer of the past 2,000 years. All who visit the centre may observe and participate in the proceedings.
Exerpts from the ABC Primetime Special by John Quiñones on February 12, 2006
The man called "João de Deus" or "John of God" is said to have miraculous healing powers and can supposedly perform surgeries without pain or even anesthesia.
For nearly 30 years, millions have visited the tiny village of Abadiania in remote, central Brazil to see a man some call the most powerful spiritual healer since Jesu
João is not a licensed doctor. At 16, the story goes, the "entity" of King Solomon entered his body, and performed a miraculous healing. For years, João wandered Brazil offering healings. Twenty-seven years ago, he took residence in his casa in the plateaus and became known as "John of God."
Today, more than 30 doctors and notables can enter his body, João says. They're the ones that do the healing.
Among those luminaries are Dom Inacio de Loyola, a 15th century Spanish nobleman; Dr. Oswaldo Cruz, who helped to eradicate yellow fever; and the late Dr. Augusto de Almeida, a meticulous and demanding surgeon.
The "incorporating" happens in an instant, without warning. As João prepares to operate, his body suddenly jerks. He is said to take on the personality and even the eye color of the entity who inhabits him.
Visible and Invisible Surgeries
John of God's patients typically stay at Abadiania for two weeks, but they can stay for as long as they want. They can stay for an afternoon or morning and leave if they want to. Some people even arrive via bus on day trips.
Everyone is told not to stop taking their medications or treatments such as chemotherapy. After seeing John of God, there are some strict rules: for 40 days, no sex, alcohol, pork or pepper, which are all said to weaken the body's aura, or energy field.
John of God cautions that cures are not always instantaneous, but can take months or years and the entities cannot heal everyone. Some may be just too sick; others may not be ready spiritually.
When patients come before him, he makes a diagnosis with just a glance — scribbles a prescription for herbs or even schedules an operation.
Some surgeries are "invisible." The entities are said to have such supernatural powers, they can heal without breaking the skin. Others are "visible" — and only certain patients are considered eligible. They must volunteer, be 18 to 52 years old, and cannot be in wheelchairs, or have recently had radiation or chemotherapy.
The "visible" surgeries can be graphic. "Primetime" witnessed one in which João took four-inch gauze-tipped steel forceps, dipped them in a solution he calls "holy water," and shoved the forceps all the way up a patient's nostril and twisted them violently.
It took 45 seconds, and the patient left bleeding. But João's assistants videotape such surgeries regularly and sell them at the gift shop.
Open to Possibility
For a second opinion, "Primetime" consulted Dr. Mehmet Oz, one of the most respected surgeons in the United States.
Asked about Ireland's remarkable improvement from a brain tumor, he agreed, "something stopped a process that normally is very aggressive." He also wondered if the atmosphere of John of God's clinic contributed.
"I want to have the kind of music that gets him to meditate, the kind of biofeedback training and meditative training that will allow him to do what he needs to do to turn on his own body's healing mechanism," he said. "That may be the greatest lesson of all here."
About Sclippa's progress from her spinal cord injury, he says it's conceivable that she could have made the same progress with intensive physical therapy. But he added her experiences with John of God may have been valuable too.
While the doctor said he wouldn't send his patients to John of God, he still expressed curiosity about the clinic.
"I don't care what it is, if you really feel better with this kind of tragic injury, we need to research that," he said. "Crawfish regrow their nerves, right? Maybe there are things that we could harvest in our psyche that allows us to do it as well."
And questioned about the graphic visible surgery, Oz said it could be "an old magician's trick, but it's a pretty powerful one from a physician's perspective."
John of God could also be on to something, he said. If you go to the roof of the nose, you find the pituitary gland, he said. "I'm wondering if touching the pituitary gland may influence all those chemicals that go between the body and the brain.
"Either he's a healer who has found some talents that he has innately within him and can help people — or he's crazy," Oz said.
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