From: Grant Callaghan (grantc4@hotmail.com)
Date: Tue 05 Nov 2002 - 04:03:07 GMT
>Date: Mon, 4 Nov 2002 22:00:02 -0500
>
>Interesting, Brad, thanks.
>
>Can you speculate a bit on the power of faith in terms of affecting the
>physical realities, such a 'miracle cures.' Would you say from your travels
>and observations that these have provided any 'real cures', i.e., a real,
>demonstrable alleviation of some affliction?
>
>Lawry
One case I actually saw involved a shaman of some esoteric sect who
supposedly performed an excision of a cancerous growth. What actually
happened was that the shaman palmed a piece of liver and a small package of
blood, after which he claimed to be sticking his hand into the body of the
patient and pulling out the cancer. The miracle was in the fact that there
was not incision and no scar afterward. As part of the ritual, the "cancer"
was disposed of and no one got a chance to examine it closely. The blood
all over the area of the body and the piece of liver made it look pretty
convincing. But if you go in not believing, it's pretty easy to see what
the shaman is really doing. What's difficult is convincing the faithful
that what you saw was true and what they saw was false. They know he
removed the cancer because they "saw" him take it out. Meanwhile, the
patient died less than a year later from the "removed" cancer. I never
heard the shaman's explanation of how this could be, but he was still
removing cancers when I returned to the U.S. I think he was successful
because he was selling hope. The number of people who saw the cancer
"removed" were many and they were impressed by his performance. Only a few
family members were around when he died and nobody wanted to talk about it.
Grant
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