Source: International Mission Board, February 19, 2018<\/p>\n
In the Mampruli language, the word for medicine also means \u201cmagic.\u201d In this culture, anything with healing or supernatural powers is considered to be or have tiim<\/em>. When westerners first showed up and offered suffering patients small white pills that relieved pain, they were called \u201cmagic.\u201d The only word for pharmacist in the local language\u2014tiimdaana<\/em>\u2014means the \u201cmagic guy\u201d when translated literally. Every time I prescribe medication to patients in the local language, I have to tell them to go buy some \u201cmagic\u201d (tiim) from the \u201cmagic guy\u201d (tiimdaana).<\/p>\n West African healers often tout the fact that their cures are \u201call-natural.\u201d It\u2019s true that they know of many roots, barks, and leaves with legitimate curative properties. But in practice, mixing those ingredients into medicine is usually accompanied by a sacrifice to ancestral spirits. If the cure fails to work, it\u2019s not seen as the fault of the local healer or the medicine but a failure of the patient or family caretaker to appease the spirits.<\/p>\n \u00bb Full story<\/a> provides some great illustrations of what happens when cultures clash and tips for Christian doctors serving in contexts with similar traditional healing practices.<\/p>\n \u00bb See also Witch Doctor Pastors Selling \u201cMiracles\u201d Contrary to Teaching of Jesus<\/a> (Global Christian News). This month the Global Prayer Digest<\/a> is all about West Africa. Subscribe here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Source: International Mission Board, February 19, 2018 In the Mampruli language, the word for medicine also means \u201cmagic.\u201d In this culture, anything with healing or supernatural powers is considered to be or have tiim. When westerners first showed up and offered suffering patients small white pills that relieved pain, they were called \u201cmagic.\u201d The only … Continue reading GHANA: The Christian Ministry of Healing Where Medicine Is Magic<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7703","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-briefs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7703","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7703"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7703\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7704,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7703\/revisions\/7704"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7703"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7703"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7703"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}