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joão de deus, shadow and light

 

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Michel Meignant is a psychotherapist and ethnologist filmmaker. He and his partner Anne were both suffering from cancer. They both traveled in 2015 to Abadiânia in Brazil to Casa Dom Inacio de Loyola to receive healing from medium João de Deus. "It's not me who heals, it's God, it's the Benevolent Entities," João de Deus kept repeating. They filmed the series in total tranquillity over 3 15-day stays, without seeing or knowing anything about João de Deus's sexual abuse of the participants. The medium had been receiving 1,500 people a day 3 times a week for some fifty years in Abadiânia and all over the world, without any problem.

On December 16, 2018, João de Deus was suddenly accused of sexual violence and put in prison. In 2019, he is sentenced to 64 years in prison, following several trials held behind closed doors. The ethnographic series shows the truth of the healings and distinguishes between the shadow and the light of the famous medium. The miracles were performed by the benevolent entities embodied by João de Deus, as he performed visible and invisible operations in full view of the public. João de Deus turned himself in to the police. The reality of João de Deus's guilt is legally established and he is serving his 64-year prison sentence.

 

 

Editing Daniel Le Bras

French version

Running time : 1 h 28

asclepia © 2021

www.joaodedeus.fr

 

 

 

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