To all the Santo Daime community
in the worldMy name is Juan Carlos, responsible for the Daime
church of St. John of Madrid, Spain, and president of the Spanish Federation of Daime
churches.
As you know, on the last 5th of April came to Spain the inquisition persecuting our
sacrament in all of Europe. After Germany, Holland and France, it was our turn to be
harassed. To be sincere, I would say this did not catch us by surprise, except in the way
it happened. Here we raised the first proper Daime church, following the Brazilian model,
and we were aware that the beginning was not going to be easy. After the busts in the rest
of the continent, we had taken more extreme precautions, reducing the rhythm of our works
and paralysing the eventual expansion of our doctrine in our country until the whole
situation became clear. We were hoping that, at some point, the authorities would get in
touch with us, and in that case we would be initiating the process for the legalisation of
our church, to be well prepared. We didn't have time to do anything else, though.
What we could never have imagined was that we would be treated as if we were
delinquents of the Colombian drug cartel. For a whole month, they were listening to our
phone calls, spying on our homes and investigating our lives. And then we gave them a
reason to intervene. The rest you already know. We were arrested: six Spanish and two
Brazilians. Chico and Fernando stayed 54 days in prison and I have been freed on bail, but
will go to trial.
Before going on, I would like to thank deeply, in my name and of all here in Spain, the
effort you made to generate this current of solidarity that still goes on. After the shock
we suffered, it helped infinitely to raise our morale to see all the mobilisation that was
going on beyond our reach. I believe this is the moment of not letting this flame of
communication die out and keep on pushing for this New Age, that has already begun in the
material world, to continue until we obtain the world's recognition of our right to
freedom of cult.
I would also like to make one point clear. For better or for worse, politics also
affects our Daime organisation. It is impossible to escape from it. And here we know, from
references, the polemics that came about with Cefluris around the fact that Chico and
Fernando brought Daime to Europe without Cefluris' previous knowledge. It certainly was an
error. But it was made by all of us. Even here, when we were warned, we were not awake and
regarded this arrival as something natural, without foreseeing that were heading for the
precipice. There were precedents, though, and we did not worry. At Christmas, many Spanish
brothers travelled to Europe with Daime and there were no problems. Thanks to them, we
managed to keep up the pace of our works. One of the litres they brought was even
facilitated by Cefluris in Rio de Janeiro.
All right. I don't want to throw more wood into the fire. But it has to be to said
that, sooner or later, all of this would have happened, anyway. Three weeks later, two
brothers from Andaluzia were expected to arrive from Mapiá. They surely brought Daime
with them and were arrested at customs. And this, apart from the days in prison that Chico
and Fernando suffered, was worse for us, since it did not produce the world-wide
mobilisation that happened this second time around. It was not the same as having two
"Brazilian shamans", as they were called by our national press, in jail,
compared to two little known Spanish guys. I believe that this was written, that it had to
be like this. It would have been worse if, for example, the police appeared in the middle
of a spiritual work, followed by an army of reporters. Chico and Fernando were martyrs,
but their prison also served to put into movement something the other incidents in Europe
did not manage to do until now: an absolute solidarity coming from people in a dozen
different countries.
Now, as I was saying, is the moment to make the best of this energy, towards a decisive
step in our world union. So much is being talked about globalisation that we could not
hope to stay out much longer. The initiative of our brothers in Brasília, creating a
world-wide network of daimistas in the internet (the Daime eGroup), was the first step.
Paulo Roberto, in Rio, is also launching a movement to group all ayahuasqueros in the
world in the name of the same cause: the defence of our sacrament as an option to
exercise, in freedom, the spiritual dimension of each human being. Akira, in Japan, was
also thinking of something similar. Even with Fernando's father, we talked a lot about the
ecumenism motivated by the Vatican itself and the need for inter-religious dialogue.
During this whole process, we got in touch with the CISEI - Centro Interamericano de
Espiritualidad Indigena (Inter-American Centre of Indigenous Spirituality), in Mexico,
which is preparing a meeting in Guatemala (next February) with a single theme: a request
to the world's authorities for freedom of use of sacred plants in a religious or healing
context, based on the right every people has of expanding its culture, spirituality and
thought to all corners of the world. Spirituality is a patrimony of all humankind, let no
one forget this.
I believe these events are clearly marking the path for us. No more civil wars (we, in
Spain, know a lot about this), no more inner fighting, no more endogamous movements, no
more quarrels - please! Every people that uses plants of power is in the same boat, for
better or for worse. In this beginning of a new millennium, there is no other way out than
uniting ourselves and our beliefs, to fight together for true spiritual union.
In Europe, we are planning to celebrate the III Meeting of European Daime Churches,
next November in Assisi, Italy, and we hope this could be the seed for the creation of an
European Union of all Daime centres in the old continent. We are already beginning to work
together with CISEI to participate in this meeting in Guatemala and I imagine that, from
now on, until then, there will appear many lines of action to mobilise the biggest number
of persons, institutions and churches in the world with this aim.
This is the idea, for now. I think union begins with oneself, the Astral and those that
are nearest us. It is logical to go from less to more, to sum up, and not to go after
grandiloquent or megalomaniac shortcuts that lead nowhere. Until now, at least in Europe,
many daimistas were half hidden. Now, those that decide to follow ahead, already have
nothing to hide, because everyone knows what is going on. Or, better still, what is not
going on. We have been taken out of the closet and now is the time to act with
consequence.
Even if the best way for us to organise ourselves cannot be seen yet, we already have
some references to begin to move on. Any reference will be welcome and perhaps someone
could propose a good platform of world-wide communication to go on with this project. Many
thanks to everyone and our greatest wishes for Love, Truth, and, now more than ever,
Justice for all.
JUAN CARLOS