Oracle88 Ministries

Reverend Adey Bell is the Village Healer for the Temple of Soil & SoilDAO Commons.
All services are free.  Donations encouraged.

The Village Healer ~ a short story;
For thousands of years, the village healer was a revered and integral part of the community. Supported through a system of reciprocity and mutual care, the healer’s services were often compensated with food, goods, or labor rather than currency. Villagers would bring offerings of crops, handicrafts, or assistance with daily tasks in exchange for the healer’s wisdom and treatments.

The healer’s home doubled as a clinic, stocked with herbs and remedies gathered from the surrounding land. Their role extended beyond just physical healing – they were counselors, spiritual guides, and keepers of traditional knowledge passed down through generations.

However, over the past 200 years or so, consumer programming and the rise of modern medicine have brought the village healer to the brink of extinction. The shift towards a cash economy made it difficult for healers to sustain themselves through traditional forms of compensation. Western medical practices, often backed by pharmaceutical companies and government policies, began to dominate healthcare systems even in rural areas. The healers’ traditional knowledge was frequently dismissed as unscientific or primitive. Consumer culture promoted the idea that health could be bought in the form of pills and procedures, rather than maintained through holistic practices and community support. Patients began to expect quick fixes and tangible products, which traditional healers often couldn’t provide.

Marketing campaigns by healthcare and pharmaceutical companies further eroded trust in traditional methods, portraying them as outdated or ineffective. As a result, many village healers found themselves unable to make a living from their practice. Young people were less inclined to apprentice and carry on these traditions, seeing more profitable opportunities in modern sectors. The intricate web of community support that once sustained the healer began to unravel, leaving a void in many villages where holistic, culturally-relevant healthcare once thrived.

Today, while there are efforts to integrate traditional healing practices into modern healthcare systems in some regions, the village healer as a central, self-sustaining figure in community life has largely faded away. The “Village Healer” that is reborn into this new society (or descended from a long line of such) often suffer from a severe identity crisis, feeling the call to give of themselves freely to the community, and yet receiving little to no compensation for doing so. Their innate programming prohibits them from marketing their services and capitalizing on their efforts. The end-result is suffering for the healer & suffering for the community.

Please remember this when seeking support from our Village Healer.  Remember where we all came from, and support your minister as you would your mother. Although it may seem challenging to translate the support you receive into a dollar value (in lieu of gifting the vegetables you used to grow in your garden), please be generous – as the Minister will never ask.