The Amazon Forest is the birthplace of Santo Daime, which appeared as religious doctrine around the ’30s when Raimundo Irineu Serra, known as Master Irineu, started to make public ceremonies of its precepts. The name of a drink, Daime, was revealed to Master Irineu by Our Lady of the Conception, considered the “Queen of the Forest”. The origin of the name comes directly from the verb “to ask” or "to give" in Portuguese, thus when the practitioners drink it they ask to be given what they need, such as enlightenment, strength, love, peace or prosperity.

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Santo Daime is a musical doctrine and it’s a religious manifestation set up by many other religious influences, being known for its eclectic structure. In its origins, it has influences from shamanism, Christianism and the esoteric New Age thoughts. In the ’80s, with the expansion movement towards the urban centres, led by the Godfather Sebastião (the title of a religious position), the doctrine opened itself in order to incorporate new influences, such as Umbanda, Kardecist spiritism, Candomblé, Buddhism and other eastern philosophies.

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The doctrine purposes the spiritual development through the usage of a holy drink that leads to an expansion of one’s perception and consciousness, promoting a mystical revelation experience: the “miração” (related to a “self-staring” state). That experience effectuates self-knowledge, self-improvement and spiritual development of the adepts.

 

In addition to this nature of revelation, there is also the divine and therapeutic purposes, for the daimistas, what the practitioners are called, believe in healing through this practice.

 

 “The faith in Daime is the certain, through this experience, of the existence of God, of the divine beings, of all spirituality. That certainly goes deeper with this living... with the revelation. This faith of believing as you see, and seeing as you believe.” – Walter Dias, godfather of the Igreja Céu do Vale (Valley’s Sky Church)