healing ceremonies
Therapeutic sacred gatherings
Healing ceremonies are rituals performed to restore physical, emotional, or spiritual well-being.
Found across many cultures—from Native American sweat lodges to Amazonian ayahuasca rituals—these practices typically combine prayer, chanting, medicinal plants, or symbolic acts.
The ceremony itself is understood as therapeutic, with the community, setting, and practitioner all contributing to the healing process: The shaman led a healing ceremony for the sick child.
- sweat lodgeHeated structure for ritual purification
- shamanismMediation between worlds
- chantingRhythmic repetitive vocalization
- blessingsFavors from the divine
- prayerAddress to deity
prayer circle · purification rituals · ritual cleansing · sacred fire · smudge stick · herbal remedies · ancestor veneration · drumming circles · sound bath · reiki · energy work · curandero · spirit guides · anointing · laying on of hands · meditation · ancestor worship · invocations
- folk customsfolk dances, folk customs, burial rite, folk costumes, folk traditions
- African traditionsinitiation ceremonies, ancestral worship, rites of passage, tribal chiefs, tribal initiation
- ethnobotanyayahuasca, peyote, coca, coca leaf, cannabis
- folk medicinefolk medicine, herbalism, herbal remedies, herbal medicine, herbalist
- indigenous traditionselder council, powwows, totem poles, healing rituals, sweat lodges
- native spiritualitymedicine man, sacred ceremonies, native rituals, vision quest, sweat lodge
healing ceremoniesdeath rituals
Ceremonies marking life's end
human sacrifice · death rites · blood sacrifice · funeral rites · executions
healing ceremoniesmedical procedures
Healthcare interventions on patients
surgery · hospital care · evidence-based medicine · chemotherapy · radiation therapy