This paper analyzes the expansion and internationalization of the Santo Daime religion from the Amazon to the world. The growth and internationalization of this religious movement is explained in terms of its structural characteristics: its psychoactivity and miscibility. Such expansion is placed within the diaspora movement of the global southern religions towards the North, and reflects the increasingly relevant role of Brazil and Latin America in the global religious scenario. However, the spread of Santo Daime has generated conflicts and tensions in the different locations to which it has migrated. The expansion has also produced several consequences and backlashes in the original Amazonian traditional communities. We argue that the internationalization of Santo Daime illustrates the religious ambivalences and controversies of our times, and thereby stimulates discussion of key issues regarding the global religious context and modernity itself.
Santo Daime; Internationalization; Religion; Amazon; Ayahuasca