Localising and acculturating the global: the Healing Rooms prayer service network in Finland
Hovi, Tuija (2015)
Hovi, Tuija
The Donner Institute, Åbo Akademi
2015
Kuvaus
Tuija Hovi, Åbo Akademi University
PhD Tuija Hovi has specialised in social psychological and anthropological studies of Christianity, as well as in qualitative methods such as ethnography and narrative inquiry. Her fields of interest are the global Pentecostal-charismatic trends accommodated in contemporary Finland and contemporary popular religiosity. Hovi is affiliated to the Department of Comparative Religion at Åbo Akademi University, Finland.
PhD Tuija Hovi has specialised in social psychological and anthropological studies of Christianity, as well as in qualitative methods such as ethnography and narrative inquiry. Her fields of interest are the global Pentecostal-charismatic trends accommodated in contemporary Finland and contemporary popular religiosity. Hovi is affiliated to the Department of Comparative Religion at Åbo Akademi University, Finland.
Tiivistelmä
The article addresses the theme of accommodating an imported model of international religious practice into a national context. The case in question involves an intentional ’translation’ of an American Pentecostal concept of a lay-based prayer service into a Nordic, rather secularised Lutheran context. This recent newcomer into the Finnish religious field is the Healing Rooms network which is a predominantly charismatic Christian, globally expanded, interdenominational intercessory prayer service. This study of Healing Rooms is based on material compiled by means of ethnographic methods. According to the interviewees, the idea of a prayer clinic must be adjusted culturally and nationally, even though the basic function of the practice is the same everywhere. In Finland this means adjusting the service to fit a culture and society in which the mainline Lutheran Church has traditionally had simultaneously a distant and dominating role on the religious scene.