When a prominent Brazilian politician visited "the surgeon of the rusty knife" -- Zé Arigó, one of the most astonishing psychic healers of the 19th century -- eschewing the advice of his own physicians, the story spread around the world. Politicians have never been averse to employing the services of faith healers for themselves or their relatives (could there be a more vivid example than that of the Russian monarchy's support of Rasputin?), although some of these accounts are little-known and must be rescued from oblivion.

One of the most startling involved Mexican president Plutarco Elías Calles, who governed our neighbor to the south in the 1920s. There is a curious footnote to the life of this post-Mexican Revolution president: Calles was the son of Elías Calles, one of three camel-drivers recruited by the U.S. Army during its abortive experiment involving the creation of the "U.S. Camel Corps" in the 19th century.

Even more curious than his pedigree would be his involvement with one of Mexico's most revered and powerful faith healers: Fidencio S. Constantino, better known as Niño Fidencio ("the child Fidencio"), venerated as a true saint throughout the southern U.S., Mexico and as far south as Colombia. Readers interested in the life of this healer will find ample sources of material on the Internet.

It was said that President Calles suffered of "a shameful disease" and that the faith healer was his last best hope. On February 8, 1928, the presidential train arrived at the dusty town of Espinazo in the state of Nuevo León, where Niño Fidencio treated hundreds of patients on a daily basis. Although Calles traveled with a small retinue, an ocean of well-wishers awaited him at his destination. Brass bands made up of madmen and lepers--Fidencio's patients--played martial airs while the Mexican flag was waved by others who would more than likely not live to see the next day, but would die contented with having seen their corner of Mexico visited by the president.

After a cordial greeting, the healer and the first citizen vanished into a room. Details of the treatment are still unknown, but all reports of this singular occasion agree that Niño Fidencio walked out of the room, ignoring the presidential retinue, to lose himself among his other patients. Hours passed. The president's chief of staff, Gen. Andrew Almazán, angrily dispatched an aide to find the faith healer and decided to open the door to see exactly what kind of treatment the president had been prescribed.

"The President of the Republic, General Plutarco Elías Calles," writes María Luz Bernal in Mitos y Magos Mexicanos, "was completely nude, sitting on a chair in a corner of the room, and was unrecognizable: his entire body was covered by a dense layer of honey." Almazan's aide and his guards brought Fidencio back, who apologized profusely for having forgotten about his illustrious patient--he had stopped to play with some retarded children.

The treatment prescribed by Niño Fidencio appeared to have been successful. In gratitude, the president ordered the construction of a water line directly to Espinazo from a mountain spring thirty kilometers away and which remains in service to this day. Railcars full of supplies for the faith healer's patients were part of the presidential bounty.

Sufferage and Saucermen

In the Mexico: Special Report 1997 issue of the Samizdat newsletter, Dr. Rafael A. Lara once again delved into the intriguing nexus between politics and the paranormal, but this time from the UFO angle. The senior Mexican political party--the Partido Revolucionario Institucional or PRI--had shown an uncharacteristic interest in the UFO phenomenon and other manifestations of the paranormal, to the extent of hosting its own UFO conferences featuring distinguished ufologist Pedro Ferriz Santacruz as the main lecturer, all the while supporting the PRI's political platform...despite the fact that Ferriz was himself running for political office under the Frente Cardenista de Reconstrucción Nacional for the regencia of Mexico City itself.

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