1 Globalized Apparitions Clemens Cavallin Introduction Revelations as alleged preternatural disclosures of the holy have in various forms been a natural part of religious life as long as we can follow it in history, but within Christianity revelations have acquired an ambivalent status after the scriptural canon was closed. In the official teaching of the Catholic Church, there is, therefore, a distinction between universal (official, public) and private revelations. ‘Private’ revelations have, nevertheless, been conspicuously public, often written down with the expressed intent of being disseminated as wide as possible. The use of mass media has, consequently, been a natural choice for those propagating these messages, and in the late 20 th century this has been facilitated by globalization in the sense of new media technology and fast global personal transportation. In this paper, I intend to discuss how globalization has provided new opportunities for Catholic private revelations, and thus contributed to the build up of an apparitional subculture within the Catholic Church in which messages and itinerant prophets incessantly circumscribe the globe. 1 However, the new global context does not only provide new communication possibilities but also bring with it important constraints on the content, form and function of private revelations; especially as it pertains to the oscillation between the levels of local and global. Globalization is thus a process which opens up new possibilities for prophetic charisma, while at the same time in some respects transforming those prophets and revelations which enter on the global scene. The notion of private revelations Before discussing the globalized context of contemporary revelations, we need to dwell for a moment on the meaning of the notion ‘private revelation’. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia there are two categories of revelations (i.e. revelations from God and not diabolic manifestations or illusions etc.): 1 For a discussion of Catholicism and globalization in general see Casanova 2003. Prepublication version. The text has been edited and developed for publication