On other occasions, the relationship between ritual healing and biomedicine is seen as more problematic. The healing power (sakti) of gods is sometimes spoken about in nostalgic terms, as in the sentence that give this give this paper its title, and the blame for the gods’ diminished power to heal is put on the spread of biomedicine. This argument is often adopted by both and lay persons to explain to explain and justify ritual failures, as for example when an exorcism or a healing ceremony does not prove efficacious even after a long time and several attempts. People often explain the persistence of the problem with a discourse that entails a circular feedback loop. Increased recourse to ‘modern’ ways of healing, and increased adoption of a modern lifestyle generally, diminshes people’s faith in gods and induces to forget their ritual duties towards them. This in turn lessens the local deities’ power to heal, a power that is perceived as based on a relationship of reciprocal exchange between belief (sraddha) and celebration (puja) on the people’s side and the bestowing of bliss and healing by the gods.