Comments on: La Santa Muerte

By: Pro-Ana: The Pro-Anorexia Fad - Pop Occulture Blog

Pro-Ana: The Pro-Anorexia Fad - Pop Occulture Blog — Mon, 17 Jul 2006 18:57:26 +0000

[...] It’s kind of hard not to use a word like “cult” after hearing such things. This whole thing about Ana, Bella and Mia makes me think immediately that perhaps they are tapping into some kind of actual spiritual entities (or maybe have created their own). Maybe they are beautiful skeletal beings who thrive on the offerings of food these girls (and men) are giving to them, instead of eating for themselves. Some of the obsessive and unhealthy behaviors associated with these disorders may in fact be keeping with classic characteristics of spirit possession or fixation. I also heard recently that La Santisima Muerte, the Mexican folk saint appears to people as a beautiful woman’s corpse drained of blood. So, hey who knows? I wonder how people’s attitudes towards these things would change if they understood that they were possibly feeding a malicious spirit with their life energy? [...]

By: fantastic planet » In the Company of Saints: Gnostic Hagiography

fantastic planet » In the Company of Saints: Gnostic Hagiography — Tue, 15 Nov 2005 22:01:55 +0000

[...] rayer to old PKD. But, if you do, what’s the difference between that and praying to La Santisima Muerte or Jesus Malverde, or even the more mythical, nonhistorical tra [...]

By: Tim Boucher

Tim Boucher — Sat, 24 Sep 2005 14:40:17 +0000

Hm, thanks Robert! That’s just the kind of first-hand information I like to hear. Much appreciated.

By: Robert in Phoenix

Robert in Phoenix — Sat, 24 Sep 2005 05:10:44 +0000

In my Phoenix store I sell some Santisima Muerte stuff alongside my Day of the Dead merchandise (although a Venn diagram of these two things would show little overlap). What I know about this saint comes from customers who share stories with me. The saint is benign, if respected properly, and many people pray to it for a variety of reasons. I suspect its veneration may be regional; I observe that most Mexicans or people of Mexican descent from the northern part of the country get into this, although there are some artists in Mexico City who are dabbling in the imagery. Like other forms of “folk Catholicism” throughout Mexico and the Southwest US, the Church frowns on it because it is the Spiritual outside of their top-down power structure. I have had devout Catholics come in my store and frown on the Santisima Muerte stuff. And by the way, I’ve never heard anyone refer to the Muerte as a woman, although in Spanish grammatically she definitely is.

By: rev max

rev max — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 22:41:39 +0000

This article quotes one person describing her followers as â€œnarcotraffickers, corrupt cops and politiciansâ€

Wait I’m confused, is this talking about Santisma Muerte or the Skull’n'Bones club?

By: rev max

rev max — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 22:40:16 +0000

Seems funny to think of the Grim Reaper as having a sense of humour.

In a lot of cultures the death spirits are bawdy and profane and like to play pranks

“What’s so funny? Care to let me in on the joke?”

Things must look differnet from their perspective

By: Tim Boucher

Tim Boucher — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 22:28:59 +0000

oh of course

By: rev max

rev max — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 22:07:49 +0000

i’m sure this has already occurred to you as well

By: Tim Boucher

Tim Boucher — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 20:48:47 +0000

Yeah, man, I kind of want it. It’s so weird and compelling…

By: rev max

rev max — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 20:26:31 +0000

yeah from lex luthor

maybe its made out of kryptonite?

By: lyam

lyam — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 19:52:11 +0000

ebay 2:

current bid 16.66

haha

By: alistair

alistair — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 19:01:57 +0000

some of the crankiest people i`ve ever met are catholic priests, so it` no surprise that they`d react this way to someone else making up saints. i`ve found it deeply theraputic the yell FUCK YOU to people who can be so ignorantly judgemental and use an international bureacracy to back up thier hostile position.
life is about celebrating our existance through ritual. we do it in all that we do. we have a little ritual for getting the keys out of our pocket and putting it in the lock, we have a little ritual for putting cream and sugar in our coffee. we have a little ritual for butting our soccer boots on before a game. the catholics don`t have a franchise on that,though they`d like to. fuck `em.

By: Tim Boucher

Tim Boucher — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 17:31:24 +0000

holy crap! that santa muerte enclosed in a pyramid is so awesome and creepy!

Gina, you should check out some of the medieval art of the bonesman appearing to people of all different walks of life. His morphing ability sounds very similar to some of these depictions.

By: rev max

rev max — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 17:22:15 +0000

of possible interest:

ebay 1

ebay2

By: rev max

rev max — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 17:12:37 +0000

BTW you know who else is cool is St. Simon (aka Maximon). This is a guatemalan folk st. who is depicted as a dude in a black suit sitting in a chair with a rifle and a bag of gold. Very powerful “crossroads” type figure representing cthonic forces - a real “man of the world.” Anywho this is anothe rexample of a saint who came to catholicism from the outside and is not accepted by the vatican, his actual origins are as a Mayan underworld deity.

St. Judas is another cool one. And of course the Devil also!

By: rev max

rev max — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 17:09:07 +0000

i have seen some fabulous santisima muerte statues on ebay in three colors:

red, for witchcraft having to do w. love & sex
white, for healing & spiritualism
black, for protection & hexing

whatâ€™s the difference between religion and magic, and how does one turn into or influence the other?

Jesus says in the Bible “hoc est me corpeum” - this is my body - he turns bread in flesh and wine into blood

the slurred & shortened version of this phrase, latin repndered as rhyming nonsense - “hocus pocus”

LOL

ABracadabra comes from abraxas

Now here’s one thing I wonder

The catholic church condemns folk saints, condemns magic

why can’t catholic priests do magic though? Theoretically theyre channelling the power of god, a catholic priest should have the juice to be able to help someone get a job, or get laid, or heal from a disease, whatever

I read this article recently where the author was arguing that the Church condemned magic, condemned gnosticism as irrational, primitive, demonic, etc and so chased all of the worl’ds mystery and magic into hiding until people lost the ability to see non-christian gods

once this trend started, it was hard to stop. ove rthe centuries, Chritsianity promoted itself as something rational and reasonable as the world was emptied of enchantment

but the emptying didn’t sop once christianity’s main rivals in pagan europe had been de3feated. it kept going and going util now chritsianity has been emtied of magic and miracles too. And so now many people reject chritsinaity on a rational basis

its like scientists who invent a genetically engineered bacteria to kill a certain crop-destroying pest and are horrified to discove rthat now their invention has killed all the pests and is continuing on to eat the crop as well!

Thats one thing hinduism has going for it, it doesn’t set itself in opposition to varying impulses - abstract psychologized theology, down & dirty folk magic - it embraces & absorbs all of them

FUck, if you can’t beat’em join ‘em.

By: Gina

Gina — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 17:02:59 +0000

I had another weird dream the other night, where I was introduced to a “boneman”, he asked why I looked at him in such distress, don’t you know I can look like anyone or anything”, and proceeded to morph into different public figures. These dreams are just getting too weird, lately. My interpretation was that death is an illusion, he was very amusing this boneman and kept cracking jokes, he even morphed into Dick Cheney once. Seems funny to think of the Grim Reaper as having a sense of humour.