San La Muerte - Practice

Practice

To believers, San La Muerte exists within the context of the Catholic faith and is comparable to other purely supernatural beings such as archangels. The San La Muerte devotion involves prayers, rituals, and offerings, which are given directly to the saint in expectation of and tailored to the fulfillment of specific requests. Offerings can include (human) blood, alcoholic drinks, candles and other valuable objects. San La Muerte receives offerings in exchange for favors related to a wide range of personal problems; San La Muerte is said to help to restore love, health and fortune, to protect worshipers from witchcraft, to remove the evil eye and to grant good luck in gambling. In addition to these powers, which are commonly attributed to folk saints in general, San La Muerte is also said to be able to grant a number of requests that are connected to crime and violence. For instance, it is believed that the skeletal saint can bring death upon the enemies of his devotees, can keep people from being sent to prison and shorten prison terms of inmates and can help in the recovery of stolen and misappropriated items.

The San La Muerte devotion is characterized by a moral code that must be obeyed. In the devotion of San La Muerte devotees have numerous obligation towards the saint, which they must honor in exchange for his protection. While followers request favors from other saints they demand them from San La Muerte. Communication with San La Muerte takes place through prayers that are passed on between believers. The San La Muerte devotion is based on punishment and submission and to be granted a favor the saint sometimes must even be threatened. Commons threats involve hunger or banishment to an uninhabited place until the favor is granted. When graces are granted, the saint will be rewarded and fed but never fully, in order to increase the chances of him soon being willing to grant another grace.

For most devotees San La Muerte offers personal and non-transferable protection that will only be accessible to others when - after the death of the original owner - he or she has acquired the sculpture. There are also intermediaries such as witch doctors and traditional healers who invoke San La Muerte's power on behalf of their clients, usually concealing the image from sight of their customers. In other cases San La Muerte is kept as a concealed household saint, extending his protection upon all family members with no distinction. A number of public altars that are devoted to San La Muerte can also be found. They are run by devotees acting as guardians of and caretakers for these altars. Some of these altars host public festivities on the 15th of August, San La Muerte's saint's day (Since San La Muerte is not included in the saint's calendar of the Catholic Church the date is somewhat contested and in some cases his saint's day is celebrated on the 13th of August).