<\/p>\n
Pat Robertson’s is receiving well deserved if still <\/p>\n I had gone to New Orleans to attend a Southwest (!) As a long time New Orleans resident, I hoped she could get The day before I drove to her botanica<\/a>, <\/span>to introduce myself and in the The shop was in one of the most unusual neighborhoods I had When I returned later for the ceremony I walked up the As the ritual began we all did a kind of circle dance, and After the ceremony ended and I had returned to where I was While finding links for this post I came across a Voudon <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Pat Robertson’s is receiving well deserved if still insufficient condemnation for saying the Haitian earthquake may be a “blessing in disguise” and is the result of a “pact with the devil” Haitians made long ago to drive out French slave masters. (After all, BLACK people could not possibly defeat White people without Satanic help.) As…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[111,105],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-464","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-events","category-pagan-spirituality"],"yoast_head":"\n
\ninsufficient condemnation for saying the Haitian earthquake may be a “blessing
\nin disguise” and is the result of a “pact with the devil”<\/a> Haitians made long ago to
\ndrive out French slave masters.
\n<\/span>(After all, BLACK people could not possibly defeat White people without
\nSatanic help.) As is probably well known to my readers, Haiti is a center of Voudon<\/a>, (popularly called Voodoo) a Pagan African Diasporic religion that survived bloody persecution by Christians. It’s prominence there is likely why he is spreading his inane drivel about Haiti and the devastating quake that killed so many and maimed so many more. Robertson’s poisonous bile had one positive impact for me. It brought me back to happy memories of
\nattending a Voudon ceremony years ago in New Orleans. <\/p>\n
\n<\/p>\n
\nPolitical Science Association meeting and took the opportunity to visit an old
\nfriend in the city who taught at a University there. <\/span>So I arranged to spend a few extra days in the city. <\/span>I also hoped somehow to get to attend a
\ngenuine Voudon ceremony.<\/p>\n
\nme invited to the real thing, not one that was arranged for tourists. <\/span>She said she’d look into it, and soon
\ntold me there was one I could attend in a couple of days. <\/span>My use of the correct term, “Voudon,”
\nhad favorably impressed the woman who served as the group’s Manbo, or priestess.<\/p>\n
\nprocess make sure I could find it at night by first finding it in the day
\ntime. <\/span>Her botanica was a small shop with
\nherbs and various things used in Voudon.
\n<\/span>We had a delightful conversation during which she mentioned that her
\nteacher in Voudon had at one time also studied Wicca. <\/span>(Hear that, Pat?)<\/p>\n
\never seen. <\/span>Narrow streets with old
\nhouses in an architectural style I cannot really describe, except to say it did
\nnot look like America, or the French Quarter for that matter. The neighborhood
\nlooked and felt like another country. (The longer I stayed in New Orleans, and
\nthe longer I was away from the French Quarter, the more this sense of
\ndifference seemed to characterize everywhere I went.)<\/p>\n
\nbuilding’s narrow stairs and through a narrow hallway into a back room that
\nopened out on a back porch. <\/span>White
\nand Black people were there, and in this temple the majority were white. <\/span>Two or three guys had the invocational
\ndrums and as they drummed the priestess traced patterns for different Loa<\/a> on the floor with white flour.<\/p>\n
\nin time several people became “horses” for different divine riders. Papa Gedde<\/a>
\narrived and spent much of the rest of the ritual on the back porch, smoking and talking
\nwith people who approached him.
\n<\/span>Before long I had my own rider, Agwe (a Loa of the sea), which was a
\ndelight to me and apparently a surprise to most there since I was a
\nvisitor. <\/span>But the incorporation was
\nnot real deep. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nstaying, and had a chance to get some perspective on the ceremony, I decided
\nthe “feel” of the ritual was remarkably Wiccan. <\/span>There was a larger crowd, but not much larger, and the
\ndrumming was something no Wicca ceremony in my experience has had, but all in
\nall I felt right at home.<\/p>\n
\nblog<\/a> that seems well worth reading for those interested. \/<\/a>\n<\/p>\n