Introducing Santa Muerte, the Skeletal Lady of Mexico

Who Is Santa Muerte?

Santa Muerte, or "Holy Death" in Spanish, is a folk saint who is believed to be the feminine embodiment of death. Her modern form comes to us from Mexico, where she is styled as a female Grim Reaper figure. She is often depicted as a skeleton wearing a long robe and carrying a scythe, but with added feminine features such as jewelry, flowers, and flowing hair. Her devotees describe her as a warm, friendly, and convivial spirit who is delighted by the antics of the living and who enjoys interacting with them.

Santa Muerte has power over everything that can be touched by death and decay, which gives her an incredibly broad scope of influence. Since life flowers before it fades, Santa Muerte cures illnesses and addiction. Since fortunes can quickly change, she showers her devotees with money and prosperity and untangles legal problems. She also provides ironclad protection from harm, cutting short with her scythe the curses and maledictions of others. Because death touches on everything, her knowledge and wisdom are unparalleled. She empowers her devotees to deepen their understanding and strengthen their creativity; like necessity, mortality is the mother of invention. Because death touches everyone, she may also throw open the doors of social influence as well as attract a wide variety of lovers. Santa Muerte holds the keys to the underworld as well as other planar realms, and she may unlock their gates to allow communication with spirits of the dead as well as other entities. Since death and dying both have the power to transform your consciousness, Santa Muerte is also a powerful patron spirit of magic. She may assist in shaping and empowering the consciousness of devotees, deepening their wisdom, strengthening their willpower, and expanding their awareness. These three things translate to increased magical power, making Santa Muerte the natural ally of both witches and magicians.

Even this is not an exhaustive list of Santa Muerte's broad portfolio of powers. Because she is the face of death incarnate, her capacity to act is limited only by her devotees' capacity to ask. It is deeply ingrained within many of us to openly deny what we really want because we are afraid of being viewed as greedy, sinful, or cynical.

For example, many people ask spirits for help with winning money in the lottery. Often these requests are filled with promises to use the winnings to help the less fortunate, such as giving large sums of money to charity. If this is done honestly as a form of spiritual bribery, it can be quite effective. Some spirits respond well to being paid for their services, such as with charitable donations made publicly in their name. However, making such promises to simply mask your greed will actually have two different effects. First, spirits tend not to respond well to deception. Not only is being deceptive itself very rude, but you are also telling the spirits that you think they are stupid enough to be deceived. Since no one likes being insulted, spirits will respond poorly — if at all.

Second, making such promises also weakens the power of your request, since you are wasting time and energy trying to convince a spirit that you truly desire to donate millions to charity when actually you don't. Since this attempt will fail anyway, making these kinds of false promises is an ultimately self-defeating practice. Many people try these tactics because we believe that friendly and helpful spirits will not help a person whose desire to win the lottery is rooted in greed, as greed is thought to be destructive and evil. The kind of spirit that would fulfill such a request is often not the kind of spirit that many people would choose to ask for help.

Santa Muerte is notable because she is not concerned with the underlying motivations driving the requests of her devotees. She assigns no particular moral weight to any kind of request, because, to death, everything is a zero-sum game. Whether you dedicate your lottery winnings to feeding the homeless or to retiring to a beach in Fiji, you will still die in the end. Therefore, Santa Muerte is far more likely to respond to a greedy but heartfelt request than one that is diluted by fake feelings of altruism. Because she is so nonjudgmental, her willingness to intervene is limited only by her devotees' willingness to ask for her help. Because she assigns no moral weight to any kind of request, her response also extends to using her power to harm other people. This has led to Santa Muerte's condemnation by religious and civil authorities and to her followers often being considered suspect.

It is the destructive side of Santa Muerte that has helped her garner so much attention in recent years. The US Federal Bureau of Investigation labels Santa Muerte as a "narco-saint" that is idolized by drug traffickers; it blames her cults for shocking acts of violence and ritual slayings committed on both sides of the US–Mexico border. Cults dedicated to Santa Muerte frequently operate within drug cartels because it is believed that she will grant their members supernatural protection and aid. The media often sensationalizes stories of her statues found in graveyards and at roadsides, apparently left there as components of spells designed to harm specific targets. Her veneration is not condoned by the Catholic Church. In fact, the Catholic Church condemns Santa Muerte as a Satanic figure.

To the police, the appearance of Santa Muerte at a crime scene presents a dark omen indeed. During an interview with a law enforcement official from New Mexico, I was told about a local drug bust conducted by the US Drug Enforcement Administration. While raiding a cartel compound, the agents found an entire room turned into a temple dedicated to the worship of Santa Muerte. The main feature of the temple was a Santa Muerte "statue" made out of a female skeleton wearing an elaborate black silk wedding dress. The official explained to me the primary reason that authorities fear Santa Muerte cults and thus specifically target them for eradication. It's not that they fear supernatural repercussions. What they fear is how reckless and violent drug traffickers can become when they believe they have supernatural protection. Such a criminal is incredibly dangerous and capable of anything. In an attempt to curb cartel violence, the Mexican military specifically targets Santa Muerte shrines for demolition in an attempt to demoralize drug cartel members. Even if the authorities do not believe in Santa Muerte, they...