What advice would you say to anyone about initiation into vodou? Asking because the loa told me I not only needed to initiate but marry (Agwe tawoyo) urgently and I have noticed an abundance of good changes since my readings but this all came with a lot of unexpected news and I would like advice about how to make sure I have the spoons to make it through the path to initiation without getting so upset.
Hi,
So, I regard having to do anything as huge as kanzo and maryaj lwa urgently as something that needs a lot of push back. There are very, very few reasons things with that much life change and spiritual significance need to hurried, and even then a solid houngan or manbo can help slow the process down. The only real reasons I would entertain hurrying for would be imminent death of the person asked to do those ceremonies or their child, or crippling, life-threatening illness...and there are still stopgaps that can be employed to prolong life and give enough time to plan and mount those ceremonies. There is a lot of time and effort that go in, nevermind money.
So, I would want to know why the need for urgency. Because the lwa want it that way is not a good reason; the lwa must respect their people and negotiate for what they want. If folks allow, the lwa will make immediate demands but it is a houngan/manbo's job to help negotiate that and help you stand your ground. I would also ask what they are seeing as urgent; is that with a year? Within five years? Time for spirits is different than time with us.
I also recommend a lot of slowness before initiation. Before someone even considers going into the djevo, they should be present and active in the community that will support the initiation for honestly years. Go to lots of ceremonies and observe, get your hands in the work, meet the members of the house and see if you vibe with them. Spend a lot of time with the person who would mount the initiation for you and learn who they are. Get to know the spirits. Without all of that, you are being dumped in the deep end without knowing how to swim. The work of initiation can never be undone, so choosing wisely and with a lot of discernment is necessary.
With maryaj, it is very often not just one spirit; it is multiple to hold us in balance, provide the optimal protection, and prevent destructive jealousy. Many houses do all those spirits in one ceremony to reduce the need for more and to conserve money. Marrying only one risks needing to do more ceremony in the future to appease unhappy lwa.
Additionally, you wouldn't marry a person you didn't know quite well so you shouldn't be marrying spirit who you don't have at least passing familiarity with. Forging relationships is important. And, maryaj comes with requirements that affect current or future intimate partners. Maryaj and kanzo also have lifelong obligations that need to be met over time.
Just because spirit lays something down as a need, urgent or otherwise, doesn't mean you should immediately pick it up. They cannot and should not demand immediate answers and need to respect your free will. An ask does not mean you have to do it and, quite honestly, does not mean you should. Spirits ask for lots of things, and sometimes the answer is yet but sometimes the answer is no.
I also would want to know why they want initiation. What do you gain from it? They gain a lot, but what's in it for you? How are they going to help you? How do you and your life benefit from this?
The lwa can definitely pave the way after giving big news but that also doesn't mean you should say yes or that it would be beneficial for what you want for yourself. Running fast into something like initiation or permanent bonds of marriage with spirit is a recipe for disaster. Too often people are in a hurry, and then things go poorly for them. Initiation should not be then first thing done in the religion or the first motion of participation in a community. It should be a natural development of growth.
You can't make sure you have the spoons to make it through these processes. Initiation is a difficult, grueling, uncomfortable process that takes you apart and puts you back together, and the process is longer than the actual ceremonies. There is lead up and there is what happens after and it can take awhile for your life to come back to center. If you don't think you have the spoons to do it without it wrecking you or making you upset, you should not do it or should wait until you feel you are more ready.
You additionally can't plan for preparation in any particular way that preserves you because you don't know what the process will require for you. My road to my kanzo required that I shed almost everything important to me; I gave up a job and career path, my home, my car, most of my belongings, and relationships that I had thought were lifelong. That's not the way for everyone but the path to get to kanzo has sacrifice involved. Maryaj is not dissimilar; it required permanent changes to intimate relationships that have consequences if not met.
So...no easy answers. Don't rush, and don't allow pressure from spirits or people make the decision for you. You need a solid foundation before going into either of these ceremonies, and you should not be asked to do things quickly without really specific reasons and after other interventions happen to measure the impact on the situation. You wouldn't jump into life changing processes in other areas without a lot of discernment, so do the same here.
If there is indeed a life threatening situation involved, ask for what can be done immediately to assist in slowing that down or resolving it in a way that does not involve rushing. There are always options.
I hope this helps! Happy to chat more if that feels helpful.
I only have a few thoughts after Saturday’s Fet. I never get approached by spirits at fetes. Half of me is glad because I don’t speak Kreyól and would feel pressure in a large crowd to respond or generally know what’s going on (which is rare, even after a year of attending). The other half of me was starting to feel neglected by the lwa. Why tell me to initiate and give no further instruction? The thing is, every Fet I attend results in me receiving a message from a random vodouisant I’m sitting or standing with me that helps me on my journey. Fet Gede this year was no different.
Spirits don’t speak to me at fetes right now because 1) there’s nothing urgent I need to do (thankfully!) and 2) they speak to me in my dreams and in my regular waking life. I need to stop doubting that and second-guessing the signs. Attending fetes serves a different purpose for me. Instead, I need to call Manbo Maude more often to sort through what I see and hear. Period. I have issues developing new relationships, especially with elders/potential parent figures BUT I have a mission.
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A handful of years ago, today (July 24) was the day that I was lifted from the djevo, baptized, and reintroduced to the world as an houngan asogwe. It is the achievement I am most proud of in my life thus far, and there has not been one thing in my life that has moved me more than slipping under the water for 9 days and truly learning what it means to walk with the lwa.
The lwa literally saved my life by granting me access to the djevo. When I (esentially) crawled in there, I was dying and had I not made it there, I would have been dead by the end of the summer. Like, casket dead...not esoteric dead. Things were more serious than I realized, and I was clinging to life by my fingernails.
But...they healed me and worked literal miracles throughout the process, from getting me there to a hand-to-heart miraculous healing the night I was to enter the djevo, and all they did during the process and after to help me rebuild myself and create a life worth living.
A moment with Dantibitsyon at Leve Kanzo
July is my month because of this. When we are not in the middle of a pandemic, I spend July in Haiti and it is always a gift. Good things always happen. Following kanzo, I married my lwa in Haiti, then married my husband, and have been blessed with deeply meaningful time in the the temple with my lwa and my loved one celebrating all those things and more. I couldn't be there this July but that doesn't mean I am not celebrating at all...
Today, I put a crowbar in my badji and took a look around to see what seemed good to share. I do not make large batch spiritual ingredients or items, so it's all limited quantities on a first come first served basis.
(4) 6 oz flasks of Baume du Commandeur. This is one of my favorite things to make; the process is great for me and it's an absolute firecracker. It was brought to the island during colonization and, like anything worth a damn, was made better by the genius of enslaved Africans who became Haitians. It is a common ingredient in Haiti where I learned to make it, but not really available off the island very easily.
Baume du Commandeur is like hopped up 'do as I say' or other commanding work. It's a soldier that can get set to its task on its own or (my favorite) as part of a bigger piece of work. Add it to a bath or a handwash, use it in lamp work...it amps up and intensifies and magnifies the work at hand. A little goes a LONG way. It is one of those things that if you know, YOU KNOW.
$40/flask + shipping, first come first served. I'll be making another batch in August, but not at this reduced price. I am taking pre-orders for full-sized bottles with a $50 discount, deliverable in late August/early September.
(1) bottle of Benyen Bon Chans. This is liquid gold, and it's a bath I prescribe fairly often as it essentially resets the clock on your luck and clears the table to allow blessings to roll in. You'll get some tips and tricks for my favorite ways to use it, too.
$77 + shipping, first come first served.
And...all leson/card readings are $50 until August 1. Book by the 1st for a day that is most convenient for you. A leson is a direct consultation with the lwa to explore what the spirits may have to say and address and questions or concerns you might have, including investigating your spiritual court and possibilities in the religion.
So...happy kanzo to me and happy shopping to you! DM/inbox me to claim/schedule (or reach out via email at [email protected]) and for payment info.
By the time this posts, I will (FINALLY) be back in Haiti celebrating the lwa and our newest ti fey and our collective resilience, in the temple I call home. It has been the longest year, and it has felt indescribably empty without the summer cycle of ceremonies and joy that ground the rest of my year. However, like all things in sèvis lwa, we persevere. Haiti has blessedly not experienced COVID19 on the scale the US has...it's been a blessing not worry overly much about my loved ones down there and an even bigger blessing to be able to travel safely in a way that supports community health, wellness, and continual joy.
My feet miss the earth. I need my medicine.
I've been fairly quiet this past year not for any bad reasons but because I work in a high risk public health position and that has taken up the majority of my energy. Through the summer, I worked a million hours a week in environments where an unknown third of the people I was seeing were COVID+, and where PPE was scarce and morale in the shitter. It was a whole lot, and the majority of it was me praying with my spirits and my mother giving me remedies for tea to drink after work and steams to protect my lungs and treatments I could do if I felt the least bit unwell, right alongside my husband keeping the literal home fires burning. I was otherwise locked in my house like the rest of everyone, save for a brief trip south to Haiti to shelter in place while some unavoidable business got taken care of.
I've been thinking about this year in all its ugliness, and thinking about how this has been it's own womb. It's been 9 months of this now, and what has been birthed?
For me, this year has had incredible highs and terrible lows. I have experienced the most profound joy and then found moments of deep despairing grief where it felt like there was nothing left...and yet, here I am.
This plague birthed new understandings and, for those of us who do people-forward public health work, new ways of working and surviving. This year, there's even been some thriving...even in the midst of the moments where I thought the world was ending. Those moments were where 'survive' turned to 'thrive' and where my lwa met me.
There is some part of me that needs to relearn, over and over, that my lwa will always be beside me no matter what I find myself in the middle of. I don't even have to look, but just breathe them in and fill my lungs with their presence. They are, as I was reminded while fixed with the gaze of a spirit who sees and has seen me in all my parts, in everything for me...if only I will seek them there.
And so those moments of seeking are what I hold onto this year. Hearing incredible news and tipping my head back to laugh and give thanks. Hearing the news of my family in the US and in Haiti. Collective action to make sure our tiny little community is safe. Receiving love. Learning new things about myself. Having a COVID+ person cough in my face and then die ten feet away from me, yet my numerous tests coming back negative. Cool water and Caribbean sun. Grief so thick I thought I might die of a broken heart. My husband's laughter. The smell of a sweet lamp, burning for the good of another.
In my best moments, I turned to them in glee because it is they who bring all sweetness and blessings. In my worst moments, I turned to them because there was nothing else to hold me up and even when I was too upset to hear them, they bore witness to my pain and reminded me that sweetness tastes like sand without its bitter brother.
I am grateful that I am here to see the close of the absolute worst year I have ever lived through, and equally grateful for each experience that has shaped my understanding of myself through this collective dark night of the soul. I'm looking to 2021 with cautious hope, and the writing is on the wall for some serious leveling up.
There is a New Year's tradition that whatever you are doing on the first day of the year dictates what you will spend the year doing. Right now, I am watching kids play in the lakou while the granmoun sit and talk ahead of tonight's ceremony. I've had my soup joumou already, and might have a little more before the drums start pounding. My husband has just come back from running an errand and he smells like work and happiness. In a little while, we'll put on our whites and fill the temple with heat. I'll sweat like a Republican in a food line, and then will drop off to sleep like a baby afterwards, next to this guy who I can't get enough of. We'll probably skip the bed and spread a banana mat on the porch and sleep for a precious few hours. He'll make me coffee and tease me about his hair, and I'll remind him that he sleeps like a starfished toddler. All will be in balance. That's how I want to spend the next year.
When my feet meet the earth in the temple tonight, I'll be praying for the best possible outcomes for all of you in the coming year, whether you're a regular reader or you click over now and then. May this new year carry blessings for you in the ways that serve you best.
I have spent the last few weeks in Haiti. It hasn’t been my usual sort of trip as there has been no ceremony, no going to the beach, and no gathering with chosen family of friends. Instead, I’ve taken care of some pressing business that couldn’t be avoided and otherwise sheltered in place with my husband in our favorite spot in the capital. It’s been quiet and lovely in the middle of the global chaos of this completely avoidable pandemic. I am lucky, but I also got on a plane with a respirator and a whole lot of hand sanitizer.
With business taken care of, we stay in. When it’s shady, we sit on the small balcony that looks down in Pétion-ville, with Gwo Mòn on one side and Jalouzi on the other. S points out the soccer stadium that is lit up each night for an ongoing tournament, and Legliz Sen Thérèse, a tall triangle against the short buildings around it, and the buildings that past president Martelly was responsible for. We negotiate the air conditioning, as 75 feels cold for him and the 95+ outside is too hot for me. It’s quiet and slow, and that’s alright.
In the morning, S makes us coffee and pours it between two cups like every Haitian ever to dissolve the absurd amount of sugar that many Haitians like in their morning wake-up. Later, S gnaws on goat and I eat endless amounts of lanbi boukannen/grilled conch, piled high with pikliz echalot. We play the same clicky games on our cell phones (it’s true love...) and occasionally turn on the TV to watch the news, the French overdubbed telenovelas (El Diablo! La Doña!), and the occasional American movie. You have not lived until you’ve seen Mrs. Doubtfire in French.
We talk a lot about the dichotomy we can see from the balcony; the affluence to the left and the poverty to the right. Jalouzi is called a slum because it is packed full of people, many of whom fled the valleys of Haiti when their homes were destroyed in the 2010 goudougoudou. It became a focal point of a government striving to appease the more privileged when an artist was hired (with PetroCaribe funds....) to paint all the houses in Jalouzi a bright and cheerful color. It was floated as a way to beautify and raise morale in a really difficult place to live, but it was really about appeasing the more affluent folks who were looking out their window at a wide gray swatch of concrete and metal homes and shacks.
Today, Jalouzi has faded back to muted colors and gray buildings again and people continue to struggle to make it through the day. There is no electricity to speak of though the soccer stadium less than a quarter mile away is lit up every single night as are the houses in the more affluent surrounding areas. It’s strategic and it does it’s job; folks who are more poor are isolated to their neighborhoods where the folks who are more affluent don’t have to see. If you don’t have the money to buy a better life, my husband says, you are not just waiting for something better to come along but are pase mizè, or sort of waiting in your misery like other might pass time. Each day is a careful balance that results in the sun rising the next day.
One of the things I find most difficult to write about is the intrinsic balance that must be struck by folks who are learning Vodou and, by extension, learning Haiti. It is easy to enchant what is really the result of a lack of exposure to other cultures in the world, and yet it is equally easy to miss the thing that Haiti has achieved that the West has not: the absolutely seamless lived experience of a cultural religion, which certainly looks like enchantment from the outside. You can’t have Vodou without having your feet in the dirt in Haiti, and you can’t have Haiti without Vodou.
But..it’s a risky balance that we all walk on our journey to seek the lwa where they live. With the explosion of the internet, it’s easy to see narratives about how Haiti is essentially this mythical vacuum where everything is sort of twee and picturesque way. People inevitably come away saying that they found the only ‘real Vodou’ on the island and want to package that for sale and distribution, but it is clear to anyone with eyes to see that they have not yet grasped the reality of what they stood in the middle of.
And--since pendulums swing both ways--there is the other side, where folks discount the importance of Haiti and discount the significance of having your feet in the same dirt that the lwa rise up out of. In similar ways, that experience is packaged for sale with things like the idea of a ‘kanzo’ in the United States and the sale of items called kolye or asson, without really caring or understanding how these are made in context or why someone who is not a legitimate asogwe cannot make them for other people. It is a similar lack of grasping as above.
Who knows the right way out? Probably not me. The lwa take a longview and watch, and we know where the lwa live by the spiritual fruits produced (versus material fruits...’stuff’ and capitalism is never the answer). For me, I just do my work and remember that when I come here, I am both coming home to the lwa in their various homes and I am also arriving to where people live and die and do their work in between. Balance in a difficult place.
Today marks 229 years since the ceremony at Bwa Kayiman that began the uprising that birthed the Haitian Revolution. This was a beginning that has never really finished on the island; the French colonizers were expelled and life moved forward in a different way, but the struggle is still ongoing. Haiti has kept fighting under totalitarian regimes, political corruption, numerous pandemics, hunger, bigotry from across the border, economic famine, and continual foreign occupation.
And yet, the dust is the same. When we are on the island, our feet touch the same dirt that Boukman stood on when he called for the lwa. We stand on the same ground that Mèt Feray Aleman and Metrès Ezili Danto were born from when enslaved Africans said ‘enough’. The revolution lives here and not anywhere else, and that’s why it’s important to come. When we are lifted from the djevo, we are lifted with that revolution born within us to carry into the world.
With all these things in mind, I am listening the murmur of folks living out their lives over the rustle of the palms. The drums are pounding hard today all over the country, and I am seeing the tendrils of smoke from cooking fires that no doubt have some manje lwa on them. My heart lives here part-time or full-time or all the time, and it beats a little stronger when I can put my feet on the dirt and feel the ground still reverberate with the fire of Bwa Kayiman. These things are especially poignant in this time of becoming in the world, where we look at what our global systems of inequality and capitalism has birth while we struggle with this illness that takes what we love most.
Papa Boukman o, nou ap we ase
Each and every blessing is counted today, tomorrow, and always, and I hope the same for all of you: may you find your blessings abundant in this time of upheaval and be able to count them with a full heart.
Bonswa Houngan!! I had a question...how do you spot a trained, initiated priest who is trying to swindle you/take advantage of you financially through the religion? I know that this religion can have heavy costs and services just generally cost something but beyond outright fakers or scammers, how do you spot people who are licensed to do the spiritual work of this tradition, but try to take advantage of you or profit off of you? Thanks
Hi there,
This is a good question. One of the unfortunate realities is that there are priests who were made correctly who make bad choices that harm others. Additionally, there are people who believe they were made correctly who are perpetuating that fraud that was inflicted upon them. It’s a crap thing that this is the reality, but the internet has provided a platform for the spread of information and there are unethical folks who take advantage of that and the relative ignorance of folks who are seekers. It’s even worse when they don’t even realize that what they are doing is based in fraud, because that’s what they were given.
I am of the mind that if someone is out there swindling folks or perpetuating fraud, they are not a legitimate priest. It’s a betrayal of the oaths we take as part of our initiation and so when they begin cashing in on people, they lose what makes them a legit priest. You can come out of an ethical djevo and turn out to be a terrible person. Kanzo gives us tools and opportunities, but it can’t force us to be good people or ethical priests.
It can definitely be hard to tell. Because learning and information in Haitian Vodou is passed teacher to student, it can be a challenge to discern what is accurate and what might look pretty but is broken. There’s no one way to figure it out, but there can be a lot of signs and symptoms of stuff that is not so great and/or downright harmful. I’ll write about a bunch of them below, but of course nothing is exhaustive...sadly there is always more.
Here’s some big red flashing warning signs:
They say they have the only ‘real Vodou’. It often is spelled out as that they are the only ones who have ‘real Vodou’. This plays on someone’s desire for spiritual authenticity and the search for a spiritual home, and seeks to create a dynamic where they are the only source of information. After all, who would want something that’s not real? The truth is that Haitian Vodou varies throughout the country. There are definitely some things that are absolutes in the religion, but there’s a lot that depends on location, lineage, style of initiation, and other factors. Insisting that they are the ones who can pass on what Vodou really is boils down to either miseducation (they were conned themselves) or deliberate manipulation (they are being con artists.
Don’t go talk to other people. This often goes hand-in-hand with the ‘real Vodou’ thing. Folks get told that they should not (or outright cannot) talk to other vodouizan. This is often couched as that no one else can help you or that this specific group is made up of bad people or whatever. This is an isolation technique that is setting you up to be beholden to one person or one group. In any other religious tradition, this would be labeled cult-like behavior, but folks seem willing to accept that in Haitian Vodou for whatever reason.
As a priest, it’s not my job to dissuade you from speaking to other priests or tell you that you should not seek out what Vodou looks like anywhere else. Part of the discernment process SHOULD be seeing as much Vodou as is possible before making commitments, if indeed commitments are what is being asked for by the lwa. It’s not the place of a priest to try and limit your access to the religion even if you it leads you away from them because it is not the job of a priest to limit you. If the lwa want you with someone, they will make that clear if you listen.
(More behind the cut...this got really long)
All the shit talk. Everyone in the religion has their own feelings about regleman and what other people do, and it’s not uncommon for people to instruct their ti fey/children born from ceremony in why what someone else does would not be acceptable in their house. It’s not uncommon for people to be gossipy (because we are all human). What is kinda out of hand is for folks to be outright denigrating someone to a seeker or a client. It’s poor form. We can say that we do things differently, we can say that we were taught differently or that we are not sure why someone would do xyz that way, we can even say that something was not done correctly or that you were misled without going in on some character assassination. This kind of thing is born from jealousy and insecurity, and it’s super transparent.
Exorbitant prices. Like you identified, things cost money. Neither people nor the lwa work without being paid, and part of the sacrifice of kanzo is the work and time it takes to come up with the financial sacrifice. That being said, there is unreasonable cost. With my airfare/transportation, special clothing, and all my personal shopping included, I paid about $10,000USD for my kanzo. The base fee was $8500, and I was given a complete accounting of what was purchased in my name. I came out of it telling my spiritual mother she should charge more based on the work I saw, but it’s hard to do because it’s already a lot of money for most folks and there’s no reason to ask anyone to pay more, really, since everyone can get paid out of that and all things can be purchased with that amount. No one who is ethical is making money off of ceremonies--it all goes into materials and making sure that everyone who shows up to work is paid fairly for their time and labor.
So, for an asogwe kanzo, it’s reasonable to be asked for anywhere really between $8,000USD and $10,000USD. I could see someone going a little lower than that, but I would side eye someone really hard who is asking for much more. I’ve heard stories of people being asked for $25,000USD for a kanzo, and that’s ridiculous and absolutely out of hand. Also, if you are paying in the $8,000 to $10,000 range, that should include all materials. You should not be being asked to ship barrels of supplies to be used in your ceremonies or be bringing suitcases full of stuff to be used on top of your fee. If someone is going to say that you need to provide all supplies (and a complete asogwe kanzo requires a LOT of supplies...the list I was given as an accounting of what was being purchased for me was three pages long single spaced), the price should reflect that.
Minimal pricing. On the other end, there are people who ask for so little money that it is not possible to even purchase all the supplies nevermind appropriately compensate everyone who is working on your behalf. I’ve heard of ceremonies supposedly being done for under $1000USD, and that’s just not possible. You are not getting a complete ceremony for that. If someone is trying to tell you that you can get a cheap kanzo, what are they cheaping out on? Do you really want to put your head in the hands of someone who is not going to do the work completely or is being tight with money and perhaps buying substandard supplies or leaving things out?
That goes for free kanzo, too. There *are* situations where kanzo can be done for no money; that is often the biological children of a priest or for someone who is working for the priest long-term. That is how many Haitians in Haiti pay for their kanzo: they live or live close to the temple and work for their initiatory parent to earn their way in. Also, a priest may choose to do the work gratis for someone who is facing imminent death (like, any day now) and the lwa have indicated the djevo will save them. It’s not free, as it will be paid off later, but I have seen priests work completely out of pocket when it is clear that this is the only option to save their life.
But...being offered free kanzo as just a regular person who needs the work is not a thing. It was offered to me before I went in with my spiritual mother, and I remember thinking about what they would actually be taking payment to do that, i.e. how much of my soul would I be leaving behind with them, however unknowingly. There is absolutely no free lunch.
Buy 1 Get 1 Free. Also known as ‘if you bring a couple friends, you won’t have to pay as much’. Packing a djevo with whomever can be compelled into it doesn’t make anything cheaper, it’s just that they want to collect as much money as possible and they know that people in the US love to think they’re getting a deal. There is no bulk discount on labor, in that the priests working your ceremonies are not going to be happy being paid less to do more, and the machann is not going to give a bulk discount on chickens and other things. That’s just no how it goes. Beware the person who wants to sell you a good deal.
Changing prices. The price you are given should be the price, period. There should be no last minute asks for more cash because of some crisis or some other thing that suddenly needs to be done. I hear this more and more often: someone gets to Haiti and suddenly the person who is going to be doing ceremony for them asks them for more money for things that were previously unaccounted for or, even worse, someone says mid-ceremony that more money is needed for something they didn’t outline before. This is taking advantage of your vulnerability in the situation, and it’s super gross. Prices of supplies can change and things can come up, but covering that is what the priest commits to when you are paying your fee. This is serious enough that, in the lineage I was initiated in, there is a contract that outlines how much kanzo costs, what the expected costs are for us outside of the fee, and a suggested outline of how to divide up payments (if necessary). This is not only a guideline and commitment for the person who signs it, but for the priest as well.
Asking for money for unrelated things. Asking you to invest in their businesses, pay for personal services like hair/nails/clothing, asking for expensive gifts in the name of spiritual devotion, etc is outside of anything that should happen. It’s not uncommon for children of a house to contribute to ceremonies being mounted (bringing a bottle of liquor, flowers for the table, contributing cash towards expenses if they are able, etc) but it’s never okay for someone to ask you to give money so they can get a massage or for you to buy them an iPhone or for you to invest in the start-up costs for their business (all real examples I have seen). Deciding of your own volition to give a gift is perfectly fine, but them asking for those things or holding them as necessary for you to undergo ceremony is not okay.
Heavy recruitment. Posts on social media recruiting for kanzo, people inboxing trying to get you interested, holding multi-level marketing lectures or group meetings couched as informational sessions (often goes hand-in-hand with the buy 1 get 1 approach) if you’re interested in kanzo, etc. A healthy djevo and sosyete does not need to recruit; the djevo fills itself because the lwa send the right people who need to be there.
They hold no other ceremonies for you to attend. Anyone who has not grown up inside the religion should be able to attend other ceremonies in the lineage they are interested in being a part of. The lack of other ceremonies being held is a big red flag; our spirits are fed through our fetes and spiritual feedings, and none of those are really secret (some aspects may be, but all have large public ceremonies). If they are not feeding their spirits in the ways the religion does, then they are feeding you to their spirits (I’ve literally seen people marked as sacrifices are).
And, if you cannot attend their ceremonies, how can you get to know their spirits, their other children, and the community that supports them? It is the first thing I tell people who are interested in serving the lwa: come to a fete and see what the religion is all about. How can you fully commit to something you’ve never seen? Those things should be accessible to you.
The first time you meet them should not be at the airport. That speaks for itself. Initiation and other ceremonies are forged via relationships and the religion is taught in person. If you cannot have a relationship with someone who you can see occasionally, you’re not really getting the benefit of the religion. This can mean sacrifices of time/money (many people travel for their Vodou), but it is worth it. You should not be expected or asked to undergo ceremony sight unseen. This is also why a house holding other ceremonies is important; seeing how the priest works and how they interact with spirits is key.
They have an empty temple. Healthy sosyetes have a community around them beyond the children of the house. Temples are full for ceremonies and are PACKED for kanzo and kanzo-related ceremonies. People travel from all over for fets and ceremonies that are done correctly and completely. The community also has an important function: their presence is endorsing the work the priest is doing, ESPECIALLY around kanzo. If there is no one there or it is only members of the house, there’s a big problem.
Related: if they are undertaking ceremonies alone, that’s also a red flag. If they have no priests who are willing to come work with them and they are doing all the work on their own, there is a problem.
They are rigid and immovable. This is often pushed off on the lwa being super pejorative. You have to do this thing, or the lwa will be mad. You can’t kanzo at any other time but this, the lwa said so. If you don’t do kanzo with me, the lwa will kill you. If you talk to this person, the lwa will be angry.
All of those things are real things really frightened people have brought to me personally. This is inappropriate power and control. The lwa understand we have lives and understand that sometimes things cannot happen in the timeline we had hoped. Sometimes there are consequences to not doing a thing, but there are DEFINITELY ways to manage that without things going totally sideways.
When folks make statements like that, it is really about them and not the lwa. Changing your mind on doing a ceremony can be a let down for the priest who has prepared to do it, but that’s not about you. How you work through that is between you and your spirits.
They cause or seek to cause outright harm. I’ve heard stories and seen the fallout from priest physically assaulting their children for genuine mistakes, smashing sacred items as punishment, coercing folks into sexual activity, calling and threatening family members when they decide they no longer want to deal with abusive behavior and tactics, and all sorts of horrific stuff. I’ve heard these things be passed off as traditional, and that’s a lie. While there can certainly be cultural differences and it can take time to learn to navigate those, assault, threats of violence, and outright abuse is not a part of the religion.
They rush you. While it’s certainly normal for a priest to need to know if you are going to be a part of a ceremony or not and to expect you to pay on time or as you agreed to, there’s no rushing someone into the djevo. I might tell you that the spirits are indicating that kanzo is necessary or that it might be a good idea to do it sooner rather than later, but there is no flurry of chaotic activity that demands you part with a whole lot of money and get pushed right into the djevo. The lwa are patient and if there is an emergent need things can be done to either address that need temporarily or to encourage the lwa to give more time.
They have no elders. If someone cannot name their initiator and their initiator’s initiator and on, there’s a problem. In Haitian Vodou, that’s not secret information; we are very proud of where we come from (or we should be). If they say they have no elders or don’t need them or have no contact with them, there is a deep problem. Our initiatory parent is our foundation; they even outrank the lwa in that the lwa place us in their hands to follow the expectations that our parent lays out.
If their initiatory parent has passed away, there are systems of checks and balances that still leave them with supports (godparents, priests who oversaw their ceremonies, elder siblings, etc).
If their relationship with their initiatory parent has degraded to the point that their parent won’t show up to the ceremonies they are holding or won’t help, there’s also big problems.
They cannot provide any proof of their initiation. In this day and age, there are ALWAYS pictures and video of our leve kanzo and baptem. Those things are not secret and we looooove our photos and video. They also serve as important proof that we were where we said we were and underwent what we said we did.
If no pictures were taken, they should be able to provide contacts who can verify that they were in the djevo and can verify the ceremonies were done completely and correctly (another reason community and other priests are important). Even if their parent has passed away, there still should be priests who can vouch for them.
Additionally, there are also other ways that priests can be called out in public to prove that they are who they say there are. There is a whole ritual battle that can happen with the asson/sacred tool priests use, there are specific gestures and language that can be used, and other things that are only taught to people who make it through kanzo. If they can’t do those things or can’t account for them, there’s a big problem.
They mix things in. Haitian Vodou is Haitian Vodou and it’s a complete religion on it’s own. Folks who are selling ‘spells’ for the lwa, who are utilizing rootwork/conjure/hoodoo and presenting it as travay/spiritual work in the religion, who divine with Tarot cards or shells or runes or whatever else, who bring in outside spirits like Orisa or Santisima Muerte or whatever else and claim it belongs are missing the boat. People can certainly have multiple spiritual commitments, but those should be held clearly separate.
Haitian Vodou has it’s own system of spiritual work that is pretty distinct, and the same with divination, prayers, construction of a table for the lwa, and how ceremonies are laid out. For someone who has been taught well, it’s easy to spot but in general passing off all those other things as Vodou is not accurate.
And...sometimes it’s not that they are trying to mislead you. Sometimes they have not been taught how to do traditional work and so are leaning on what they knew previously because it has not been communicated to them that there are traditional ways to do spiritual work or to divine. See above with not knowing that someone has done wrong by them.
They exploit vulnerability. This often rides along with ‘I have the real Vodou’ and it focuses on addressing parts of identities and lived realities that carry weight in our day-to-day and that could be sensitive areas for us. The most common way that this plays out is claiming that they have real Vodou because they only make Black folks in the religion because it is a Black religion. This is super, SUPER insidious and requires some teasing out of threads to really get at what is being said.
It is certainly true that Haitian Vodou is a Black religion, in that it is born out the Black Atlantic, slavery, and colonialism, and that it has deep roots in Africa. There is no reframing or reinterpretation of Vodou that can subtract or nullify that, and any attempt to do so is a deeply racist wrong.
What this presentation of Vodou fails to take into account is it’s Haitian-ness; it divorces the culture from the religion and leaves it as a reinterpretation that isn’t rooted in the actual religion. This is a really carefully crafted whitewashing (really) of a HAITIAN religion aimed at exploiting the deep and true and valid desire that many Black folks have for a spiritual space without white folks and turns it into a cash cow. It’s gross.
If someone really wants to go down the road of ‘real Vodou’ and strip it down to it’s utter bare roots, no one who is not Haitian is getting in the door. That’s what the sales pitch is leaving out; it plays on the want for a space of folks from similar backgrounds and similar experiences and turns it away from the actual reality of the religion. There are many very legitimate lineages and sosyete who do not admit white folks, but they also only admit Haitians. It’s couching a grift under a veil of very true and real things.
It also doesn’t communicate the reality of going to Haiti as a non-Haitian: it can be hard, and it can be doubly hard for someone who might look majority Haitian (darker skinned) but who does not speak the language or understand how to navigate the culture, religious and otherwise. The word for someone who is an outsider no matter their skin color is the same across the board: blan. That can understandably be hard to swallow, and it’s a disservice to present the idea to someone that they are getting the real deal because it will only be Black folks only to be put in an environment where they are unprepared to be a cultural outsider.
This happens to other folks, too. I’ve seen situations where someone is told that they are the only white person that the priest has made, so they are getting the real thing, or that they are the only house that will make a trans person or someone who is queer or gay or whatever. Manipulating people through using core pieces of their Self is pretty heinous.
There are no Haitians. Tying into the above, you cannot do Haitian Vodou without the presence of the culture bearers. It’s simply not possible.
They will not give you what is yours. Someone who is made a manbo or houngan asogwe should have their own pot tet, asson, a kolye, a set of govi, and a set of paket kongo. All of those items should be made for you as part of your kanzo. The specific number of paket and govi can vary a little, but they are yours and you should be able to take them home with you if you want. Many houses give folks the option of keeping their govi and paket in Haiti, but the choice should be yours. Additionally, many sosyetes give asogwe the choice of whether to take their pot tet home or keep in in the Haiti temple. There should absolutely be no discussion about your asson and kolye; if they are not going to give them to you, they are essentially holding you hostage and disallowing you from acting on the initiation you went through with good intentions.
They do not do kanzo in Haiti. This has somehow become controversial, but it’s straightforward: kanzo is only valid when done in Haiti. I see it as presented as opinion or with qualifiers (only asogwe needs to be done in Haiti, etc), but that’s just simply not true. Beyond the outright impossibility to build a complete djevo in the US/outside of Haiti (throwing a little dirt under the floor ain’t it), there are things that must be done when your feet are literally on the dirt and there are parts of ceremonies and preparation for ceremonies that cannot be done in the US or outside of Haiti (chache fey, lalye, a full bat ge etc).
Further, an important part of all kanzo whether it is hounsi kanzo/senp, sou pwen, or asogwe is meeting the lwa in their home. The lwa are rooted in Haiti and how can we profess to want to serve them if we either won’t go there or won’t bring people there? When you go through ceremony in Haiti, you are profoundly changed and it is easy to see why it is so important to make the sacrifice to go there. Trying to find a workaround for that says a lot about what folks are really trying to do.
And, for people who are meant to be manbos and houngans, a ‘kanzo’ that is undertaken in the US is not recognized, meaning that no legitimately made priest can or will greet you as a peer. You can’t be passed an asson to salute spirits in ceremony, you cannot take part in what spiritual work is done outside of Haiti, and you have essentially taken your money and burned it up.
Folks don’t think it’s that serious, but I’ve seen Haitians literally turn their backs on people who profess an American ‘kanzo’ and be disinvited to attend ceremonies until they get right with the religion, and assons snatched out of hands that have not been made to hold them. It’s a real thing that has real world consequences, and that doesn’t even touch the spiritual repurcussions.
Ceremonies that can be done outside of Haiti include lave tet, aksyon de gras, spiritual feedings (if you’re feeling hefty and have lots of people to help), maryaj lwa, and all sorts of fets. Nothing can compare to having them done in Haiti, but they are absolutely valid done elsewhere. Some folks have asked what happens if going to Haiti is not immediately viable (especially with the reality of COVID19), and the answer is that we wait or do other things in the mean time.
So...that’s the big stuff that I can think of off the top of my head. It’s a lot, but that’s the stuff I see and hear about regularly (really). The biggest and best tool that Joe Vodouizan has to discern whether or not what they are seeing is common sense:
Would I accept this as true and valid in any other setting?
How can I verify that this is true/accurate?
Do I feel like I am getting away with something, versus working through a difficult process?
What happens when I ask questions or (politely) challenge what I am seeing/hearing?
Does this make sense?
How do I feel about this?
These are the things that will save you from being taken advantage of. Move slowly and thoughtfully, and listen to your inner voice...that’s your guardian angel trying to guide you.
I hope this is helpful...I know this is probably more than you asked for. Let me know if you have more questions.
