9 Sacred and Superstitious Voodoo Sites You Can Visit Today

You probably know of voodoo dolls, the witch doctor Facilier in Disney’s The Princess and the Frog, perhaps the controversially named Voodoo Donuts. But beneath this cultural runoff, Voodoo is a complex, albeit dark… religion? Culture? Maybe both.

Voodoo combined pieces of Roman Catholicism (the religion foisted upon colonized nations by Italy, Spain, and Portugal) with traditional local belief systems, including, in some cases, witchcraft. Traits of Catholic saints and ideas from syncretic religions are mixed together in the form of loas, who act as intermediaries between the human world and the Supreme Creator.

Physical charms, herbs, amulets or “gris-gris” in American Voodoo, could be imbued with spiritual power to protect oneself or harm one’s enemies.

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