Seventeen years of the National Congregation of Santa Muerte in Ecatepec, State of Mexico

Abstract

The National Congregation of Santa Muerte (CNSM) came into being early in the year 2000, in Ecatepec de Morelos (State of Mexico), as part of the expansion of the cult that arose in Tepito (Mexico City), and which later became a reference for ritual practice. Although the CNSM was based on the aforementioned model, it later published its own ‘ritual practices,’ due to the academic training of its leaders (a historian and a communicator, who have integrated the cultural loans from different religious systems into the rituals), added to the experience of the head of the family as the heir of family wisdom in the dark arts, such as sorcery, witchcraft, and the cult of Santa Muerte. To erect his altar, the father and his two sons (as ministers), appropriated space below the vehicular bridge close to the Ecatepec Metro (subway) station. In this article, we approach the cult of Santa Muerte through a qualitative approach, performing participant observation during its monthly rites and the festival of the ‘Day of the Dead,’ along with conversing with leaders and believers, bearers and practitioners of a cult that has gained sufficient symbolic effectiveness to not only maintain itself, but to increase its follower numbers -for seventeen years- through a process of formalization.