My journey to the goddess began when I was a precocious nine-year-old child in Los Angeles. I sort of lived in the library, and my mother never knew what I was going to come home with next. I discovered Edgar Cayce and psychic phenomena and would say things like, "I'd like to hypnotize you and do a past-life reading," but when I saw the movie The Story of Saint Bernadette, my whole life was transformed. I immediately wanted to become a Catholic saint. 

I had been raised a Protestant in the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church, where no one ever mentioned the Virgin Mary. When I discovered her, I suddenly had someone to pray to. I liked the idea of praying to a woman; it gave me the sense of mom being on the job. All you had to do was ask, and she'd nod her head, enfold you in her arms and put in a good word for you: "Gee, God, why don't you do this for her. She's a nice girl; I like her, come on." Jesus felt kind of remote for me, and God was too stern. I liked the idea of intercessions by saints-beings you could deal with personally. All you had to do was be very devoted and light candles. 

When I was twelve, my mother gave me my choice of religions, so I decided I wanted to become a Catholic. She rued her offer immediately when I decided to go to Catholic catechism. We got out of school early on Thursdays to attend church. I had attended boring, generic Protestant classes and learned the books of the Bible. There was punch afterward, which was pretty good; but the Catholic kids got to ride a bus. There was a nun at the front, and they sang songs and had a whole lot more fun. 

But catechism and I didn't get along so well. I was going to become a nun and then a saint. I had to get my act together quick. I got the Baltimore Catechism book, took it home and read the whole thing in a week. I learned that there were venial sins and mortal sins-venial sins were like misdemeanors, and mortal sins were like felonies. They showed them in the book-the milk bottle with venial sins was about half-full, but the bottle of mortal sins was full. I certainly felt like the full milk bottle. I was definitely a sinner. 

The last chapter was about the last-rites sacrament for people who were dying. It said that if you couldn't get a priest, you could bless someone, using any kind of fluid. About the second week in class, I raised my hand and asked a question: "If you didn't have any fluids, could you use spit?" That was the wrong question. The nuns were supposed to ask the questions, and you answered. The nun teaching the class turned bright red in the face and sent me to the Mother Superior's office. 
 
At the end of the semester it was time for us to get baptized and take our first Holy Communion. The Mother Superior had a priest with her. They sat me down and asked me to explain transubstantiation. I told her it was the mythical change of the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ. She told me it wasn't mythical; it was the actual transformation. And I said, "In that case, you'd be a cannibal." I was dismissed, and a letter came to my mother from the bishop of South Los Angeles stating that it might be a good idea if I waited a few years before I converted to Catholicism. So my dreams of being a Catholic nun dissipated. 
 
But for years I had a little niche-an arch of molding in the wall in my bedroom where I used to pray that the Virgin Mary would appear. It was just perfect for the Virgin Mary. If she miniaturized herself, she could show up there. Her blue robes would shine, and the aura around her would be really beautiful. I would be able to see it from my bed, find my old rosaries, get down on my knees and say some Hail Marys. Of course, I looked all around my room for her at night, especially around my head. Virgins are tricky-you can't tell them what to do. Nevertheless, I always had a special space in my heart for her. 
 
It wasn't until I was studying goddess religions that I realized the word "virgin" was used for most goddesses in Europe. It implied goddesses who were entities in and of themselves. They were sexual, but they stayed virgins as long as they didn't marry and they kept charge of their own selves. That really excited me. 

 
In college, I showed up by mistake at a group that was reenacting rituals to Isis. They immediately welcomed me, and explained what they were doing. I felt destined to be there. In the sixth grade, I had become interested in the gods and goddesses of Egypt-Isis, Osiris, and Set. Set hated Osiris, his brother, dismembered his body, and cast it all over the world. Isis spent years trying to find pieces of his corpse. She found most of them, but when she wasn't able to find his penis, she substituted an obelisk. (Smart girl!) 
 
I was particularly interested in Hathor, the mother of Isis and Osiris, who was represented as a cow. In our culture we still use the phrase "holy cow." That's extremely Brahman, and extremely Egyptian. A lot of cultures worship the sacred cow. We slaughter our cows, and yet we say this. It is an ancient idea. I liked the fact that Egyptian gods and goddesses, before Isis were symbolized by animals. 
 
I had dreams that I was the daughter of Isis. In astrology, Isis is often symbolized by the planet Pluto. Eventually I learned that astrologically Pluto is on my midheaven, squaring four planets in Scorpio-all in a "stellium." Every time I took my chart to astrologers they would give it back and say, "Here, take this to someone else." One astrologer told me that Pluto was blocking the information, but that I would eventually learn more about myself spiritually-no charge for that. 
 
In my third year of college, a psychic told me that a lot was going to happen in my forties and fifties, but that my twenties and thirties would provide the groundwork. (I'm now forty-seven.) She encouraged me to learn as much about the Goddess Isis as possible. 
 
I took the name Isis when I moved to Mendocino County in 1981. I had been dreaming of her intensely. She was urging me to bring her back. Isis comes from Somalia and the Sudan-a black African goddess who was adopted by the Egyptians. Her cult was so strong in Europe during the Roman Empire that the Romans made a decree that she couldn't be worshiped alone, that she had to be accompanied by a Roman goddess. So although temples were dedicated to Isis/Juno, for example, her cult was taking over Europe. Her Egyptian name was Au Set. She has been worshiped for thousands of years, and is one of the original East African fertility goddesses, the goddesses of life. The Egyptians didn't change that. She is often portrayed as jet-black and deeply veiled. These images of her are hidden. On Egyptian murals she is honey-colored, with multicolored wings; she holds an ankh in her hand, and usually protects the pharaoh. The throne in Egypt descended via the female, which is why the pharaohs married their sisters. There was a lot of inbreeding, but the tradition continued. 

 
Between 1973 and 1977, I was the assistant director of a drug rehabilitation program in London. I also led meditation workshops all over Europe-in Spain, Germany, Holland, and Switzerland--teaching a form I learned in London called The Enlightenment Intensive, originated by H. Charles Berner, who used to be involved with the Church of Scientology. It combines something like Zen koans, partner work, and a clearing process. You sit opposite a partner for forty minutes, and go back and forth in five-minute segments. Each person has a question to contemplate. If the question is, "What am I?" your partner asks, "Tell me what you are." You go inside and meditate on that, and then verbalize whatever comes up-a thought, a vision or a feeling in your body. You are seeking a direct experience, not just a verbal answer. The workshop also included walking meditation, working meditation, and some silent sitting over a three-day period. People had enlightenment experiences very quickly. 
 
At my first intensive, I knew I wasn't going to get it. I was the only black person in a room with eighty white people, and I figured this was something white people could do, but not me. It had nothing to do with black people, and it pissed me off. I thought they were all racist pigs. Charles was sitting there at the front of the room dressed in white, interviewing people. He either acknowledged their answer as truth or sent them back with some focus to help them go deeper. Many people were getting it. The wind outside was whipping and howling. It was like a Hollywood movie in Yorkshire. 
 
In the dead of night on the second day, I just wanted to go to sleep and forget about this who am I bullshit. I didn't know, and I didn't care. Okay, so I don't know and I never knew, okay? Then I saw a woman walk up to Charles. He asked, "Tell me what your question is." She said, "My question is, Who am I?" And he said, "Tell me who you are." And she said, mumble, mumble, mumble and he said, "Yes, now go share it." I was thinking, YES! She's got the answer! Ah hah!  So I got up, and kept an eye on her. She was glowing. I nudged up to her and said, "Would you be my partner in the next round?" She looked me over and said, "Oh yes, " and I was thinking, Whatever she's on, it's got to be pretty good. 
 
I tried to figure out which partner begins-which side of the cold wooden floor to sit on so I could ask her first-the one on the window side or the aisle side? The window! I prayed I was right-please, please, let it be the window. I was sweating. She was glowing. Finally Charles said, "Those of you with your back to the window, give your partner the question." Inside I felt, I did it!  I looked at her and said, "TELL ME WHO YOU ARE!" She said, "I'm the creator of all my selves." And I said to myself, I'm the creator of all my selves? I've spent two days walking around this cold fucking place for, I'm the creator of all my selves? Jesus H. Christ! What white people will not do! Oh God! I listened to her for five minutes, and felt my insides sink. She was beaming at me. The gong sounded; we thanked each other. Then she asked me who I am. I said, "I'm the originator of all my me's." She nodded her head and glowed. And I was thinking, holy shit! So every five minutes I went inside and I told her everything that happened. I was disappointed. We did this for forty minutes. Then I got in line to confront this motherfucker. When I finally got to Charles, he asked, "What is your question?" I said, "My question is, who am I?"  He said, "Tell me who you are." I said, "I'm the originator of all my me's." He looked me directly in the eye. I was mostly looking down at the floor. He said, "Yes, now fall into it." I was thinking, YES? That's the answer? Fall into it? 
 
That night, I went to sleep thinking, What the hell is he talking about? Finally, about three o'clock in the morning, I had a dream. I was at Stonehenge-not in the valley, but at the top of a hill. Standing next to me was Christ. The sun was coming up, and it was the most beautiful sunrise I'd ever seen. The colors were outrageous. I turned to Jesus to say, "This is what you meant all the time." I was totally in the moment. I turned to him, and there was no one there but ME! I woke up crying. 
 
I got out of my sleeping bag and sat for hours waiting for everybody to get up. I was so excited. I was there! The next day was remarkable. I started seeing people's angelic selves. I was calling it a hallucination, but remarkable things were happening. 
 
I was intrigued, and I did more intensives. Berner went back to the States, leaving us with his master students. A master named Jeff Love eventually agreed to take me as a student. After two years I became the first black woman to receive the stamp of approval as an enlightenment master. So that's what I did in Europe-Enlightenment Intensives. 
 
Truth is a direct experience. When it happens you're immediately changed. At the same time, you may start seeing visions, and have other things occur. Once I levitated. The important thing is not the phenomenon but the enlightenment. Once you become enlightened, you can't lose it. It's not that you get enlightened once, and that's all you have to do. You can get enlightened about lots of things. The basic question is, Who or what are you? Most people over forty can tell you that they are themselves, but what that self is is difficult to experience. 
 
The next question-What is life?-really stumps people. Most people have to work through What is death? before they can know What is life? They have to work through their religious training about life being a consequence of wrong-doing and having been thrust out of heaven, or life being a trial they have to go through so they can get back into heaven. People have a lot of misconceptions to meander through before they can directly experience life. 
 
The question-What is another?-usually puts people into tailspins. But possibly the hardest question is, What is love? I don't hand it to people who I suspect don't have the courage to go through the well of what hate is to find out what love is. It's very difficult to face your own hate, to face the blackness within you. I'm not talking about the void that Zen talks about. You really have to transcend your emotional crippling to find your love. And the question begs for more than heart love. You have to become bigger than yourself to find that love. Only some of us truly yearn for that. 

 
I was in Europe from 1973 to 1977. I came back to the United States married, cocksure, and absolutely self-involved. Back in California, I started working in drug abuse treatment in Los Angeles. When my ten-year high-school reunion came up in 1978, I told everybody I was going, but I didn't show up. Soon after that, one of my good buddies from high school contacted me-a woman named Starhawk. She lived in San Francisco, and called me one day at home when she was in L.A. working on a commercial. She wanted to know if we could get together the next time she came back down. My response was, "Well, have your girl call my girl." I was acting very efficient because I was intimidated by the fact that she was in the television industry, making commercials, and I was only running a clinic in a hospital. She called me from San Francisco a few weeks later saying she was coming to L.A. and could we have lunch or dinner? We had lunch, and I took the rest of the day off. 
 
The last time I had seen Starhawk she was going to UCLA; her room was painted black with symbols of pentagrams in silver paint, and I was sure she was using drugs. Since I had gotten into a drug rehabilitation program, I was holier-than-thou about substances at that point. Anyway, in 1978, when she told me she was publishing a book about witchcraft, all of my fears about her rose back up in my throat. She seemed normal, but I didn't know if this child was really normal or not. We went back to her family house--where I had spent many days and nights as a teen--and she gave me the galleys of her book. It was called The Spiral Dance. She left me alone for a couple of hours while I read a couple hundred pages. During that time, I suddenly knew that I was a witch--there was no doubt about it. Finally there was a name for me. Everything she was talking about, I absolutely believed with every cell of my body. 
 
I was really interested in the stuff about the goddess. The idea of this old matriarchal society made sense to me like nothing else. When she came back into her bedroom, I said "I'm a witch. Thank you. Thank you." She beamed at me; I beamed at her and we hugged. In the beginning of October I got this package in the mail. It was a pre-publication copy of The Spiral Dance, with an inscription inside. I read it from cover to cover. 
 
A friend of mine who worked for the L.A. County Office of Alcohol and Other Drugs had told me about a women's magic store in Venice. I had driven past it a couple of times, but had never gone in. One morning on my way to work I got into my truck, and about six little spiders jumped out of my hair and started spinning threads down onto the steering wheel. It was awesome. Around noon I left work and drove to that store. I walked in and asked the woman working there, "Is there some meaning to spiders jumping out of my hair and weaving webs down onto my steering wheel?" She came out from behind the counter, put her arm around me and said, "Dear, I think you have a home here." She then told me about a women's moon circle led by Z Budapest that was coming up Friday night. I was real interested. I bought several books and yarn to make myself a girdle--a red braided sash that you wear around your waist in a pagan ritual. I also bought two candles, a book on candle magic, an athame (a black-handled ritual knife), incense, and anointing perfumes. Friday night came. I told my husband that I didn't know what time I'd be home, because I was going to a women's ritual. He was pretty freaked out. 
 
I was apprehensive, since I had no idea what was going to happen. We all met at the store at sundown. People arrived with food and wine and carrier bags full of stuff. I just came with my candle and my knife and my girdle, not knowing what else I needed. Z told us that once the circle was closed, we couldn't leave until it was over. That really made me nervous. I wanted the option to leave. We went out into the Hollywood Hills, to a beautiful house overlooking Los Angeles. The lights below us were gorgeous; you could hear crickets, and it was very peaceful. 
 
A young woman around sixteen years old was the maiden. She inscribed the circle around us, and then others started calling on the spirits of the east, spirits of the south, spirits of the west and spirits of the north. Z is a Dianic witch-she only calls upon the goddess. This was substantially different from what I had read in The Spiral Dance. (Starhawk is a neo-pagan witch and calls upon the goddess and the god, her consort.) 
 
All of this was so interesting and wonderful. We wrote things down on paper that we wanted to see happen between now and our next meeting.  Then we burned the paper in a big cauldron. We danced and sang songs. When the circle was opened, we had a feast. This was the part that blew me away the most. Suddenly all this food showed up-delicious finger-food-Brie cheese, French bread, dolmas (grape leaves wrapped around rice), and everything you could think of. You weren't allowed to feed yourself; other people fed you. They would walk up to you with a goblet of wine and say, "May you never thirst." Then you'd turn around and somebody else would offer you food and say, "May you never hunger." This brought tears to my eyes. The essence of being a witch is the love and affection in a sisterhood that has been largely lost from our world. After the feast, we sat in a hot tub overlooking L.A., chatting about the ritual. I realized this was something I wanted to do more of. 

 
In 1979 or 1980, I was running a three-day Enlightenment Intensive in Malibu at a women's retreat. About eight women had signed up. In the afternoon of the second day, I took everybody outside for a silent meditation under some trees. While we were sitting there, I heard a voice coming through the hills beside us. It was Luisah Teish, talking about the African orisha. I stopped meditating, fascinated by what this woman was saying.  I had never heard anybody talk about African goddesses, and she really seemed to know what she was talking about. 
 
I realized then and there that I had to take her workshop. I got everybody back inside and explained that I had been called to hear Teish speak. I invited everybody to come with me because I felt that what she was talking about was a very important tradition. A couple of people were disgruntled, but almost everybody came with me. 
 
In 1986, I was very sick with Lyme disease and chronic fatigue syndrome. My daughter, Morgan, was about five years old. At my sickest, a friend drove me to Oakland to meet with Teish. Teish had told me to bring twenty-one silver dollars and three coconuts. We got to her house at 10:00 or 11:00 a.m. She came down from her altar room, and met with me in the spare bedroom where she did her work. After taking my history she told me I was very lucky because one of her teachers was coming from Los Angeles that day, and I would have the benefit of her assistance in a ritual healing. She sent my friend to the store for the herbs and spices we needed for the ceremony. I was then left alone for a long time while Teish attended to other people in the house. This was not a fifteen minute doctor's office visit. It was an all day experience. 
 
At one point, Teish grabbed me by the arm, took me to the living room, had me lie down on the floor face down, and put a cowbell in my hand. She told me to ring the cowbell and to repeat what she said in Nigerian. I didn't know a word of what I said. Suddenly a woman walked in. She smelled wonderful--and not from a perfume. She emitted a heavenly smell that made my whole body relax. She tapped me on the head, the shoulders and legs while saying a blessing in Nigerian. I kept ringing the bell. Then she told me to get up. When I looked into her brown eyes she said, "This is a child of Yemaya, don't you know." Then she and Teish had a conversation about me and Yemaya. They said I should be initiated soon. They walked me back into another room and talked over my head as if I weren't there. 
 
The next thing I knew, Teish took me into the bathroom, closed both doors, had me take my clothes off, gave me a bar of African soap and had me wash from my hair down to my feet. She said I should wash in cold water, but at my protest, she let me wash in a little warm water. I was thinking to myself what Alice Walker used to say that her grandmother always told her: "Wash up as far as possible, wash down as far as possible, then wash possible." That's what I did. Suddenly the door to the bedroom opened. Three women dressed in white came in with a bucket of cold water and dumped it on me. I screamed at the top my lungs. It was such a shock. Suddenly my daughter was standing there saying, "Don't you hurt my mommy." Teish assured my daughter she wouldn't hurt me. My teeth were chattering and I was covered with goose bumps. I looked horrible. I felt horrible. They pulled out a white bedsheet, wrapped me up and took me into another room. 
 
Then they opened one of the coconuts and shredded its meat. Teish ritually put coconut on my hands, my face, and my head. Again, she blessed me in Nigerian.  She gave me white clothes to wear home and then she did a divination using coconut. While in trance, my grandmother came through and talked to me about my illness. This all-day ritual cost me only twenty-one dollars. Teish didn't charge by the treatment, but by what the goddess, Oshun, had divined for her. 
 
I had experienced a profound spiritual healing, and my grandmother put my mind at ease that I was not being cursed. No one was causing me harm. This was very healthful and helpful information for me at that time. 

 
My own background is black, Scottish, Cherokee, and another Native American tribe. My great grandmother, who was half Native American, never talked about it. It was a big secret. She lived in Kentucky at the time when the only good Indian was a dead Indian. So she passed as black and kept her mouth shut. It was much safer that way. 
 
In the late 1960s I tried to reclaim my Native American heritage, but found that my interest was not very welcome. I began to understand that you don't just say, "I'm part Cherokee," and expect everyone to lay down what they are doing and say, "Well, come on in." 
 
So I cut my hair and got my first Afro, and started wearing daishikis. Then, my grandmother freaked out. To her Africa was a place where she sent money to the missionaries. She was a good African Methodist Episcopal churchwoman, but the AME church was very sedate compared to the holy-roller churches that more resembled African tradition. 
 
As soon as I knew about Yemaya, the sea goddess of Nigeria, I knew I was her child. I recognized this when I listened to Teish at that first retreat. I also had an affinity to Obatala, and was later told in a divination that there was a confluence of Yemaya and Obatala at my head. I had two orisha who sat over me and protected me. I realized I was a child of Obatala one night when I had a dream that I was driving down Eastside Road in Talmage toward Mill Creek Road. Suddenly a white owl-one of the strongest epitomes of Obatala-flew right through my windshield and grabbed my heart with his claw. He looked me straight in the eye and said, "Who are you?" Then I woke up. 
 
I was stumped when it came to going further into Santería. I was invited and was very close to asking Luisah Teish to let me in, but I couldn't handle the bloodletting and animal slaughter. I am a vegetarian, and I have a hard time dealing with the killing of animals. I became a vegetarian when I started thinking of animals as my co-creatures, and felt it was healthier not to eat them. 
 
I had a coven here in Ukiah for awhile. It was dedicated to an African water goddess named Mami Watu. We called ourselves the Mami Watusis. We met every full moon and did rituals and had a great time. We made up our own rituals-not traditional African rituals. Some of the women wanted to incorporate Native American rituals. To me Indian drumming, vision quests, sweats and so on smack of colonization. So, the coven eventually broke up. 
 
All of my explorations have made a great difference in my life. I have had to acknowledge over the past ten years that I am a solo Dianic witch. When I think about power, I see myself as being in a long line of matriarchs. In a workshop, when talking about birthing oneself, I suddenly had a vision of this enormous line of black women giving birth to each other. I was at the end of the line, and my daughter came after me. 

I live my visions. 
I live and love and work with women. 

---

 
I learned many things about the Nigerian orisha (gods) from Teish. In that tradition, the Great Creator is beyond human comprehension. Since its vast essence can't be understood with our minds, it created a god named Obatala to help us. Obatala was a single source, but in some stories he had a wife named Odudua who is actually himself. He is hermaphroditic, having both a male and a female aspect. His colors are white. Children of Obatala wear all white-headscarves, robes and sashes. He is represented by white owls. Each god has aspects, a number, an animal and a color association. 

Through Obatala, all the other orisha appeared. When this father/mother god made the first human beings, he was drunk on palm wine, and they were disfigured. After that he promised to never get drunk again. Then he made the rest of the humans. Children of Obatala do not drink or use drugs, and you never give him offerings of rum. 

I met a woman at a workshop with Starhawk and Teish who had had polio as a child. She had always felt God was punishing her. When I told her the story about Obatala being the patron god of people who are maimed or disfigured, she started crying. She had never heard of any religion where those with disabilities were blessed. In Nigeria, individuals with disabilities are seen as children of Obatala. They are not hidden. People go to ask for their blessing, and they are considered great assets to the community. 
 
In Nigeria, each of the orisha is separately worshiped, and each village has ceremonies dedicated to its orisha. A village dedicated to Yemaya, the goddess of the sea, would be near the coast. A village dedicated to Ogun, god of ironsmithing, would be near the coal mines. A village dedicated to Oshun would be near the Niger River. Oshun is the Aphrodite of Nigeria-a benevolent queen of beauty. Her children are gorgeous; they dress in gold cloth. Jewelry and things of gold come to them. Oshun's favorite foods are oranges, honey and cinnamon; you keep her in the kitchen. 
 
Oya, also called Yansa, is a goddess of change. She causes great winds-whirlwinds, hurricanes, tornadoes, and waterspouts-of which there are a lot in Nigeria. The weather patterns that start in Nigeria, on the horn of Africa, build up as they cross the Atlantic and move toward either the Caribbean or to Florida and up the eastern seaboard as hurricanes.  The slaves in these regions would become scared-but not of the wind. They had a greater fear of Oya's displeasure. 
 
Papa Legba is symbolized by the crossroads. He's a trickster, and messenger to the gods. If you want something, you have to go through Legba. You keep him by your front door. His usual symbol is a large coconut-like head with cowrie shells for eyes and mouth. He's not very pretty, but looks extremely African. His colors are red and black. In Brazil when you come to a crossroads-even in the city, but especially on country roads-you'll find plates of food, flowers, symbolic figurines of red and black chickens, armadillos, possums. This energy in the crossroads has great meaning and great mystery. You don't ask about it. Even here in this country, black people in the South are very cautious when they come to crossroads. It's a place where they say the Devil hangs out. Legba was epitomized as Satan by the church because he's a trickster. 

 
Yemaya, the goddess of the sea, was greatly revered by those Africans who survived the middle passage to the Americas. The vast majority of slaves were taken to the Caribbean and South America. There was a triangular trading route. Ships went to the Caribbean, particularly into Cuba, to pick up sugar cane and take it up the coast to New England. It was made into rum in New England, and taken to Africa to barter for slaves. Thus began the enslavement of Africa to alcohol. The boats then took slaves back to Cuba. The only alcohol that had been in Africa before European interference was a palm wine-a benign alcoholic beverage more like beer than wine. It had a low alcohol content, perhaps two percent, and it was not drunk regularly. 
 
From the 1500s to the 1800s, as black people were imported to the New World, they brought with them the traditions of their local villages. Their religions changed in the Catholic countries of the New World since people from various regions-who were dedicated to different orisha-lived on the same plantation. In the new religion all the orisha were worshiped, and everyone celebrated their feast days. The gods hid under the skirts of Catholic saints who had similar attri-butes. On the feast day of a saint, the people would celebrate the corresponding orisha. 
 
For example, Saint Barbara is represented by red. She carries a sword and has attributes similar to those of the god Shango. Shango is one of the masculine gods. He is hot-blooded and hot-tempered. You never call him by his name in a ceremony. You call on him by another name. His feast day is the feast day of Saint Barbara, which has nothing to do with Nigerian custom. 
 
The African slaves in countries like Cuba and Brazil went to church, put up saint statues, and kept altars and candles going in their cabins. Since the people saw their old orisha in the saints, the Nigerian priests and priestesses were able to keep their religion and communities alive. Children were initiated the same way they had been in Africa, not in the United States, but in Cuba, Haiti, other Caribbean countries, Brazil and, to a lesser extent, Venezuela. 
 
The new form of religion was called Santería in Cuba. With the influx of Cubans to the U.S., we see the spread of Santería even here on the West Coast. There are two parts to Santería. One part is the orisha-the gods. The other part is the Eguns, the ancestor spirits. The ancestors sweep the path of your life for you. They are worshiped, fed, contacted. Everything is a manifestation of a spirit and energy called aché (a-che). We live in a web of connection through this world and other worlds. 
 
In Santería, a celebratory gathering is called a bembe. People get together and sacrifice animals, cook them for the later feast, play drums, sing songs and dance the different orisha. Sometimes, they become possessed by the orisha. The dancer is like a horse, which an orisha rides. People lose all personal control; their personality disappears, and the orisha manifest. When someone starts to falter and reel in circles, everything gets very intense-the drums, the rhythm-and then they fall, are removed from the circle, dressed up as the orisha, and come back as nobody you would recognize. 
 
You don't choose who is going to be your orisha. They choose you. You learn how to care for, and feed the gods. Your head is shaved and is dedicated to the orisha through a series of trainings and rituals lasting for at least a year-a process of becoming a child again and being reborn into rituals of the orisha. You cannot touch anyone during this time, and have to stay ritually pure. 
     This religion is organized into "houses." Each house has at least a mother or father. On feast days, there is a big bembe. People who belong to that house come from all over. Houses are huge; sometimes hundreds of people have been initiated over the years. Each house has a botanica-a place where you can buy herbs, symbols, and candles and make contact with people. The Santeras, those who are initiated, wear all white, with a colored sash that corresponds to the color of their orisha. Devotees of Yemaya wear blue sashes. Devotees of Shango wear red sashes. Devotees of Oshun wear gold sashes. The color distinguishes who your orisha is-who owns your head. 
 
The drummers have their own religious training. Each drum is an entity that has been consecrated and named. Drums are considered to be alive. The drummers drum off of each other, giving verbal and visual cues to change the rhythms. They study the drum they are dedicated to for years and years. Their rhythm moves the energy of the people, and moves the aché, so that the Egun, the ancestors, are welcomed and placated. The orisha also come and are present. 
 
Divination is a way to make sense of the world and receive help. The lowest level of divination is done by throwing a coconut that has been broken into pieces and washed in salt water. The answer depends on whether the pieces land with the light or dark sides up. The next level is throwing cowrie shells. You get a variety of answers, so you have to keep throwing to get a definite yes or no. The last thing people throw is a chain. Babalawos, men trained specifically in divination, are allowed to throw the chain. I heard that in the city of Ifa, a certain white woman is chosen as the head of the religion, and is allowed to throw the chain. 
 
In Haiti, the Fon people brought their religion with them, called voudun. (The term "voodoo" is a transformation of the Louisiana French term for this religion, voudou.) They came from Dahomy, near the Horn of Africa. In Brazil, the religion is called Candomblé or Umbanda, and the worship of the orisha has incorporated native Brazilian deities. In Haiti a god is called aloa. Many of the aloas have similar attributes to the orisha. 

 
African religion was almost completely lost to the slaves in the United States. Outside Louisiana, the areas they occupied were primarily Protestant. The strict belief system of the Protestants limited worship to the Holy Trinity. Seeing no need for the Virgin Mary or for saints, there was no space for African gods-no place to hide the orisha. 
 
The wholeness of the religion died out, and African-American people began to embrace the Protestant religion of their masters. Many became Baptists. In the black churches you see the last remnants of the jubilation of the African religions. I always found it very interesting to go to Pentecostal black churches as a visitor. There was a big one not too far from our house in Los Angeles. The elder women in the church dress all in white, and wear white Nehru-type caps (instead of a turban or scarf). They nod and sing with the choir, often fanning themselves when they start to get warm. After the minister preaches and riles everybody up, all of a sudden, one woman will stand up and start hollering. She is getting the spirit. Her eyes roll back in her head, she starts to quiver and quake and falls on the floor. She "has the spirit of God on her." She is ridden  just as a Santería is ridden by an orisha in Santeria.