Voodoo in Haiti

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After reading Authors of the Impossible, The Paranormal and the Sacred it reminded me of the time in Haiti where I had my own paranormal experience. We were a group of about 20 people. It was mostly kids and a few adults. We were there on a mission trip with my church in Hingham. We were visiting one of the families near by. Some of their children have this condition that causes them to not be able to walk correctly. By the time they are teens they can no longer walk at all. When we got there I felt a kinda dark vibe coming from the area. We gave the people food and we sang and danced with them. I don’t want to say I didn’t enjoy the time we had that afternoon with that family, because I did, but it just felt off. Later that night the other kids and I were all talking about how it felt really weird there and they felt a dark presence. Our priest, Father Sinisa, said that he was pretty sure that they practiced voodoo there. Voodoo is “A black religious cult practiced in the Caribbean and the southern US, combining elements of Roman Catholic ritual with traditional African magical and religious rites, and characterized by sorcery and spirit possession.” I was told more about this religion in my remanding time there. I was told that is is a dark religion where people call upon dark spirits. I did some more research online about it for this blog post so as not to totally attach this religion. From what I found Voodoo can be dark but it can also be good. People use it to heal and Pope John II has attended a Voodoo ceremony to help cement the amiable coexistence of these two religions. I would assume that these people we visited were using Voodoo to try and heal their family members but I can’t be sure. I’m also assuming that we all felt weird because we could feel the spirits around us. So in conclusion I don’t know exactly what was going on there but I could feel a presence I didn’t normally feel. The picture here is my group from church visiting the family I was talking about. The arrow is pointing to me handing out food. I also circled some of the children I was refereeing to. There was a younger boy that also had trouble walking but he was still able to get around and I don’t see him in this picture. 


KELLY, DEBRA. “10 Things You Didn't Know About Voodoo.” Listverse, Listverse , 21 June 2014, https://listverse.com/2013/12/11/10-things-you-didnt-know-about-voodoo/.

“Voodoo.” Merriam-Webster, Merriam-Webster, www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/voodoo.

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