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About the Author
Erika Buenaflor, M.A., J.D., has a master’s degree in religious studies with a focus on Mesoamerican shamanism from the University of California, Riverside. A practicing curandera for more than 20 years, descended from a long line of grandmother curanderas, she has studied with curanderx in Mexico, Peru, and Los Angeles and gives presentations on curanderismo in many settings. The author of several books, including Cleansing Rites of Curanderismo, she lives in Tujunga, California.
Index
Numbers in italics preceded by pl. refer to color insert plate numbers.
abstention ritual performances, 80–81
altars
cleansing, 70
cosmic spacing, 65–67
Elizabeth example, 71–74
initial cleansing/cleaning and, 64–65
location of, 62–64
near graves, 58
offerings and, 58–61
photo, pl. 3
sacred items for, 67–69, 71
size and construction, 64
stationary, 63
tuning into energy in placement of, 62–63
workplace, 63
ancestors
about, 6
as active agents, 2
benefits of working with, 4–5
choosing, 27–29
in clearing ancestral curse, 97–101
deification of, 11–12
deified, 132, 133–40
food and drink sharing and, 47
foreign, appropriation of, 25–27
“honorary,” 18, 27
importance of, 2
invocations for welcoming, 49–74
locating, 17–48
locating, in nonordinary realms, 29–37
“miracles” of, 76
Nepantla spirituality and, 1
in the North, 123–24
reclamation of, 12–13
sacred essence energy, 3
sacred heart connection with, 40
ancestral bundles
about, 141–42
in Classic-period iconography, 140
cleansing/cleaning, 142
cremation, 138
myths, 138
placement of items within, 143–46
purchase of, 130–31
use of, 131–32, 141
veneration and honoring of, 138
vivifying, 132, 142–43
ancestral burial sites
broken vessels at, 52
item location at, 8
location of, 20
looting and, 10
middle class and commoners, 23–25
royals and elites, 19–22
soul energy of, 58
ancestral connections
about, 6–7
image or representations and, 45–46
love letters and, 46–47
offerings and, 48
path in establishing, 27–29
rites to strengthen, 44–48
sacred heart, 40
to Teotihuacán and Toltecs, 26–27
ancestral curses, 4
ancestral healing. See also healing
curses, clearing, 151–52
deified sacred energies for, 130–60
experience of, 144
gifts, 147–48
limpia rites for, 152–54
offering, 145–46, 147, 148, 149–50
scope of, 147
wrongdoings, balancing, 152
ancestral traumas, 145–46
ancestral veneration rites. See also specific rites and practices
about, 3, 12
beauty and sacrality and, 14
benefits of, 4
carving of ancestor heads for, 139
elements of, 8
as medicine, 15
regional and temporal, 9
Teotihuacán, 9–10
appropriation, 28
art-making. See also ceremonies
about, 86–87
calaca (skeleton) scenes, 88–89
calavera, 87–88
frame decorating, 89
inviting inner child before, 87
pinecone bundles, 89–91
use of, 86–87
artwork, 60, 133–35
autosacrifice, 59
balancing into higher consciousness, 41
balancing wrongdoings, 149, 152
baños, 155
barridas (sweep limpias), 157–59
bathing rite ceremony, 110–11
Beth’s story, 97–101
“blue water” (blue pigments), 83
bone manipulation, 81–83
breathwork to journey into sacred heart, 40–44
burials and tombs, 51–53
burning of effigies, 113
calaca (skeleton) scenes, pl. 6, pl. 8
calavera making, 87–88
candles
colors of, 118
flickering, 116
honoring divine beings, 117–18
scented, 156–57
velaciónes with, 116–17
Caracol, 21
cardinal spaces, 34
centering breathwork exercise, 40
ceremonies
about, 11, 75–77
ancestral veneration, 85–97
art-making, 86
bathing rite, 110–11
cacao atole, 124–25
devotional offerings and, 91
nature, 96
reentry rituals, 81–83
ritual performances, 77–81
solar calendrical rites, 83–85
special days and, 91–95
trance dance, singing, spoken word, and, 96
trips, 96–97
wailing, 80–81
chalchihuitl, 112
citrus peels, 121
