bertiaux – Big Lucky Hoodoo

Available through Seraphin Station, this rosary is handmade with a mix of pressed glass and Czech glass beads, each decade being separately attached to the center ring — a finger rosary — and embellished with a focal Pater bead of pressed glass, Czech glass, or in one case recycled sandcast glass. Whether you want to see this as a charm collection on a charm hanger displaying seven individual chaplets or single-decade rosaries, or as a sort of deconstructed All Saints’ rosary for contemporary rootworkers, this is a striking and unusual piece created by a rootworker with over 35 years of experience working with the roots, rosaries, and these saints in the folk Catholic tradition.

Large, sturdy, colored aluminum jump rings connect each decade to the center ring, so it’s possible, should you ever want to, to remove the individual decades and treat them as separate single-decade chaplets. This could be useful if you are working intensively with one or some but not all of these saints or if you’re traveling and need to cut down on how much spiritual stuff you’re lugging around.

Saints are chosen for their importance in the spiritual landscape of deep South hoodoo rootwork, with an eye towards popularity and contemporary usage (in the sense that while 100 years ago, St. Dymphna was probably not petitioned so often in conjure, today she is an enormously popular saint invoked by folks from all kinds of backgrounds and in all kinds of folk belief contexts. So she’s here!)

It’s made with strands or decades for the following:

St. Gerard, patron of pregnancy and childbirth in the Catholic tradition, also represents Baron Samedi of Haitian vodou in some houses and temples. He is the patron of communication with the ancestors and the dead. On the other side of this medal is Our Lady of Perpetual Help pictured with Christ and the angels Michael and Gabriel. OL of Perpetual Help is called on for all kinds of things – in hoodoo in my region, it’s often against sickness, income uncertainty, hunger, and unstable households. She’s known to help with all of those things. She’s also associated in some houses and temples with the lwa Erzulie Danto.
St. Lazarus is the patron saint of lepers and against leprosy, and by extension against plague and pandemic in contemporary practice. He’s also sometimes invoked by beggars, the homeless, people with HIV/AIDS, people with Hansen’s disease, and those who have unusually close relationships with dogs. He represents the lwa Legba, the patron of Yoruban divination and master of the crossroads, in many temples and houses, so he’s a powerful ally in road opening work.
St. Expedite is the patron saint invoked for fast luck, for help breaking through obstacles, for help with procrastination, and, increasingly, in desperate cases, much like St. Jude. He’s also the patron of computer programmers. In some regions and in some houses, he’s associated with the Ghuede lwa who rule the crossroads between life and death, esp. Baron Samedi.
St. Jude, the patron invoked for hopeless causes, is also called on more generally in conjure for financial prosperity and stability and is a good ally for those whose livelihoods involve working with emotional clients/customers and whose incomes can fluctuate for a host of reasons.
St. Christopher is the patron saint of travelers, children, and boat captains, invoked for safe travel. In some houses in New Orleans Voodoo, in which Santeria has had a noticeable influence, he is associated with the orisha Agayu. He presents his devotees with difficult obstacles but also grants them the inner power to overcome those trials and grow strong enough to carry all burdens.
St. Philomena is widely considered a miracle worker invoked by devotees for all kinds of things when other measures have failed. She’s the patron of babies and children and is considered the patroness of the living rosary. In some houses and temples, she is a lwa in her own right, seen as a helpful and pleasant spirit who helps those who make their livings as market sellers, removes negativity and evil from the surroundings, and grants the ability to have prophetic dreams.
St. Joseph is the patron saint of happy death, carpenters, stepfathers, and workers more generally, invoked in all kinds of situations to do with the financial wellbeing of a family and/or household, but especially petitioned by those seeking employment. He’s also called on by folks who need to sell their house. He’s associated with the lwa Papa Loko, the originary houngan and healer. St. Dymphna is on the reverse side of this medal. She is widely invoked against mental illness, anxiety, and depression, and she’s the patron of incest survivors and teenage runaways.

Some of these associations vary by region and the religious background of the practitioner, so I don’t mean to imply here that most modern rootworkers work with St. Gerard because of his association with a particular lwa in Haitian sevis. Most rootworkers do no such thing. Hoodoo and vodou are of course two distinct traditions, the former being folk magic and the latter being a religion. In Louisiana, though, especially New Orleans and surrounding areas, there is a strain of practice where the two are often blended to a greater extent than elsewhere as a result of the city’s unique history.

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Just a reminder that if you are a denizen of livejournal, and/or you prefer to “follow” my blog there, I host a mirror site of this blog there at Big Lucky Hoodoo @ livejournal.

While I’m at it, let me post this reminder/note about my blog’s title and about who’s who and who’s related to whom on the web:

About Big Lucky Hoodoo

My blog’s title “Big Lucky Hoodoo” is an homage to Tau Michael Bertiaux. (That doesn’t mean he endorses the blog.) My blog is not related to LuckyHoodoo.com, which is the URL of a shop in Michigan called Lucky Hoodoo Products. It is also not related to Lucky Mojo, though I happen to be a student of cat yronwode (the owner/proprietor of Lucky Mojo). I am not an employee of either Lucky Hoodoo Products or Lucky Mojo. As a member of AIRR, I am a member of AIRR, not an employee by Lucky Mojo. The I in AIRR stands for Independent. (You might be surprised how often this comes up and how often I’ve had people write me to ask me when the order they placed with Lucky Mojo will ship; I have no idea. I live in Atlanta and Lucky Mojo is in California.)

For more on Big Lucky Hoodoo as I use the term, see p. 1 of Bertiaux’s Voudon Gnostic Workbook, heading “Lesson One: Who Can Be A Big Lucky Hoodoo?” The Rev. Dr. Bertiaux responds, “Anyone can become a big lucky hoodoo.” He goes on to explain how, and what follows is a ritual from his tradition, which is not necessarily synonymous with the hoodoo that I practice, nor with traditional Haitian vodoun sevis, though he goes on to use both the terms “hoodoo” and “voodoo” in this lesson. But the attentive will note that he is using Hoodoo almost as a category of person or a title of sorts in this phrase: in this chapter, a Hoodoo is a person who harnesses the powers under discussion and who works with the spirits of hoodoo.

It is in that sense that I use the term. I believe that nearly anyone can become a Big Lucky Hoodoo (though you do not become one simply by naming yourself one!) There is a lot about Bertiaux’s system that is clear only to initiates in his system. His is not the only system. There is a lot about vodoun that is better left to initiates, and a great deal that is best left to trained serviteurs of long standing even if they are not initiates. There is even a lot about hoodoo that is best done under the guidance of someone with experience who comes from the way of life – ie, I don’t recommend your first non-funeral trip to a cemetery be to dispose of ritual remains. If you don’t come from a culture that is friendly with the dead, you need to get friendly with the dead before you go working cemetery magic. And Hoodoo is a way of life, in my opinion, not *just* a “magical path” or set of spells or correspondences that would categorize you as a Wiccan on Monday when you use European herbal correspondences and a Hoodoo on Thursday when you use African-American ones. Not at all.

What Bertiaux is outlining is a method for aligning your perspective and ultimately your way of life to be “in the current” of the spirits of hoodoo *as outlined in his particular system* which shares a lot with but is not in every aspect identical to traditional Southern conjure OR traditional Haitian voodoo sevis. THIS is what it means to be a Big Lucky Hoodoo – to live Hoodoo as a way of life, a worldview. And in this sense, anyone can become one, if they are willing to put in the work — and undergo a potentially radical change in perspective, depending upon where one begins.

Devotionally, I work in a Franco-Haitian Gnostic Voudon lineage with full consecration as a bishop in several lines of apostolic succession, and work with an active group of fellow bishops, energy workers, magickians, rootworkers, and serviteurs of the loa on a regular basis, here in the Southeastern U.S. Much of the work we do in the area with the expanded points chauds system, Gnostic voodoo, and Congregational Illuminism owes its origins to Tau Michael Bertiaux’s Gnostic Voodoo work, as expanded upon by Tau Allen Greenfield, Tau Dositheos, Tau Heosphoros, myself (aka Tau Naamah), and others. One of those lines of apostolic succession in which I am a consecrated bishop is a line that Tau Michael Bertiaux also holds consecration within (no, he did not directly consecrate me, and this should not be read as his knowing of me or my work or endorsing the work of any congregational illuminists in the Southeast or the greater Atlanta area, and I do not lay claim to any membership in or rank within the OTOA or any of Bertiaux’s other organizations).

Read more about me at my AIRR page or website.