If all you know about Santería is that it’s a line in that one Sublime song, you should check out this interview with Caridad, a Santería priestess, over at the Hairpin.
Caridad explains the basics of her religion (more accurately called Lucumí), including nature spirits, reading the future with cowrie shells, and how animal-sacrifice rituals are actually “the OG farm-to-table.” Here’s her description of the way she had to dress for a year after her initiation:
I’d have people in the community just come up to me on the street and talk to me like a child. “Your whites are so clean! Do you need some candy?” You’re hyper-visible. Because you have to dress all in white, your head is shaved, you have to keep your head covered…and you’re not supposed to wear makeup or look in the mirror for at least part of that time.
