Inside Mexico's 'Holy Death' cult [View all]

[Judi Lynn]

LONG READS

By Evgeny Lebedev
31 August 2020

In Mexico’s war on drugs, death is ever present, and the resurrection of the colonial-era Santa Muerte cult represents a new morbid normality. In this archive piece from 2014, GQ explores how cartel killers make offerings for courage, their relatives pray for protection from the law, and for those living in the crossfire, ‘Holy Death’ is the only sect that makes sense in the world’s most violent cities



You would not notice anything unusual about Julian at first if you met him, as I did, in an American city on a sunny day, with cars whizzing past full of people on their way to the mall. Perhaps you would see that he walks a little awkwardly, but that is all.

He is a handsome guy in his mid-thirties with high cheekbones and a big white smile, and for years he ran a trendy nightclub in a Mexican city. He loved running his own business, he told me. “You’re the boss of your own time,” he said, “you don’t have to tell anybody else what you’re doing.” In his spare time, he would go biking out in the desert.

Gangsters arrived at his business a few years ago, as they did at all the businesses in his town. They demanded “protection” money. If he paid, he would be protected from them, and if he didn’t, he would face their wrath. For years, he paid whatever they asked, and they demanded ever larger sums, until one day he explained that they were bankrupting him and couldn’t give them money he didn’t have. He was terrified, but he had no more money to give and had no choice.
At first they threatened him. Then, after several weeks of threats, they shot him in the arm.

Julian was almost relieved. Now they’ve extracted their price, he thought, I will be able to get on with my life. But they came back, still demanding “their” money. He explained again he didn’t have it. So they dragged him into the street, in the middle of the day, took out a saw, and cut off his feet, in front of everyone.

More:
https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/politics/article/mexico-holy-death-cult