The Patron Saint of the LGBTQ Community and S*x Work: La Santa Muerte
- Rose B
- Nov 2
- 13 min read
The first time I faced Death, the doctors didn't tell me that my chances of surviving were slim. The deadly bacteria from septic shock had permeated my brain, my heart, and every organ in my body as I blacked out from the pain on an ER stretcher. Sweating, feverish, with unforgiving hospital lights searing my eyes, I was informed that I didn't, in fact, have a sprained ankle.
"Who told you your ankle is sprained? You need emergency surgery. You're in septic shock," the uncaring, cold, assholey doctor informed me.
Septic shock causes organ failure.
How could I have septic shock? Apparently, bacteria had "seeded" in my ankle joint and the swelling/pain I'd been trying to ignore was deadly bacteria eating its way out from the inside. The skin on the outside of my ankle had "cauliflowered" and broken open as puss oozed out. The pain was indescribable.
I don't remember anything after that aside from waking up in a hospital bed with the same sweats, chills and throbbing pain radiating through my foot and ankle.
After two weeks in the hospital, another surgery, and four months in a degraded nursing home, I was discharged with a walker. I limped around for another few months and, not long after, continued battling with other deadly health conditions that weren't easily cured via a PIC line and IV antibiotics.
Folks have no empathy for traumatic situations like this until they experience them and we all will experience a situation like this. This was a test, one of many training grounds and ego deaths. After two surgeries to cut out the infection, I had to accept the fact that I'll never run, squat with both feet on the ground (my ankle lifts up due to there being little cartilage in it after the two surgeries), lunge or dance again in a typical manner but I'm extremely, extremely blessed in that my foot wasn't amputated. The Universe knew I couldn't handle that.
This battle also gave me the gift of empathy for folks with physical health conditions, strength, and the awareness that I'm heavily energetically protected.
I didn't know at the time that I owed my life to The Boney Lady. Read on to discover her Power and why she's so popular with marginalized folks.
Strength, Survival and Santa Muerte
Devotees of Santa Muerte are often folks who've survived deadly, traumatic health conditions and experiences. We've brushed up against the unknown power of Death. That wasn't the first or the last time I'd meet with St. Death. She'd decided that I still had work here to do on this planet so returned me from her warm embrace.
I reclaim my voice, my narrative in these posts and illustrate the fact that folks who have had or still live with health conditions, folks who've conquered trauma, look just like you. We are you.
My Pact with Death
I share my testimony as a form of devotion to Our Most Holy Death, La Santisima Muerte, because I know there are others within my little cyber community who would benefit from forming a relationship with her. Additionally, when one makes a pact with Death to bring her more devotees, one does not renege on said pact. She has continued to bring me a life beyond my wildest dreams as I continue to share my story.
A few years ago, I'd scoff at the idea of spiritual practice and roll my eyes, exclaiming, "You're just fooling yourself. Energy isn't real. 'Spirit' isn't real. I am a materialist and only believe in that which can be proven via the scientific method. The scientific method is my Higher Power."
This blog explains the connection between Higher Powers and the material while explaining how, through the transmutational power of fire and pain, we can utilize occult practices to heal ourselves and generate prosperity.
Sex Work and Santisima
The bony hand of Santa Muerte is especially useful if one is a SWer in 2025. The SW industry has become extremely saturated, dramatically shifting within the past twenty years due to a number of sociopolitical and economic challenges. The 2009 subprime mortgage crisis was the tipping point when many SWers reported a dramatic decrease in income and clients. With the middle class disappearing and many shifts occurring that economically screw most people, many SWers work harder and harder each year for their coin due to market saturation and other issues.
There will, however, always be prosperity, abundance and wealth available to SWers who call upon Our Most Holy Death, La Santisima Muerte, to use her metaphysical scythe to cut down predators and Time Wasters while remove all blockages standing in the way of our prosperity.
Mexican folk saint Santa Muerte (Holy Death) has been a popular devotional figure for those who are stigmatized by society. The philosophy is: Death comes for everyone and doesn't discriminate ("La santa no discrimina"). She is, above all, nonjudgmental and with all of us whom the mainstream reject: SWers, the LGBTQ community, the misunderstood and anyone who remains stigmatized and rejected by Christianity. Rooted in European and Aztec ideas regarding Death, this is an open practice and not based on ethnicity, skin color, age, sexual orientation, gender and all of the superficial things humans obsess over.
Santisima Muerte's robes, skeleton face, and scythe are Catholic influences due to Spanish colonizers. Many devotees in Mexico identify as Catholic and hold masses in her honor. They pray rosaries. On the other hand, the idea of a loving yet fierce Death goddess arose from indigenous belief in the Aztec Goddess Mictēcacihuātl who guides us into the transformative process of death. This is where Dia De Los Muertos, a day spent celebrating our dead, originates. Well, it's traditionally celebrated from October 29th through November 2nd so isn't just one day.
Death was seen as a new beginning to the Aztecs and devotion to Death combines European and Aztec beliefs to create a post-modern spiritual practice that accepts all. Death is Holy. Death is Rebirth. We rise like a Phoenix from the ashes, giving the middle finger to anything standing in our path with the nonjudgemental, unfuckwithable Power of St. Death at our side.
How to Become a Devotee
Anyone can be a devotee but not everyone can work with Santisima.
How do we become Devotees? We obtain an image of her. Ideally a statue but if we can't afford that, we can print out an image of a skull. It's that simple. Death is with all of us at all times so it's not difficult to open the door to her energy. There are more complex processes involved in devotion, like setting up an altar, that I won't get into here.
Anyone can be devoted to her and petition her for prosperity, love and protection but only a small group of people can practice energy work with her. For example, when I'm practicing, I say, "By the Power of La Negra, La Santisima Muerte, Holy Death, my blogs bring me prosperity and extended dates." I call upon her power because, well, she likes me. It's ultimately, like most Divine experiences, inexplicable and I assume she chose me for a variety of reasons I can't fully discuss.
She's Too Extreme
Santisima is well known to be "extreme," meaning many people can't handle her Power. Death is final. Death is Powerful and doesn't mince words.
Let me give you an example: She once didn't protect me from losing $2,400 cash in an Uber in order to teach me a lesson. I've been seeing admirers for many years and money never magically floated out of my bag and onto the floor of a Lyft. I quadruple check everything.
I looked at my bag when I got home and the zipper was partially open. I don't fall asleep in public yet I'd fallen asleep on the ride home so I didn't notice that my bag was ajar.
The driver had beeped his horn to let me know I forgot something and I ignored it, thinking he was beeping at someone else. There are more odd synchronicities I could go into but suffice to say: It happened on purpose.
Crying in front of her alter, I asked her why she didn't protect me when I'd specifically performed a protection working on the purse I carried to sessions. Because of this distress, I consulted with another devotee who is a hereditary bruja and she asked me if I'd done a protection working before performing a specific spell on a specific target (a man). I told her I hadn't, which is a big no-no when working other people.
It was extreme, it was painful, and it taught me a much-needed lesson. She brought me the $2,400 back within a few days once I thanked her for helping me improve my practice. Some people aren't strong enough to handle this type of an extreme experience, like the guy I dated who used to be a devotee and told me, "She's too extreme."
He was too weak for me and I see now why he couldn't handle her.
One the other hand, she brings very vivid, very obvious gifts to those who petition her and I immediately began making a lot more money after I began working with her. It was shocking.
Read any book on Holy Death or speak to any devotee and they'll tell you the same thing: There's a reason why her devotees are so devoted: She works very quickly and sends very bold signs. We hold parades, build huge altars and shrines to her, get tattoos (I'm getting mine in a few days), go on a pilgrimage to Mexico to honor her, write Bibles and books because she does what no other energy can do.
She is Like a God to Us: Queerness as Ordinary
As the fastest growing New Religious Movement (NRM) in the world, according to religious scholar R. Andrew Chestnut in his book Devoted to Death, devotion to Santa Muerte is continuing well beyond Mexico and many of the prominent figures within her mystery school, or (non-toxic) cult, belong to the LGBTQ community.
Although the mainstream media generally sensationalizes and utterly misrepresents Holy Death as "evil," this USA Today article isn't totally inaccurate in their portrayal of Santisima's popularity amongst trans SWers in Mexico, "The skeleton saint — with her female form and association with death — is particularly appealing to transgender sex workers, who face the persistent threat of violent clients and transphobic hatred."
In one of the only moderately informed news articles I could find on the Boney Lady, a Mexican transgender SWer, Betzy Ballesteros is quoted as saying, “The majority of us believe in Santa Muerte,” said Ballesteros. Referring to herself and her fellow SWers, she say, “She’s a God to us. I ask her to shield me from danger and provide work and clients."
Most leaders in the Santa Muerte community are queer. This article is short but explains how queerness is beyond accepted within the Santa Muerte community.
"In my time with this community of devotees to Santa Muerte led by Arely Vázquez in Queens, New York, I no longer needed to imagine what this (queerness as uplifted in spiritual practice) might look like. This summer I had the opportunity to observe a community where queerness was not only accepted, but ordinary," writes Breda Page Violette. So many of us are traumatized by Abrahamic religion's misogyny and hate that we shut off the part of our soul that has an awareness beyond the material, limiting scientific method.
La Santa cuts a new path with her mystical golden scythe in order to reveal the fact that Source is simply watching and waiting in non-judgement for us to call upon her.
Stereotyping and Stigma
The ideas perpetuated by the ignorant, who've never researched Santa Muerte, are as follows: She's a narco Saint for "bad" drug dealers and "criminals." She's negative. Her black candle aspect (La Negra), her ability as Death to literally kill, curse, and use her scythe to cut down anything or anyone is the focus because: If it bleeds, it leads. The Catholic church does condemn her as Satanic due to her threatening their patriarchal norms.
There's also a Eurocentric racism that follows La Santa because she's a Mexican folk saint. This leads ignorant folks to associate her with negativity and "bad" things.
However, myself and many devotees rarely work with her darker aspects because hers isn't a Power to be toyed with and used lightly. When I curse someone, I want it to truly destroy them so I choose my targets wisely. She is a Dark Feminine energy meaning she walks in the Light, spreading love while not adhering to anyone's morals but her own. She will teach those who harm her devotees very powerful lessons just as quickly as she'll bless, heal and send abundance to those whom she favors.
I'm going to lose some folks when I begin discussing curses but, yes, energy is real and it's possible to send negative energy to others via a curse. However, if the curse is not justified, this negative energy will only harm us. I won't bother you with the in depth metaphysical logic behind this.
Suffice to say, if a predator has preyed upon us and abused us, many practitioners believe it is justified to work (curse) said person without any fear of energetic retribution. I've done so only a handful of times. After I cursed a certain Vegas escort (has a provable, repetitive history of abusive behavior like stalking/outing/harassing/defaming/harming businesses of her victims while loudly playing the victim for online attention/to deflect), she was civilly sued for intentional misconduct by a civilian woman whose business/character she was attacking online, found guilty and is utterly fucked in innumerable ways. One of her victims had the funds to sue her for the abusive websites, social media pages, cyber stalking and straight up lying to harm businesses and reputations. This sort of cybercrime isn't something that the law has caught up with yet and the only way to obtain justice is to civilly sue, which isn't cheap or accessible to most victims.
Charlie Kirk was cursed by Etsy witches and killed soon after. I realize that most folks are going to roll their eyes as they read this but I'm writing this for the Chosen few who do understand the power of energy and are, at a minimum, open minded enough to consider the idea of energy being real, transmutable and transferrable.
That said, most devotees don't often petition or work with her black aspect. The circumstances must be extreme if we want it to be safe and effective for us.
Death's Many Faces
St. Death is, like all humans, both light and dark as a Dark Feminine. Devotees work with her based upon her different colored robes and her black aspect is sensationalized yet rarely called upon. Most devotees see her as sweet, cute, loving and, like a Mother, she teaches us hard lessons when necessary. We create pet names for her and name all of our statues individually. It's creative, personal, and there are no set-in-stone rules to this practice other than to respect her. This is not organized religion.
We all have different energies surrounding us so, to myself and many other devotees, organized spiritual practice is nonsensical and only allows for the insertion of human ego. If I force my spiritual practice and "rules" onto you via an organized religion or practice like Wicca, my ego gets involved and that's when folks start waging war against one another.
Her red aspect, La Roja, is the robe one calls on to bring love. Her gold aspect is worked with to cut down obstacles to prosperity. La Niña Blanca, her white aspect, can represent all of her colors and is called upon mainly to cleanse and protect. Her pink aspect is worked with for healing and self-love as is her purple aspect. La Reina Ambar (my nickname for her amber aspect as it's common to give Santisima pet names) is the robe we call upon to heal addictive behaviors like addictions to Twitter (yes, I used to have a sick relationship with X), shopping, attention, power, romantic relationships that distract us, substance addictions and whatnot.
I don't want to lose too many readers by delving deep into her colors so please pick up a book on her if you feel she's calling to you.
Why is a Gringa Worshipping a Mexican Folk Saint?
I don't know what drew me to La Niña Blanca but it was partially due to the pull of an energy that's unexplainable. You will know it when you feel it. It takes time and work to tap into our intuition, but this will guide us in the process of awakening from the Matrix.
Mystical, Divine experiences don't repeat and therefore can't be measured via the scientific method's inherently limiting protocol that controls for all variables but one. That's not how reality actually operates, an idea I first heard discussed by a real, live scientist on the Huberman Lab podcast.
American culture is immigrant culture. As Scott Galloway recently said on the best podcast ever, Pivot, "American culture is multiculturalism." (Yes, I listen to a lot of podcasts.) One could claim that American magic is a mix of many different spiritual practices from around the world. Many of us have very mixed ancestry and therefore work an eclectic practice.
I don't feel any more connected to Celtic culture than I do to the vibrant Mexican, Caribbean, Chinese, etc. cultures surrounding me every time I walk outside and explore New York City. A new American breed of magic is emerging/has emerged, whether we realize it at the moment or not, blending spiritual practices just as Americans have blended together into our own unique national identity. There is no going back in time to "pure" spiritual practices based on wherever our ancestors are from considering most of us have mixed ancestral heritage.
As the saying goes, "La santa no discrimina," meaning Death come to us all and there is no controversy about whether pink, purple, black, white or any non-Mexican person can work with her energy. Please reference literally any Santa Muerte book or actual devotee if you don't believe me. Many of her well-known devotees don't have Mexican heritage.
That doesn't mean that I don't occasionally get hate from folks who don't know much about her aside from whatever the mainstream teaches. I wear a Santa Muerte necklace and either get tons of love (like the lady at the gym who now goes out of her way to chat me up when she previously gave me the stink eye) or not great reactions from people who aren't devotees and/or haven't read up on her.
Provoking ignorant folks can be fun for me (and has gotten me in trouble) because I'm a bit devilish so it doesn't bother me.
Additionally, my status as a SW attracted me to her. As a SW who may be judged by other deities or spiritual practices, it's obvious why myself and so many professionally sexy people are drawn to Santa Muerte. She doesn't judge us the way, for example, our ancestors do. (Yes, you have ancestors who've died and whose energies are with you, something non-Western people have known since the beginning of time.) Santisima is known to produce very fast results because other saints/energies/deities won't bring something to us (like a lover) if it isn't for our highest good. Holy Death doesn't care whether or not something is for our highest good. She only cares about how devoted we are to her.
There's a deep love, an openness, a lack of hate/division that permeates Santa Muertistas and our craft; Other devotees love it when I see their skeleton tattoos and tell them I'm also dedicated to Mami. They call me hermosa, sister, dap me up and tell me they are drawn to me, despite my being in the minority as a roja headed gringa. They come to me for spiritual council and advice on how to do protection workings, prosperity working, etc. and, like Santisima, don't see skin color. This is why Devotion to Death is so powerful: It is a uniting force in a divided world.
I know you love my blogs. Don't be a Lurker. It helps me out if you hit like on my Bluesky and Twitter/X posts promoting this blog and maybe, just maybe, St. Death with boop you with her Sacred Scythe.
(Yes, I'm back on Twitter, minus the Twitter addiction because no one uses Bluesky. I found someone who protects accounts from being shadow banned/deleted so I'm over there posting my entire ass in all her alabaster, juicy glory if anyone's interested. Ha.)
