Bolivian Catholic Witchdoctors

The Aymara Communities

The CNN, 17 Sep 2014 reported about the parallel between Bolivian-witchdoctor and Catholics. The findings were taken from Raphaël Verona's new photography book. Verona is a Swiss photographer who lived among the traditional Aymara communities. The Aymara is an ancient indigenous race found in Bolivia, Peru and Chile. They live in the Altiplano plateau, the most extensive area of high plateau on Earth outside of Tibet. The plateau lies within Bolivian and Peruvian territory while its southern parts lie in Chile and Argentina. In this region people believe in magic.

Pachamama or Earth Mother

Pachamama is their goddess of fertility. She presides over planting and harvesting and can cause earthquakes. She is typically depicted in the form of a dragon. She is an omnipresent and commands an independent deity who has creative power to sustain life on this earth. In their conversion conquest regime, the Spaniards tried to use the Virgin Mary as Pachamama's substitute but the concept did not go well with the Peruvian. Mary's role as an intercessor could never equate with the independent power of Pachamama. As a result the Virgin Mary is a separate deity on its own

Supai

Supai is the god of death and the underworld. Supay is associated with miners' rituals. He is described as having horns and a scarlet face. Spaniards tried to equate his with the devil but it did not work. The Aymara do not fear Supai but believe in getting on his good side to be spared from harm. Supai is a reflection of power which can be used for good or evil. Satan, unlike Mary did not fit into the bill, was not included as a deity.

Hybrid Faith

Catholic gods were added into the Aymara pantheon due to their ability to accept the existence of spiritual beings. Christian rituals were easily added to traditional beliefs to arrive at a hybrid faith. "The Aymara people have an approach to life that seems paradoxical from the outside," says Verona. "In Europe you are either one religion or another, either traditional or modern. But in Bolivia people live with both Catholicism and animism, both in modernity and in their ancestral traditions. They visit the Yatiri, the priest, to pay homage to deities or give prophesies when they are applying for visas, or for assistance in businesses matters."