Diversity in Culture - Rastafarianism

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Vodun The Vodun Religion - I always associated the word Voodoo with evil, therefore in my ignorance I thought the religion would be evil also. To my astonishment when I sat in class and heard about the many similarities that exists among this faith, and other religions such as Shango, Shouter Baptist, Spiritual Baptist, Christianity and even Hinduism, I was truly enlightened and so, my thoughts were altered in a positive way. The loa named Legba, and his likeness for meat and alcohol drinks is very similar to the Shango’s reres and Powers, where alcohol and animals sacrifices form part of their offerings and ritual sacrifices. The offering of alcohol is also synonymous with many non- adherents of the Vodun religion because many of us are guilty of pouring a little alcohol on the floor at some point in time, with utterances such as ‘this is for the spirits’. This practice is so widespread that maybe there is a little Vodun, Shango, Shouter or Spiritual Baptist in most of us. The other aspect that stood out to me were the names or the categories given to the dead such as Zombies, Zombie errants, Diablesses and Lutins. These dead persons are placed into these various categories according to the way in which the met their demise. It is such a vast contrast to what I grew up, and still believe according to my belief which is that people who die are dead, and therefore they are known as dead and have absolutely no form of existence in spite of how they may have died. I believe that what I tend to fear is the unknown, and for me to get over such fear I would have to do some investigation with regards to the problem. From this lecture I have gained the understanding that there is good and evil in all of us and in every religion, depending on how the knowledge one has acquired is used. What I can say however, is that I have now learnt that there is nothing to

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