Our faces express a lot. So do those of a person in a painting, a sculpture, or figure of a saint. Even the saints of the dead, or Santas Muertes are full of expression. During our drive from Nogales, Mexico to Altar Mexico, we stopped along the road at a row of Santa Muerte shrines. No one was paying homage to the saints, so we were allowed to get out of the van and approach the figures. Since those who worship the saints are often tied up in crime and violence, especially drug violence, if there had been people at the shrine, we would have looked only through the windows of the van. Stepping out and approaching the figures, it was clear they had been visited recently. One of the figures had a lit cigarette in its mouth, the smoke spiraling up across its face in an eerily real way. There were food offerings, and candles at the feet of the saints. The drug trade has the power even to sculpt and change traditional religious beliefs that people hold within Catholicism, though from vandalism of the Santa Muertes, it is clear that many people are not supporters.
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