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Renacimiento Personal

I remember the day that I was re-born. It was the day that I declared my freedom from

my past, the day that I got my first tattoo. A dark day, driving home from dropping off my aunt

at the San Jose Airport, windshield wipers angrily wiping at the relentless rain, which was

emptying the sky. Then I saw it, through the gloom, a bright beacon, and a symbol of freedom to

me that night. It read, “Graven Visage Tattoos,” in flaming purple neon, and I was drawn to that

place as if by a force outside of myself. Entering the parlor was like entering a new realm; my

ears were immediately assaulted by loud, angry heavy metal music. The tattoo artist was big and

burly, an intimidating presence.

Two hours passed as quickly as it took a raindrop to fall upon the cold concrete, time was

skewed that way. The sketch of my tattoo was finished, symbols of rebellion against familial

values commingled with new symbols of freedom and re-birth. The time had come. My heart

pounded as I lay down upon the tattoo table; I felt my life was ending. I saw a drawing of a

Navajo man on the wall, and my mind flashed to tribal days, when young ones were ritually

tattooed to signify their rite of passage into adulthood. This is the image that I held onto as Paco

(that was the artist’s name) placed his needle into my flesh for the first time. As each moment

passed, the pain intensified for me. The burning of my flesh as the needle delved deep into my

skin transported me to a new place, somewhere I had never been before. I felt my death

overcome me, the death of my self. I was no longer Angie Johnson, age eighteen, social security

number 555-33-4498. In truth, at that time, “I” was no more at all. For “I” was afraid of

needles, “I” was a Johnson, and Johnson’s don’t mar their bodies like that. But “I” was not “I”

any longer; “I” was re-born through the pain. I was a new creation; I was a tattooed goddess. For

a moment, I transcended the pain and was giddy; I had found paradise. No longer need I worship
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at the feet of a dead God, for I had seen Heaven, at the point of a needle’s prick. Adrenaline

coursed through my veins, blood boiling, breath quickening. It was better than any prayer group

I had ever been to, more thrilling than a Gospel Revival! I-had-found-God. This was my

religion; my every moment of pain was my prayer. Paco, the tattoo artist, was transformed into

my priest, as he blasted Black Sabbath from his cd player and meditated on the art on my spine.

It was awful, the enduring of the pain. It was “mysterium tremendum,” the “awe-inspiring

mystery,” that which I had searched chapel and temple for, that which had remained elusive

(Eliade, 9).

Then it was over, Paco had finished with the outline of my tattoo, and I was free to leave.

My hands were shaking as I paid him for his work, and I felt like my payment was too cheap, for

what I had experienced upon his tattoo table was worth more than a monetary sum. I said good-

bye and left the shop, blood still coursing through my veins, heart still pounding loudly in my

chest. How does one recover from such a transcendent experience? How does one go on,

knowing that they have been reborn into a new identity, a new life?

That night, at the tattoo parlor, I was like a mature Mormon woman, given her first ritual

garments to wear, a rite of passage had occurred (McDannell, 198). Like Sarah, a young

Mormon woman interviewed in McDannell’s work, Mormon Garments: Sacred Clothing and the

Body, who described the wearing of the garments as “one more layer between me and the

world,” I felt that the wearing of my tattoo made me somehow different as well (McDannell,

198). I now had a secret, a wonderful secret on my lower spine. According to sociologist, Georg

Simmel, who has researched secrets and their societal role, “…Our bodies are our primary

property. To cut, scar, or in other ways remodel the body inscribes secrets on the person and thus

dedicates that person to the elders and the dead” (McDannell, 220). After my tattooing
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experience, my enlightenment via ink, I felt what McDannell, describes as “empower[ed] and

embolden[ed]” (McDannell, 220). Like the garments, which “tell believers that you are ‘one of

us,’” my tattoo signified that I too now belonged to a new community of believers, those who

worshipped the tattoo (McDannell, 220).

Some people do not understand tattooing and its significance within society, and

especially, a reference to “worshipping the tattoo.” But, this is just one of the many faces that

popular religion manifests to its believers. Maybe you are a baseball “believer,” like Annie

Savoy in the movie “Bull Durham,” who says, “I’ve tried them all [religions]…and the only

church that truly feeds the soul, day in, day out, is the church of baseball” (Chidester, 747).

Perhaps you subscribe to the “civil religion” of nationalism and war making, where the

bloodshed of young soldiers is likened to Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his own son to

Jehovah, a worthy sacrifice (Marvin and Ingle, 769). Or possibly you make a pilgrimage to the

Mecca that is Disneyland every year, to worship at the Pearly Gates of Walt’s version of Heaven,

“At a time when some proclaim that God is dead, North Americans may take comfort in the truth

that Mickey Mouse reigns at…the Magic Kingdom and that Walt Disney is his prophet” (Moore,

216).

Whether the popular religion’s focus is on a tattoo, baseball, garments, or Disneyland, the

critique of popular religion is easily made. What are the ethical ramifications of having a

popular religious belief system? Is there a revelatory period that a believer undergoes that

transforms them into a new creation, as it typically goes in traditional religions? If there is such

a revelation, then what exactly is the “new creation” which emerges after such a transformation?

While, for example, I am a “tattooed goddess” now, with a “secret upon my spine,” does that

change me as a person, really? Will I wake up in the morning, confident that the world is a better
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place, that the war against evil will be waged for another day—merely because I paid seven

hundred dollars for art on my back? Even I, who worships the tattoo, have to say no. I will not

help an elderly lady across the street today because I have a tattoo; I will not grow ethically as a

result of enduring the pain of a needle. Those who drink only Coca-Cola, while refreshed and

full of vigor, will not donate more money to charity as a result of their imbibing this brand of

soda. And lastly, for those who dedicate their every Saturday afternoon to baseball, hot dogs,

and Cracker Jack (you folks may want to leave the room), you will not see God if you catch a

stitched baseball today in your commorative glove. You will only have a used ball and an

overpriced glove. But for those who are believers, for whom religion is more about comfort and

ritual and the static predictability of popular religious beliefs, these beliefs are not only valid, but

important and personal as well. Just ask any Trekie what happened when Star Trek TNG was

moved to a different time slot; it was like moving church from Sunday. Such is the power of

religious belief, and such is the power of what is called popular religion. Whether it is called

religion, spirituality, or just obsession, the result is the same. This form of belief, and the

activities that go along with the belief, are a benefit to those who hold them, and a comfort for

their long drudgerious days.

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Works Cited

1. Chidester, David. “The Church of Baseball, the Fetish of Coca-Cola, and the Potlatch

of Rock ‘n’ Roll: Theoretical Models for the Study of Religion in American Popular

Culture. Journal of the American Academy of Religion, Vol. 64, No. 4, Thematic

Issue on “Religion and American Popular Culture” (Winter, 1996). Oxford

University Press: Oxford pp 743-765.

2. Eliade, Mircea. “Sacred Space” The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religioin

(trans. Willarad R. Trask), Harper Torchbooks, New York, 1961

3. Marvin and Ingle. “Blood Sacrifice and the Nation: Revisiting Civil Religion

Journal of the American Academy of Religion, Vol 64, No. 4, Thematic Issue

on “Religion and American Popular Culture” (Winter, 1996). Oxford

University Press: Oxford pp. 767-780.

4. McDannell, Colleen, “Mormon Garment: Sacred Clothing and the Body.” Material

Christianity: Religion and Popular Culture in America, Yale University Press,

pp. 198-221, ISBN 0-300-07499-9.

5. Moore, Alexander. Walt Disney World: Bounded Ritual Space and the Playful

Pilgrimage Center. Anthropological Quarterly, Vol. 53, No. 4 (Oct., 1980),

George Washington University Institute for Ethnographic Research pp 207-

218.
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