We went to watch "Sinners"

fangirling in the toilets and unpacking the spiritual themes on the drive home

The day before St George’s day

‘No seriously, what the hell was that?’.

I laughed as I listened to the women debriefing the movie outside my cubicle door. What the hell indeed. I emerged to see the woman the voice belonged to pacing the floor and her friend fixing her hair in the mirror.

‘The movie was a lot right? Did you guys like it?’ I asked while washing my hands.

‘I did but what the hell was that about?’ said the woman pacing. ‘We didn’t read anything about it beforehand, we just came for Michael B Jordan’ said her friend.

I cackled ‘I hear you girl, even as a vampire that man is so fine’.

‘Right?!’.

I left the bathroom laughing but was quickly overcome by wariness as I walked the corridors. I rushed to find my friend who was waiting for me.

‘I feel how I felt after watching Get Out’ I said as we walked towards my car. ‘I feel like every person is a potential suspect waiting to harvest my energy’. He laughed.

‘Get home safe’ I said when it was time for us to part. They were words I always said but tonight they held extra weight. As I drove out of the car park I could feel that the movie had shifted something in my spirit and evoked a feeling but I wasn’t sure what it was. Fear? Discomfort? Awareness?

I had been frustrated with Sam at first. When he went back into the church and didn’t drop the guitar I wanted to pull it from his hands. In my mind, the guitar was a symbol of the generational patterns that he needed to let go of. It was his abusive uncle’s guitar and I didn’t want him to carry the legacy of that, I wanted him to drop it. But, I realised that to Sam, the guitar was a symbol of his freedom.

There are some musicians who are genuinely called to play music for hearts in the church and there are some who are called to make music for hearts outside of it. Sam was of the second group. If he had stayed in the church with his Dad, he would have been giving fear the reigns to his life, he would have been giving over the very thing that he had fought for.

Sam was a light and his gift was to heal through music. His music was his therapy and his guitar his therapeutic tool. His gift was to connect, to give life to the past, present and future, to soothe souls and unbind the body and release it to freedom. He was a light. The issue is not that Sam invited Remmick by playing music, it is that Remmick was attracted to his music and wanted it. The attraction happened because the light will always attract the dark but, just because moths are attracted to the light it doesn’t mean that we should live with the lights off.

What stood out to me was that he said he said he woke up every week scared that Remmick would show up again and yet still, he got up each night and played for the people, he sang his blues and shared his gift with the world. Every week he woke up in fear, but chose the freedom music gifted him and used it to heal hearts instead. His Dad had wisdom but it was limited. His Dad wanted to keep him ‘safe’ in the church, but it would have become another form of bondage. When Sam left he wasn’t turning away from God, not really. What he was turning away from was fear dressed up in God’s clothes.

I stopped at a traffic light as my mind cycled through other parts of the movie, matching scenes up with commentary I’d read hours before.

When he said the Lords prayer the devil said it with him, that just shows you the oppressor and the Christian are praying to the same God

Annie’s root work was the thing that saved them

It just shows we need to go back to our traditional practises

When Remmick recited the prayer with him and mocked him I wasn’t surprised because again, that is the relationship between the light and the dark; the dark will always mock it. What was interesting to me though, was that Sam’s prayer was a show of humility and Remmick responded to that by sharing a story of his own vulnerability. What was also interesting, was that Sam’s prayer kept him long enough to realise his greatest spiritual gift was also his greatest defence.

At the same time, it is true that without Annie defending and protecting them with her Hoodoo knowledge, none of them would have stood a chance. Her root magic worked because root magic does work. It is the most foundational form of spirituality that we have, the foundational magic of our connection to the ground.

There was something about seeing Annie’s root work that made me realise just how close to the ground Christianity is too. Perhaps it is because we are still in the breath of Easter but I kept thinking of how root work is bound up in the physical matter of the earth and there is no physical material on this earth more spiritually powerful than blood. Blood in root work and earth magic is so significant, there is no more primordial form of magic on this earth than that which uses blood, it is the highest currency. The sacrifice of Jesus was almost like the ultimate blood magic, the one purifying act of blood sacrifice that opened the door to spiritual life once and for all.

I suppose Christianity seems further from the ground than it is because we are shielded from the physicality of it all. Christianity has wrapped up the blood and the body and presented it to us neatly in the form of bread and wine given politely in Sunday services so that we don’t have to deal with the tangible mess any more. My soul started spilling out thanks to God for such a mercy as the traffic lights turned green, because truly, what a mercy that is.

My car cut it’s way through the night and I found myself looking for the unseen beings around me, for vampires flying overhead, for spirits gliding past my windows. Whenever I was with my great grandmother she would always ask me if I could see the spirit beings perched on trees or moving around us. I would always strain my eyes and get annoyed when in the end I could never see what she did. On this night though, I was glad that I didn’t have her eyes. All I could see were street lights and stars.

Annie’s spiritual insight was for sure what helped them survive but I don’t think it’s as easy as saying we should leave Christianity and start practicing Hoodoo because one is colonial and the other isn’t. I have a deep respect for Hoodoo but I also know it can only take you so far. It has its limits, as all spiritual practices do. Swapping one spiritual system for another doesn’t get rid of the problems one faces in Christianity because all spiritual systems and communities have their blind spots and can fall prey to the darkness of the heart.

I think the real question is whether we are doing the spiritual work of cultivating that which brings life and flourishing rather than control and fear. The work of cultivating wisdom, humility and discernment, of surrender, of turning away from fear that binds even when it’s presented as wisdom, of bearing the fruit of love and following the Spirit of God even when it’s hard.

As much as Remmick was the spiritual villain of the movie, he seemed to me to represent what happens when we don’t do that specific kind of spiritual-emotional work. All of us have pain in our hearts that can give birth to a version of him. Remmick and Sam in that way showed two sides of the same coin. Both of them came from people who had been colonised and abused under a violent and false Christianity. Both of them just wanted to be free to sing their music and dance with their people. Both of them understood the power of community and fellowship. The difference was that Remmick’s fellowship showed you what happens when the oppressed gets the power to become the oppressor. His fellowship offered nothing but a limited life in the shadows with only pain and hate to sustain you. Sam’s fellowship offered life in the light and the freedom to dance across the boundaries of space and time.

By the time I got home the sky was the same blue black that I had seen Sam and Remmick fight under in the movie. I power walked from my car to my front door half expecting a vampire to jump out from the bushes and trap me in the night with an Irish jig.

To be honest though if a vampire had come to trap me and it looked like Michael B Jordan, I might not have been too mad about it.

Thank you for reading the self-disclosure diaries.

The Self-Disclosure Diaries is a collection of everyday experiences from life as a trainee counselling psychologist, sometimes with a touch of magical realism.

In therapy, self-disclosure refers to the moments when a therapist shares parts of their own experience to create connection, validation, and understanding. These diaries are where I practise that by sharing my own stories and psychological processes while exploring the ways personal and professional identities naturally intersect. Along the way, I also explore writing as a tool of self-expression, archiving, storytelling, and play.

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