I'm no expert on this but I thought she was refering to the notion tha the catholic church thinks that on all hallows eve the dead get out of their graves and walk among the living.

I' m still hung up on th title Sicut Cervus refering to psalms 42:1 As the hart panth after the waterbrooks, so panteth my soul after God.
What In tarnation does this episode have in common with a person desiring a deep relationship with God.

I'm sooo confused. . . lol

 

She basically is saying they are people we know, that we love, that we are responsible for and to whom we are connected, or some poetical bs like that, but with really bad writing. She's saying "They ours, and eeeeerybody got time foah dat"

 

My opinion. It is psychobabble that means nothing. Ridiculous dialogue from a 1950's or 1060's B grade zombie movie. I think the point trying to be made is that she sees no difference really between the living and the dead.

 

This episode is all about Santa Muerte. She is the symbol of death in Mexican culture and she has been worshiped like an idol by many people who reject the Catholic Church. It is actually a very widely practiced form of religion even now in Mexico. The most obvious sign that this is what they are referencing is the owl face that was on Luis' coin and also carved into the tree. The owl is one of the symbols of Santa Muerte. It refers to her as being a messenger and able to guide people through darkness, in other words after they die. Cecila worships Santa Muerte and believes that when people are killed they still walk the earth in some way and you have to take care of them. That's why she called them "our dead" and that's why she is literally taking care of any zombies of loved ones.

The Catholic church has condemned the worship of Santa Muerte. The catholic church and its members in this episode basically looked at Cecila's keeping of zombies like an affront to God, and as part of the reason why the Zombie plague was still going. That is what the title of the episode is about... they wanted to be closer to God by getting rid of the zombies that were being kept by Cecilia because like the priest said, he believed it was trying to drive them away from their God.

 

Am I the only one who felt some chemistry between Celia and Nick? I got the impression she liked him, as scandalous as that may be.

 

Celia verbalized that she thought he was a handsome young man. I'm not convinced she wants to jump his bones. She's just being sweet. Inasmuch as an insane mass murderer can be "sweet".

 

But why poison the people in the church?

 

They were going to kill the dead , including the ones in Celia's cellar.

 

Ah thank you. I missed that somehow.

 

As another poster mentioned - Cecelia and her family are practitioners of an alternative Mexican religion called "Santa Muerte" (The Holy Dead) . This is pretty whacked - its a form of Mexican witchcraft that makes Cuban Santeria look like a scout meeting. Its essentially a "religion" for those marginalized by society and condemned by the Church - criminals, narco traffickers, gang members, cartel members, pimps and prostitutes, junkies, etc. Law enforcement, the government and the Catholic Church is the mortal enemies of Santa Muerte.

The killing of the church members was a little bit more complex than just that they were going to go kill the dead. They were going to go kill the dead, AND Cecelia and her followers. She, and her group, is the evil the priest was talking about. Thats why Thomas came to try to keep them from going after her and to broker a peace. Thats why Louis said last week "Especially now" when he said his mother could be safe anywhere. Thats why she wanted Strand to commit suicide with Thomas. Thats why she was happy Louis wasn't "put down" and why Nick said "No" and intervened when Salazar was going to stick Louis's brain. (Obviously Nick is familiar with Santa Muerte, not surprising with his drug history.) Its also why Salazar wanted NO PART of getting the owl talisman back to Celia and disgustedly tossed it overboard, despite it being the dying wish of a man who just gave his life getting them passage to Mexico.

This is "her time". She is a witch / priestess, in a cult of the dead that uses the dead to bring revenge upon the living who have wronged them and protection from the Government, Law Enforcement, and the Catholic Church.

Celia isn't romantically interested in Nick... She is recruiting him into the cult. This is probably why Stand decided to take on a jonesing smack addict as a sidekick for this little adventure. Strand is probably also a practitioner. As a homosexual hustler, con-man and thief, he isn't exactly the type of recruit the Roman Catholic Church is looking for, but he would be the ideal Santa Muerte candidate. That may be the "potential" he recognized...

 

@Zombiekaaner - really solid post there, and excellent description/analysis of the psycho-cult that mass-murderer Celia heads up. The ONLY weak spot is perhaps thinking that Strand is a member.... if Strand is a "Santa Muerte" practitioner, why does he pop Thomas in the head?

 

Thank you. Well my thoughts on that is that Strand isn't a very good practitioner because he is completely without principles and exists only to serve his own interests without any greater purpose be it a "convict code" or "honor among thieves" so to speak. From what we have learned about Stand so far - he is not in any way a "nice" or "honorable man". Remember when we first met him - he was bribing soldiers, essentially "bought" nick like a piece of meat and told him he's "obligated", and he was tormenting a mentally unstable man about his wife finding someone better, and during the escape he looted the pockets of a dying soldier he formerly bribed while the man was being gnawed on by walkers, and he wouldn't even put him down despite the soldier begging him to kill him. He obviously did something to end up in Army detention in the first place - remember those holding cells were for the sick, the crazy, presumably the criminal.... That facility was where they took the people removed from the safe zones... In the flash back - we learned that stand was essentially a "gay prostitute / hustler rolling johns". He was working a hotel bar, took Thomas Abigail back up to his room, and robbed him to the tune of $30K on credit card cash advances, with which he bought debt, making him a loan shark. He is a black criminal from New Orleans - which almost certainly makes him gang affiliated. (That's not intended to be racist - simply a factual observation in that you cant engage in a criminal activity in the area he described himself as coming from without a sanction from one of the controlling gangs, They don't tolerate freelancing.)

So essentially what we have here in Strand is a member / affiliate of a black street gang from New Orleans - a city rich in VooDoo and HooDoo traditions - becoming "Obligated To" a man with obvious Mexican Cartel connections. I say the cartel connections are obvious for a number of reasons. For example there was a fully automatic weapon aboard the boat - which Salazar had taken the clip for. Louis also had fully automatic weapons when he came in with Nick on the RIB. He was able to successfully take head shots on multiple individuals, from the bow of a moving rigid inflatable at high speed. That would be a neat trick for a SEAL, much less someone who just picked up an M-4 he found in a dead soldiers hands or something. So its obvious this wasn't Louis' first rodeo so to speak, he was a killer with practice. (Notice they tracked down Strand and went to see him, rather than merely reporting the cards stolen, paying the $50 liability, and leaving the matter to the police.)

Strand became Abigail's "protoge" , and either his lover or his "punk". (Notice he didn't say "I love you too" before leaving for LA?) It would therefore only be reasonable that if Abigail was impressed by his criminality, and took him into he fold to mentor and possess him, that he would have also taken him into the Santa Muerte which is a "religion" tailor made for people like Strand. It seems to me that Strand is a great "emulator", notice how he at the earliest opportunity he too "saw potential" and "obligated" a common street punk to be his minion. Frankly - we don't even know who shot Louis / the Mexican Coast Guardsmen. That exchange happened off screen. For all we know, Strand took out Louis because an ideal opportunity presented itself and Louis never liked him and thus posed a potential threat to his arrangement. Louis the enforcer is gone. Now Thomas is dead. Leaving only Celia to prevent his ascent to "Lord of the Manor". if you notice strand didn't say "this is my lovers boat" or even "this is my friends boat" he said it was HIS boat. He said HE had a house... Looks to me like strand is giving himself a promotion in the cartel....

 

I'm smiling... an interesting read.
It would make more sense to take out Luis, if he knew that Thomas was bitten, but he didn't know that yet.

 

I thought the dialogue between Nick and Celia was awkward. Perhaps it was intended that way to foreshadow that she was crazy.

 

I did not catch that. It makes a little more sense but still not much sense.