Does anybody knows what these are?

[u/diet_m_dew]

English is not my first language so I apologize for any grammatical mistakes. On the 26th of March, my younger sister and her friends found these folded paper in our street. She showed it to me and I found it really bizzare, our hair stood up. She also said that the plastic with a triangle, contained a cross (I am not sure if it was a pendant or wooden carving), but her friends took it and so they were not able to take a picture of it. Also, I believe this is not the original copy, but a printed copy cause it is noticeable. What I am certain of is that the original copy is surely written by hand.

My first thought was, these are used by 'mangkukulam' or witch because of the Latin words. I have seen a lot of witches in movies using Latin chants to cast spell. IDK. Let me know what u think.

[u/crash893b]

its basically a receipt of mental illness

[u/theseabaron → u/crash893b]

Considering the drawing and the comment above's image indicate some Philippino folk religious movement , I think it's safe to say we can all move away from the reductive "it's mental illness", and start looking at this from a more sociological (aka, mature, reasonable) point of investigation.

[u/SlasherVII → u/theseabaron]

But Reddit hates religious ppl

[u/TheAmazingX → u/theseabaron]

Not gonna happen. The average redditor consumes so much content that they can only process it as a web of associations like an AI. They've seen the image below so many times that anything vaguely similar is immediately sorted into the same category.

[u/Zhou-Enlai → u/theseabaron]

I mean just because it includes references to real superstitions or beliefs doesn’t make it not mentally ill ramblings, schitzophrenic writings often put real religious and historical references mishmashed in their writing believing it all to be part of one grand design that only they’ve figured out.

[u/theseabaron → u/Zhou-Enlai]

Yes, there is that possibility that it's madness. And look! might be! That's a lot of cookoo lookin stuff! But considering a lot of the imagery is closely matched to a widely held religious belief system in the Philippines, it's warranted to do -a little investigating- instead of back of the hand 'it's crazy talk.'

[u/crash893b → u/theseabaron]

I’m 99% sure this is how most religions got started in the first place

Religious or not it was in a wrapper tied to a tree

These are the actions of someone in a major schizophrenic episode

It is heartbreaking that people experience this

[u/LeeTorry → u/crash893b]

Filipino here, I used to work in the Museum ng Katipunan as an intern. What you have there are replicas of Katipunan revolutionary documents against the Spanish colonial forces, meanwhile the ones with drawings are talismans or "anting-anting" as we called them. Filipino revolutionaries would wear them either as necklaces, handkerchiefs, or even clothes as they believe that they give them protection and strength as theu combat the Spanish and the local guardia civil. The Philippines is a devout Christian country and these can be seen as one of the many ways we would interpret a foreign culture by local means.

Seeing that these were printed chances are that these were replicas of actual documents and "anting-anting" they were probably for a school presentation or a local museum. The Museo ng Katipunan has the actual anting-anting used by the revolutionaries in display.

[u/crash893b → u/LeeTorry]

Even the handwritten portions?