The Haitian Creole verb is servi — to serve — and Vodouwizan say they serve the lwa rather than that they worship them or believe in them. The vocabulary throughout is contractual and familial: obligations, promises, debts, feeding, neglect. A lwa served properly is expected to deliver — health, protection, a job, a court outcome — and one that is neglected causes trouble in the specific way a slighted relative causes trouble, by making things difficult until the matter is addressed. This has consequences for how the religion is described. Asking a Haitian whether they believe in the lwa is close to a category error; the question that makes sense is whether they serve, which is a matter of what obligations they hold and whether they are current on them. It also explains why the religion does not seek converts and has no concept of faith as assent: you either have inherited obligations or you have not.