Saints!

Happy Saint George's day, everyone! But don't feel too special; George is the patron saint not only of England but also of "Aragon, Catalonia, Ethiopia, Georgia, Greece, Lithuania, Palestine, Portugal, and Russia, as well as the cities of Amersfoort, Beirut, Fakiha, Bteghrine, Cáceres (Spain), Ferrara, Freiburg, Genoa, Ljubljana, Gozo, Milan, Pomorie, Preston, Salford, Qormi, Rio de Janeiro, Lod, Barcelona and Moscow, as well as a wide range of professions, organizations, and disease sufferers."

What. A. Slag.

Saints are great. I particularly like St. Catherine of Siena, one of Italy's two patron saints, who amongst other things is the patron of people ridiculed for excessive piety.

I gather Santeria is so called because that's the old (perjorative) term for hagiolatry, or saint-worship. AFAIK it's OK to venerate saints, as long as you don't worship them (though to know the formal difference between veneration and worship you'd probably have to be a bit more Catholic than I am, which is not hard).

Edit: and I think a lot of 'saints' are genuinely just old pagan gods with a Christian makeover - this is certainly the case in Ireland, probably Latin America too.