Black Magic Woman

Dorothy Desir Davis has the hectic life of a modern-day woman. This Ivy League graduate is a curator, mother and wife. And she is deeply religious.

Davis is a Voodoo priestess, CBS News Correspondent Alison Stewart reports. She believes in the African religion of Haiti, which worships gods and spirits that are believed to help the living. Davis prays at her home altar daily and practices openly.

"When I saw the power that exists in the religion and the beauty that's there, why shouldn't I embrace this legacy," she says. "It's mine and I'm proud of it."

Unlike thousands of Americans who practice Voodoo in secret, Dorothy is trying to change the stigma that Voodoo is a religion of black magic and sorcery.

"I think a lot of people don't know what Voodoo is," she says. "They don't know what power it has, or they know what power it has and they think it's only negative."

Images of zombies brought back from the dead and Voodoo dolls stuck with pins are wildly untrue. Actually, experts consider Voodoo to be one of the world's oldest religions.

"Voodoo means holy or sacred, because that's what the religion is about," says Donald Cosentino, a professor at UCLA who studies the religion.

Cosentino edited a scholarly book on the sacred arts of Voodoo. He says that the late-night ceremonies saluting the spirits should not be taken lightly.

"It's like you have to prepare a dinner party as if the president of the United States or the president of France or the pope were coming to visit," he says. "It's a very expensive deal to run a Voodoo ceremony."

Voodoo ceremonies are known to last entire evenings, a minimum of six hours.

For the curious, Voodoo ceremonies can be seen as a spectacle. But for the believers, it's a heavy spiritual and social responsibility.

"I've been put in a rather unique situation that gives me no other choice but to speak, but to defend -- actually, not even to defend, but to carry my flag, to wear my crown," Davis says.

And she'll keep fighting to make Voodoo simply another religious option.