In fact, the government sponsors several public religious displays. The police station sponsored a mechanized show using Barbie style dolls in costume and sets for Christmas and this year was their first year to do the same for the passion. And the city of Arequipa sponsored a live actor passion play on Maundy Thursday (the Thursday before Easter) that we happened upon. Next year we'll know to look out for it.
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| I was impressed with the costuming, there were at least 50+ actors. |
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| They didn't shy away from uncomfortable scenes. This is the whipping by Roman soldiers, two soldiers had whips (cotton rope) and they did the whole 40 lashes. |
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| The crucifixion. This was the end of the passion play. |
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| This is the mechanized passion play at the police station. They had 15 stations, I think. 2014 was the inaugural year. |
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| They had amazing detail for Barbie type dolls. Jesus carried the cross, ascended, Roman soldiers pounded nails, and more. |
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| Each station had a light on it and narration/music for that scene. |
It's interesting, in going around Arequipa there are a lot of shrines in places that you wouldn't expect. For example, the post office, a public park, the vegetable/meat/fruit market. I have only ever seen shrines to Mary and Jesus. Most often, Jesus is in some state of torture, like with a crown of thorns carrying his cross or bloody and on the cross. We aren't Catholic or Orthodox so I didn't grow up with a lot of iconography in church. I do know from talking with others who are from faith traditions with icons that at least some of this is to help remind people of the sacrifice that Jesus made for us. My own faith tradition tends to more heavily emphasize the resurrection and part of that would be hanging an empty cross (if a cross is used at all). So it has been interesting to be in place where this type of religious iconography is not only present in churches but literally everywhere.
On Easter Sunday, we went to church at a Baptist church a couple of blocks down the street. They had someone dressed in a robe who I believe was Peter at the empty tomb (constructed of paper on a 2x4 frame). But it's very difficult to understand what is happening when you don't fully comprehend the language (fortunately, we had a pretty good pulse on the story they were telling). Outside of the mini-play, the rest of the service was much like usual, about 40 minutes of singing and then a sermon. I don't know what the Catholic service tradition is here, but I was told by others that have lived here that the big event is really more about Good Friday and Jesus' death than a big service/tradition on Easter itself. (Anyone who is Catholic in the States who cares to chime in about your traditional Easter service?)
I love the Lutheran tradition of brass playing and church choirs and I look forward to experiencing that again when we return, but I did enjoy seeing the various passion plays here.
We invited some people over to our house for Easter afternoon. Dave fixed up a yummy meal of lamb, potatoes, and veggies and we had some bread, chicha (the purple corn drink, kind of like Kool-Aid), and cheesecake, homemade cream cheese mints, and Cadbury style candy for dessert.
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| Mowing down on homemade Easter candy |
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| Having fun outside |
Our guests included another expat from the states who is here doing medical work (particularly helping with kids who have club feet) and couple of her patients who were in the hospital getting casts done in preparation for surgery. We dyed Easter eggs and did a hunt for the eggs and some chocolate bunnies I bought. None of the Peruvians had ever done that before, so it was especially fun to see them dying eggs and on the hunt.
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| Egg decorating "I haven't done this in YEARS!" |
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| Quite the artist, I think she enjoyed this. |
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| Crayon polka dots |
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| First time for both of them |
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| She found (and cracked) a couple of eggs. |
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| Searching for eggs and chocolate bunnies |
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| Miss M found an egg in the dryer, so A thought she'd check it out, too. |
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| Finally found her chocolate rabbit |
It is fun for me to see how other people celebrate holidays in a foreign culture and also fun for me to see the universality of Jesus' story. But, I missed my home culture something fierce during this holiday- it was the hardest one so far to be away from home.
The Holiday Series
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Thanksgiving
Advent
Christmas
New Years
I can imagine... My sister, who's lived in Latvia for a time (and attended a Lutheran church while there, staying at a Lutheran rectory), said that the very snowy Easter was so different and strange...
ReplyDeleteI come from a country that has many Catholic sites and monuments and statues in the countryside, so I'm used to the Passion images; there are even those "cross paths" or whatever it would be called in English, where there are images (I think twelve?) or Christ's progression to Golgotha, and usually it ends with a chapel on a hill or something. They can be found as paintings in churches, too. At the same time, I come from a family and church with a long reformed tradition (Czech reformation - Jan Hus, Utraquists, the Unity of Brethren, as well and Lutheran and Calvinist traditions), so at the same time it's also very foreign to me. For a long time, because of the history of Catholic oppression of reformed churches in my country, the symbol of the cross was actually generally frowned upon in my church... which I find silly, and thankfully most people do now. But I've also heard the explanation that because of the third commandment, those images with the dying Christ were wrong. I like your explanation. :D
For us, the Sunday Resurrection service is also much more important - we do tend to have a gathering on Good Friday evenings, reading the story, but the attendance is usually much smaller, even smaller than at a regular service. Like, I don't always go there myself and my sister plain refuses to, saying it's too depressing. Father does go, because he usually reads...
I have a feeling the focus on the Passion is a particularly Latin American thing, but I may be mistaken. Anyway, I believe the Catholics I do know really don't place so much emphasis on it as your description suggests. There's definitely nothing like those Passion plays / scenes going on in my hometown, and you usually hear about Nativity plays in the Advent or at Christmas rather than that.
I think that many countries that were Catholicized (is that a word?) and maybe had a little bit of taking the Catholic images in place of native religious symbols have a modern-day focus on the passion. For example, it's also a very big deal in the Philippines, to the point of people crucifying themselves each Good Friday. In the United States, there isn't the same exact passion focus, though there are often services on Good Friday that highlight the stations of the cross, for example. And in Germany, Lutherans have a solid passion play experience as well. So I think it depends on traditions and culture and personal faith as well.
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