RELIGION
Religiously, Roman Catholicism dominates Mexico today as
it has for centuries. Protestant Christianity is next largest distinguishable
religious group. These numbers have increased in the last 100 years due to the
influence of Pentecostal Christianity in particular. Mexico has one of the largest
numbers of Jehovah's Witnesses of anywhere in the world.
Mexican Catholicism is extremely varied in
practice. It ranges from those who support traditional folk religious
practices, usually in isolated rural communities, to those who adhere to the
highly intellectualized theology of liberation, and from charismatic renewal
prayer groups to the conservative Opus Dei movement. Lay groups with different
goals, purposes, and political orientations are well known and common in
contemporary Mexico.
The largest and best known include Mexican Catholic Action, Knights of
Columbus, Christian Study Courses, Christian Family Movement, and a wide range
of university students' and workers' organizations.
The Virgin of Guadalupe has long been a symbol
enshrining the major aspirations of Mexican society. According to Roman
Catholic belief, in December 1531, the Virgin Mary appeared on three occasions
to a Christian Indian woodcutter named Juan Diego on the hill of Tepeyac, six
kilometers north of Mexico City's
main plaza. She spoke to him in the Náhuatl language and identified herself by
the name of Guadalupe. The Virgin commanded Juan Diego to seek out Bishop Juan
de Zumárraga and to inform him of her desire to have a church built in her
honor on that spot. After two unsuccessful visits to the bishop's house, Juan
Diego returned to Tepeyac and was ordered by the Virgin to pick up some roses,
carry them on his cloak, and attempt to make a third visit to the skeptical
bishop. Once in the bishop's office, Juan Diego unfolded his cloak to present
the roses, and an image of a mestizo Virgin had been miraculously imprinted
upon it. Bishop Zumárraga acknowledged the miracle, and a shrine was built on
the site of the appearances.
Today, two neighboring basilicas of Our Lady of
Guadalupe are at the foot of Tepeyac hill. The first basilica, which was
dedicated in 1709 but now is closed to services, accommodated 2,000 worshipers;
the new ultramodern basilica, inaugurated in October 1976, accommodates up to
20,000 people. Juan Diego's original cloak with the mestizo Virgin image
imprinted on it hangs above the altar of the new basilica.
According to anthropologist Eric R. Wolf, the
Guadalupe symbol links family, politics, and religion; the colonial past and
the independent present; and the Indian and the Mexican. It reflects the
salient social relationships of Mexican life and embodies the emotions they
generate. It is, ultimately, a way of talking about Mexico. Wolf's views are shared by
Harvey L. Johnson of the University
of Houston. For him,
worship of the brown-skinned Virgin has resulted in the reconciliation of two
opposing worlds, in the fusion of two religions, two traditions, and cultures.
Devotion to Our Lady of Guadalupe remains strong even as other aspects of
Mexican society have changed. The UNAM* national opinion poll found, for
example, that nine out of ten Mexicans continued to ask intercessions from the
Virgin or a saint.
UNAM* - The Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (National Autonomous
University of Mexico)
(from http://countrystudies.us/mexico/61.htm)
SANTA MUERTE (Spanish
for Saint Death),
is a female folk saint venerated primarily in Mexico
and the United States.
A personification of death, she is associated with healing, protection, and
safe delivery to the afterlife by her devotees. Not sanctioned by the Roman
Catholic Church, her cult arose from popular Mexican folk belief, a syncretism
between indigenous Mesoamerican and Spanish Catholic beliefs and practices.
Since the pre-Columbian era Mexican culture has maintained a certain reverence
towards death, which can be seen in the widespread commemoration of the
syncretic Day of the Dead. Elements of that celebration include the use of
skeletons to remind people of their mortality. The worship is condemned by the
Catholic Church in Mexico as
invalid, but it is firmly entrenched among Mexico's lower working classes and
various elements of society deemed as "outcasts".
Santa Muerte generally appears as a female
skeletal figure, clad in a long robe and holding one or more objects, usually a
scythe and a globe. Her robe can be of any color, as more specific images of
the figure vary widely from devotee to devotee and according to the rite being
performed or the petition being made. As the worship of Santa Muerte was
clandestine until the 20th century, most prayers and other rites have been
traditionally performed privately in the home. However, for the past ten years
or so, worship has become more public, especially in Mexico
City after Enriqueta Romero initiated her famous Mexico City shrine in 2001. The number of
believers in Santa Muerte has grown over the past ten to twenty years, to
several million followers in Mexico,
the United States, and parts
of Central America. Santa Muerte has similar
male counterparts in the Americas,
such as the skeletal folk saints San La Muerte of Argentina and Rey Pascual of Guatemala
(from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Muerte)
DAYS OF THE DEAD
Days of the Dead is a week-long holiday when
the souls of the dead return to be with their families for one night. That
night is November 1 and the early morning of November 2. Like so many other
elements of Mexico's
culture, this holiday is a mixture of Prehispanic and Christian religious
ideas. In the Catholic religious calendar these are All Souls' Day and All
Saints' Day and in Europe they were set aside
for remembrance of departed family members. Certain indigenous peoples, such as
the Aztecs also had religious rites having to do with death and the return of
spirits to this world. Many of these were bloody, demanding human sacrifice.
But the victims spirits lived on and their bones were said to be like seeds of
corn from which would spring renewed life. The blood, like the heavenly rains,
watered the parched earth. Although all the ancient rituals have disappeared,
some of their spirit threads through the ages down to the present.
The celebration is not sad and dreary, but
cheerful. People are happy to think that the person they loved will return to
be with them and enjoy the pleasures of life with their family. It is also said
that death in traditional Mexican culture does not have the same meaning as it
does among North Americans and Europeans. Mexicans joke about death and poke
fun at it in their art, literature, and music. That's one reason why toys and
candies made in the shapes of skulls and skeletons are so common in this
season. Death is feared and paid due respect, but it is thought to be an
inevitable part of the natural cycle, a phenomenon as logical and natural as
life itself. And like all of life itself, death is filled with ironies, not the
least of which is that the dead are never really dead but return for this one
night of the year.
(from http://www.pbs.org/foodancestors/cult.html )
Come back