Living Easter

While Spain has some slightly strange rituals for Holy week which include dramatic street processions and re-enactments in which religious statues and displays are carried through the streets by robed figures (one might describe as Klu Klux Klan-like with their peculiar pointy hoods) I missed out on the show. Instead I joined some friends from my Taize trip to experience Easter in a number of small towns in the province of Burgos. We joined a group of about 40 young people in the town of Santo Domingo de Silos, a town known for its beautiful monastery and recently a hit cd made from recordings of the monks singing gregorian chants. We were there to participate in a project organized by Christians without borders which was to help nearby small towns which no longer had priests to celebrate Easter masses. Half the group went to a town called Santibañez and the other half to Quintanilla del Coco. I joined the latter group because I was intrigued by the name. The word ´coco´ has many meanings in Spanish which include coconut, the name of Grover from Sesame street in Spanish, a type of strange person and a type of insect. In our group we had two priests and my town´s group had a lively priest from Columbia which added another cultural dynamic to the celebrations.

If the idea was that we would share our faith with the town I think in the end it was the reverse. Arriving in the town I was absolutely delighted to meet a little old man who seemed to only speak in riddles and tongue twisters, and then when he came to mass he was almost another person arriving very solemnly and impecably dressed. If not by the detailed artwork in the church it was the reverance of the townspeople that showed us its importance in the town.

It was a very intense experience that I shared with some wonderful people. We had themed presentations in the morning, brief pre-mass preparation meetings, smalll groups, communal meals and a bit of tourism when there was time. Of those four days I want to share my favourite anecdotes.

First was trying to carry out my small task in mass which was to ring the bells. Oddly enough I think ´campana´ was one of my first Spanish words which you cannot help but learn when you work in the Peace Tower. When we got to the church the first thing I did was climb to the top of the bell tower. The small stone steps twisted and turned up to the top. To make the bells ring you had to give the rope a short, strong pull and then I realized there was the problem that from the top of the bell tower there would be no way to know where they were in the mass. That was when I noticed a rope going through a small hole in the floor and then when I went back down the stairs I saw the rope conveniently located at the back of the church. When it came time for the ´Gloria´ it wasn´t so much the bells you heard ringing, but rather the barking all of the dogs in the town. For the next mass I was given a small bell to ring inside the church for the ´Gloria´. Another simple task except that while I was ringing the bell it suddenly stopped and the handle became loose. I quickly found the small bolt inside the bell and twisted it back into place to continue to the ringing.

The townspeople treated us to cake, cookies, a thick chocolate drink and then cheese and meat trays on Easter Sunday. There is no Easter rabbit or eggs in Spain, not even an Easter bell like they have in France. In some ways Easter is like New Years and that was type of party we had after the Easter Vigil with lots of music, games and Champagne.

The most magical moment was the Easter Vigil mass which my group celebrated in another small town called Castroceniza. It is a town almost lost in the countryside and made up of mostly abandoned houses. About ten people came to the mass and as we walked up to the church on the top of a hill on the edge of town there was the most beautiful sky of stars that decorated the backdrop of the church that was lit by a small fire. Before we got started one of guys came out with a small head light and announced ´I am the miner´ and he got in place to light the book for the priest to read. It was simple mass in a small, cold church but it was full of life and it felt like Easter.