The Posada Across the Street

In the last post I was a little sad that I had not seen a neighborhood Posada. Oh, the Posada led by the San Antonio Church was wonderful but there is something very special to me when it is a grassroots event. Ask and ye shall receive.

Last night just as Carly and I were getting ready to go to bed, I heard singing in the street. We flew back to the upstairs studio to get the camera and when I looked out the window, there was the Posada knocking on the door across the street asking to come in. I was afraid that by the time I got the camera and got outside that they would have moved on so I decided to shoot from the window.

It was a good decision because just after I took this picture, the door opened and this was the house that gave Mary and Joseph room in the stable. The little house is about 10 feet wide but still all the people who had been in the street, maybe 75 or 100 people, followed Mary and Joseph into the house. I love the small bouquets. I love the candles. I love the kids lighting sparklers. I love the music. I love celebrating Christmas in such an intimate way. How blessed I am that it all happened in the street by my house.

The Virgin of Guadalupe

 

Every year on December 12, the San Antonio Church in my Colonia is the destination of a procession in honor of the Virgin of Guadalupe. I have not been here for it for several years but I'm here this year and headed over to the church. The procession comes up Salida a Celaya and the line stretched back as far as I could see. They are carrying their pictures and statutes of the Virgin to be blessed. There is also a big contingent of people on horseback with banners honoring the Virgin.

 

One thing I didn't see this year were people who came long distances on their knees. The one exception to that was while I was sitting in the church before the procession, one woman came up the aisle of the church on her knees, prayed for a few minutes and then left.

 

With the celebration of the Virgin of Guadalupe it is like the Christmas Season has officially begun. Next it will be the posadas. It is a good time for me and my camera. 

 

 

The White Dress

There must be millions of white dresses for girls in Mexico. They are required for First Communions, parades when a girl is designated as an angel, and sometimes when she dances some of the traditional dances in school programs. Maybe they are needed at other times as well. When I am photographing a gathering of children preparing to go into the Parroquia for the large First Communions they have with some religious holidays, I can see that most of the time the dress isn't a "one-time dress." It is made so it can be adjusted to a variety of sizes and you can also see that it isn't right out of the box. It has been used before.

That does not lessen the girl's pride in being "dressed up" and feeling special. They walk around carefully holding their skirt or standing gracefully and patiently with their family. They let Mom adjust their dress or their hair. Oh, they might whisper in a girl friend's ear but there are no childish giggles or running.

Now the boys.....well, as they say, boys will be boys. It is all the parents can do to keep their boy's shirt tails in and jackets on before they head into the church. The minute they come out of the church, Bibles are handed to Mom, shirt tails are out and they are chasing a friend.

The white dress stands a better chance of surviving than the white pants and jackets. 

Listening to the Stories

I have heard that there are creative writing classes where you are assigned a subject or an image to write about? Well, if I were assigned to write about the image I posted yesterday, I would be overwhelmed.

Babs commented on yesterday's post, "Oh my, this so touches your heart, doesn't it?" Yes, that image did touch my heart and I kept thinking about it after I posted it. Stories keep floating by. Stories about the fire extinguisher. Why is it there? I don't remember seeing one in such an obvious position in other Mexican churches. Stories about the flowers. Who picked them and brought them to the church and why? Stories about the battered offering box. Why is it battered? Why is it locked? Who are the people who drop their precious pesos in the offering box?

I think the Writing Muse is messing with me. Those stories are floating out there somewhere waiting to be written but the Photo Muse is keeping me too busy. The Writing Muse needs to give this assignment to someone else. I'm too old to concentrate on more than one thing at a time. Is it okay with you if I send the Writing Muse to your house?

This image of the beam of light is in the same church as the image from yesterday. I know. I know it is just kind of physics thing when a light beam comes in a small opening but I always feel like it is a ray of light from God.

Personal Devotion

Some people have asked me about the magnificent churches I saw in Europe. Ahh, Notre Dame Cathedral, St Vitus Cathedral.....beautiful. Reading the guide books as I walk around and look at the stained glass, the saints, the altars. I'm amazed at the architecture.

Then I come home to San Miguel and walk into the church to the side of the Parroquia and I see this fire extinguisher next to a locked, battered offering box topped with hand-picked wild flowers stuck in a cut-off "Electrolit" plastic bottle. The light turquoise wall bears the scars of many years. I breathe in and hold it, afraid that something might move before I can take a picture.

This speaks to me of timelessness and personal devotion. Here is where I am moved to pray.

A Part of My Life

While in Prague I wanted to go to Terezin which was an old fortress town about an hour outside of Prague built in the 1780's. About 7,000 people lived in the town when during World War II the Nazis moved them out and began using it as a concentration camp for Jews. This was the Nazi "model" Jewish town that they used for propaganda for the Red Cross and the world. In actuality, tens of thousands of people died there, some killed outright and others dying from malnutrition and disease. More than 150,000 other people (including tens of thousands of children) were held there for months or years, before being sent by rail transports to their deaths at Treblinka and Auschwitz extermination camps in occupied Poland, as well as to smaller camps elsewhere.

You may be wondering why I'd want to go there. I was a young child during World War II but at the end of the war the news reel pictures at the movies and in Life Magazine of the Prisoners of War and the Jewish Concentration camp survivors was printed in my brain. I also remember something about the trials of the Nazi war criminals. Oh not the details but it is a part of my history. So I wanted to see a Nazi Concentration Camp.

Terezin is a day trip from Prague and in the end I decided to hire a guide to take me through the Jewish Quarter in Prague. My wonderful guide was a Jewish woman whose parents had survived so my half-day tour was more like a first hand account of  the Nazi Holocaust and life under Communism.

The Jewish Quarter in Prague is really very small. The picture above is one of the walkways into the Jewish Quarter. There are several Synagogues, one of them is the oldest in Eastern Europe built in 1270. Those synagogues within the Jewish Quarter are museums and memorials to the Jews who lost their lives in the Holocaust. This picture is just a tiny piece of the walls in one of them where their names are recorded. It is set up by family name and then the members of the family. Sometimes it was name after name in one family. Being surrounded by these walls of names was emotional for me.

Another thing that hit home with me is that women were only allowed into a back space or upper gallery which was usually mostly concealed. Another reminder about the status of women throughout most of history.

This beautiful Moorish-style synagogue was built in the 1800's and has been loving restored since World War II.

My guide told me that most people in the Czech Republic are not connected to any religion, or as she put it, few say prayers. There were some 120,000 Jews in the area in 1939. Just 10,000 survived the holocaust. Today only 1,700 people "register" as Jews in Prague. There are probably more but after their experiences in the Holocaust and Communism they do not proclaim their religion.

I was surprised at how this trip turned out to be such a reminder about World War II. It is time to pull out a few history books about the period and put some events and places in perspective. I'll be writing some other entries about how places reconnected me to this part of my lifetime.

Strength, Peace and Comfort

I'm not Catholic but the Catholic church has been a part of my life since Ned and I started coming to Mexico back in the early 80s. First it was my fascination with the churches strung along the old road between Cancun and Merida. Every little village had a church built on an elevated piece of ground. I quickly learned that most of these churches were built on the foundations of a Mayan pyramid. That led to some research and a five year photography project of 16th Century churches in Mexico.

During that long project I spent a lot of time just sitting in these churches as I waited for a Mass or wedding or a funeral to be over so that I could walk around and photograph without disturbing the people who were worshiping. I came to love that time of just being still and quiet in these amazing structures that were built and consecrated to God. After we came to San Miguel I continued to stop in one of the churches when I was in the Centro to just to sit and feel near God. It became my way of renewing my spirit.

After Ned was diagnosed with cancer, I would stop in one of the churches and pray. At first I begged for Ned's life but later I asked for strength and peace and comfort for both of us. I'm still stopping in the churches and asking for strength and peace and comfort. I believe that God is still doing just that....giving me strength and peace and comfort.

This image was made in the San Francisco church this week. Wilting bouquets of white roses were on all the side altars, probably left from a wedding.