Religion, part 2

After attending my first mass in Colombia, I thought I’d add just a bit in the religion vein.

It all started Thursday night, with a random entreaty by a friend of a friend to experience the word of God. Well, thought I, I’m down for nothing if not new experiences. We jumped into a car and drove off (a new experience in itself—driving in a car instead of a bus! In downtown streets of Barranquilla!)

We arrived just a few minutes after the hour. Unlike every other event in Barranquilla, however, this didn’t seem to constitute as early—instead, the church was packed. But I use the term church lightly here.

Since we were attending Catholic mass, I expected nothing less than vaulted ceilings, a fair amount of religious iconography, hard wooden benches, and a slightly stuffy atmosphere. Instead, after winding through the entranceway, I found myself at the door to an outdoor patio. The priest, in white robes over a colorful, pajama-like suit, raised his hands and spoke under a terracotta gazebo. The crowd listened enraptured, filling rows upon rows of the ever-present white plastic beach chairs.

There was no more room for us to sit, so we stood on the brick steps, listening to the sermon.

Gradually, I learned from my companions and from listening to the priest himself that this was no ordinary sacerdote. This was a priest “from Africa,” who was apparently well known on the traveling Catholic priest circuit. He is purported to have performed miracles, and related to us a few—giving a blind woman sight, healing another so they could walk.

I decided not to spend my time questioning the veracity of these stories, and instead enjoyed the smooth flow of his words, the call and response format of the service, the peace that filled the patio. Branches of a wide-leafed tree arched over the space and rustled in the night breeze. To the right, the city’s skyscrapers rose taller than the tallest palms into the sky, their lights blinking against the darkness.  A family down the block squabbled, their dog lending its voice to the argument. And every so often, the breeze sent a hint of marijuana wafting over the crowd.

The service itself concluded after an hour, but then the crowd was offered the chance to experience the power of the priest’s hands; immediately, a line formed. And for the next two and a half hours, we watched the priest bless the attendants. This wasn’t a blessing of the sort of a cross drawn over their heads—instead, the man laid one palm on their foreheads and wrapped the other around their necks. And then, eyes closed, he swayed them—with the women looking not a little like he was making love—or, in the case of the short ones, as though he were using them to stir a very large pot. 

Three men in the white polos of the church staff stood close to catch those who crumpled. And this was not a few. A few went down immediately after being touched, although with others it took a few rotations in the priest’s hands. Caught by the men they were borne to the ground, where they lay for a varying length of time with their eyes closed, some quivering, others with their hands folded over their chest and beatific smiles on their faces.

As the end neared, the flow of people moving to line slowing, my companions stood to take their turn. Come, they insisted, smiling. So I did. His palm was soft and his hand smelled like cloves. Perhaps sensing I would not be experiencing a rapture that night, the time he took with me was brief.

After the service, we made like good Colombians and went out for early-morning salchipapas, and then went to catch what little sleep we could before work the next day.

I write this post mainly because after attending that service I was re-thinking a little bit about how religion presents itself here. Since my own Catholic experiences have been limited to attending other weddings or visiting cathedrals (including cathedrals here in Colombia), or attending high holiday masses, I assumed that mass must be the same everywhere—said in a church with few variations overall. But after witnessing mass in that natural, lovely outdoor space, I’m beginning to think that Catholicism here is a bit like the US Christianity—that there are churches with plenty of variations to fit individual needs. Even if they are all Catholic, and all share the same general belief system and all hold mass.

(On a side note, the idea that there are different “brands” of Christianity in the US is a really hard concept to explain, here)

But even if Catholicism is Catholicism anywhere, the fact that it would vary at least in presentation and in formality makes lots of sense, if it’s going to be the most ubiquitous belief system in the country. Since I’ve still only been to one church, this is mostly just a postulation.