Crucifixion in Cacalotenango, Mexico

This is part of a series of images documenting Semana Santa (Easter) in Taxco and Cacalotenango, Mexico in April 2007.

This Easter I traveled to the colonial town of Taxco, Mexico to rest and document the customs originally brought from Spain almost 500 years ago – rituals once banned have been regularly practiced in Taxco once a year for the past 100 years or so. One can see, hear, and sense the processions as they wind through the ancient cobblestone streets. Children dressed as angels, followed by the faithful shouldering beautifully carved religious statuses. I witnessed “penitentes” who show their faith through self-inflicted suffering.

These dramas and processions is an amalgamation of Spanish and pre-Columbian worship and culture. For example the use of percussion and musical instruments, and the specific qualities of “penitente” practices. The indigenous identification with Christ’s (Jews) suffering at the hands of the Romans mirrors their own history of suffering at the hands of the conquistadors. The flagellations practices are reminiscent of those found in Aztec culture. Their use of decorations, plants (zarzamora) and materials by the “penitentes” are clear adaptations to medieval Spanish customs and ritual.


Taxco is reported to be the “Silver Center of the World” where four tons of silver a month are made into jewelry and other works of art. In the late 1920s, the charm of this colonial hillside town attracted William Spratling, a North American architect, writer and artist, and his charisma in turn made Taxco “the haunt of Bohemian American artists and literati.”

Since 9/11 they’ve been hit hard. These are a proud, hardworking people who are very devout in their spirituality and commitment to their families. This is the first of a series of images captured in Taxco as well as Cacalotenango. I got there by paying a private driver to bring me. Coming back I was blessed by having made friends with two Univision TV cameramen who’d managed to have a police truck at their disposal.


Cacalotenango is a small agricultural town in the mountains about one hour west of Taxco. The semana Santa Good Friday festivities are unique in that the passion play is acted out authentically. The whippings, flagellations and crucifixion actually occur live in front of spectators who are warned to stay clear of the action to avoid getting hurt they. The photographers were always so close that they were always highly at risk. A bullwhip that was meant for “Jesus” actually hit me.

I didn’t really get hurt but (in my mind :~) I fancied myself an “artist-penitent” of sorts as I roasted in the hot sun running up and down a wide area of hills and steep walkways trying to stay close to the action.

Let me tell you, this was as real an enactment as can be put on short of death. According to a penitent, who became a friend, the crucifixion was real on both hands though the feet were tied in place. As I followed the Christ figure through various phases of torture, defilement and physical injuries, there was no doubt he was actually experiencing incredible suffering, exhaustion and pain.

As a lapsed Catholic convert and human being I was extremely moved by the devotion of the participants and spectators who were able to relive the suffering, sacrifice and selflessness of this event.

I was told by a “penitente” this suffering was offered prayerfully for the wellbeing and healing of themselves, their families and communities. Beyond this was also an offering for national and world peace.

As an example, this indigenous “penitente” told me that he was praying for peace in Iraq and for the safety of American soldiers. Although I found these practices to be extreme and outside of my frame of experience, there was nothing fanatical or pathological about the people choosing to do this. They presented as very intelligent, discriminating, balanced and kind.

I got the sense that they were at peace with themselves and very centered. They seem to go into ecstatic or meditative states that defy ones concept of human endurance and healing. I was told elderly diabetics have healed completely after deep flagellations with lead tipped whips after exhausting processions of many miles.

To be honest, I don’t quite know what to think about all this, but I’m left with a deep sense of respect and admiration for their selfless sense of devotion and spiritual dedication.

Don Alfonso's Checkered Shirt

Thanks Carol. I can understand this feeling. Though, interestingly enough, ithis is what I actually wrote when originally posting this same image in color......

"Don Alfonso was in rare form today (11/22/06). He seemed very serene and happy. He told me that we help make the world a happier place by cultivating happiness and gratitude .........no matter what seems to be happening outside of ourselves........anyway, that's what I gathered he was saying. It was just what I needed to hear too ;~)............HAPPY THANKSGIVING!"


tryingtolearneply. Could it be possible that the laws of physics - both the known ones as well as the thus far unknown ones keep "the universe and this crazy world together?" I'm pretty sure that there is a book entitled ORDER IN CHAOS, or if there is not, there should be! We just bought Carl Sagan's new book, BILLIONS AND BILLIONS, edited by his wife, Ann Druyan, and published posthumously. My husband is reading it now, and if I can pull myself away from photography and flickr long enough to do so, I will read it, too. Maybe that will offer more insight. When it comes down to it, I don't think that anyone really knows anything for sure.Cheers,Carol

Eliud:
As I said, I'm more "spiritual" than I am religious. When it comes to science, it often strikes me as a form of materialist religion even as it goes about debunking "Creationism". Although I find that "fundamentalists" are often misguided, anti-intellectual and sometimes even fascistic, they are reacting to the "reductionist" materialist sterile world that "Science" seems to be preaching about. This is a very "human" need for certainly in the arena of moralizing of late has been used as a polarizing political "wedge-issue."

This is exploited by cynics (read: neo-conservatives) who feed our fears rather than our aspirations. They manipulate our human need for the comforts derived form having a fundamental sense of "certainty" in a rapidly changing world. Some of us seem to desperately grasp for the "rock" of certainty in religion, politics and science no matter the cost in reduced freedoms to question, explore and find our own answers. Very sad that. To our own peril, we disempower ourselves by becoming "consumers" of limited information and disinformation. This often leads to fanaticism, cynicism, hopelessness and, yes, sometimes even to totalitarianism.......not to mention malaise, sadness and, yes, depression.

From what I can gather, the laws of particle and quantum physics and the unified field theories "of everything" are taking us into magnificent realms of whimsical strangeness and paradox. These seem to coincide, parallel and rival what was written about in the Vedas and other sacred texts explaining the nature of spiritual reality.

I'm struck by the fact that things once considered magical and mysterious eventually become the object of faith. From faith they seem to go through a process of codification into religious dogma. After awhile, science manages to explain away the "magic" .....and then we are left with sterile scientific materialist dogma. No wonder people resent the theory of evolution.
Ironically, this process actually confirms my personal belief that a kind of (transcendent & nondenominational) "intelligent design" is at work rather than randomness and existential chaos. While I'm aware that this belief is an article of faith, but it comforts me to "know" that I live in an expanding universe of meaning, A bit like Don Alfonso derives comfort from his own religion-based faith.

This faith moves me to think, question and maybe speculate that what we now know of as science might eventually merge with cosmological explanations now thought of as the exclusive province of theology. Some say that we will eventually be confronted by a phenomenon of "the ONE." The idea that, if "God" truly exists, there is nothing outside of this principle.......that ultimately there is only "one" force and all its manifestations exist referentially from the "ONE.
Does this make me religious, an agnostic or anything? In this context such questions amount to little. Whatever the more important questions and answers might be, they are all already inside of us. This is scary for a lot of people . . . including me. For all the talk of "freedom" and "choice"many of us often choose to run from such liberation into one kind of "certainty" or another. Eric Fromm described this as "escape from freedom."

Carol, did you get to see the movie "What the Bleep?" If you haven't already, I'm sure you can easily get a hold of the DVD. It seems to go along with what I'm feeling. There is also an interesting book called "The Magnificent Universe" which you might find interesting.

Peace my friend ;~)>

PS
The following is an interesting epilogue to what to what I've just ranted about:





What would you do if you saw your nation going fascist?
By Gary G. Kohls, MD
Online Journal Contributing Writer

Mar 28, 2006

Okay, so you call yourself a patriot. But what exactly do you think that word means?
Is it the patriotism that says, "My country, right or wrong?" Is it the patriotism that says, Might makes right? Is it the patriotism of Samuel Johnson who defined it as "the last refuge of the scoundrel?"

Is it the patriotism of the 16th century Protestant "reformers" who believed that every leader of any "Christian" nation was ordained by God, no matter how much that leader promoted the satanic mass slaughter of fellow children of God, and, therefore, Christians were to be unconditionally obedient to that leader? (See Psalm 137.)
Or are you the type of patriot that loves your country so much that you won’t let tyrants or the super-rich or the mega-corporations take it over out of their greed for more power and wealth?

Are you the type of patriot that is willing to have a lover’s quarrel with your beloved country that may be temporarily under the control of those that are close to being indicted as international war criminals?

In order to find out which type of patriot you might be, you should read the following "hypothetical" situation; and then you can judge for yourself.

Suppose you are a white, God-fearing, church-going citizen in a country that prided itself on its inventiveness, its literacy, its art, its culture, its glory in past wars and its superpower status, and suppose you saw your democratic institutions and the human rights of your neighbors being degraded by the lawmakers of your nation.
Say that you saw a bunch of powerful legislators and corporations, who lied consistently to enrich themselves and who were obsessed with the desire to wage aggressive war.

Say that they started to grab control of our country’s legislature, judiciary and military. Say these cunning politicians, with the support of ruthless financiers, gained control of the highest office in the land -- without winning the majority vote in any fair election -- and started taking away, in rapid succession, the rights of many of its minority citizens, declaring left-wing peacemakers traitors, purging anti-fascists and other resistance groups from their positions of power, eviscerating its democratic institutions, silencing the "liberal" sectors of the press, working to weaken and eventually violently destroy all political opposition, censoring or usurping the open-minded media and marginalizing and silencing the artists, the poets, the writers and the creative thinkers.

You would be in 1930s Germany and the tyrants would have been Adolf Hitler’s cunning henchmen. And what would you have done in that situation?

If you were an average white, affluent, employed citizen, with all the privilege and power granted to you by that majority status, you would have said virtually nothing in opposition, even as the rights of the Nazis targeted minority groups were legally being taken away, disappearing into the gulag of prison and mental institutions.
As an average Bible-believing Christian, you would probably have obeyed your German war-supporting bishops or pastors, almost all of whom had pledged a solemn oath of loyalty to the Fuhrer, duty-bound to follow him instead of their "Lord and Savior," the nonviolent Jesus of Nazareth. Because of an out-of-context single passage in the Epistle to the Romans you, as an obedient German Christian would have been inclined to obey St. Paul and therefore the existing rulers in Berlin in the time of crisis rather than courageously and faithfully following Jesus, who forbade homicidal violence, said that all are equal in the eyes of God and that the followers should love -- instead of kill -- their enemies.

If you were an average white lawyer, physician or psychiatrist, you would have joined the Nazi Party, for doing otherwise would have jeopardized your practice. And you would have kept your mouth shut when witnessing the anguish of your Jewish, Slavic, Gypsy, socialist, liberal, or gay clients as they were forced to march toward -- and disappear into -- the concentrations camps and gas chambers.
But the question remains -- would you have been a good patriot? Or would you have been on the wrong side of justice by being obedient to the Fuhrer ("Leader") and to the cloth flag (swastika) that symbolized his rule?

Knowing that any German citizen seen helping the "enemies of the state" was guilty of treason, on whose side would any of us have stood? Would we have taken the side of the innocents -- those oppressed or outcast -- or would we have stood with the fascists?

Knowing that revering the flag was regarded as a crucial act of patriotism would we have saluted along with the victimizers or would we have resisted?

On whose side would we have been, the freedom-fighting groups (labeled "terrorists" by the State) who were courageously and patriotically trying to save their beloved nation from fascism, or would we have been on the "safe" side with the militarists and corporatists and right-wing politicians who looked like they were going to be the winners? Our answer will reveal our politics -- and our theology.

Now fast forward to America 2006 . . . but that shouldn’t be necessary, for the point has been made.

Dr. Kohls is a Duluth, Minn., physician and a peace and justice activist who has an aversion to human slaughter, for any reason, in times of war or in times of "peace." He is also a member of the faith-based peace organization, Every Church A Peace Church.
Copyright © 1998-2006 Online Journal

Don Alfonso in Dreamland...........Meditation #1

DeLartes said: Thanks for your comments. I really appreciate your openess to sharing the deep feelings these images are evocking in you. No douibt this is about your own aging process, as it is for me, but possibly also something about these two individuals. Blanca was a very independent self-sufficient woman who has succumed to Alzheimer's and dementia.

Guillermo and Blanca met relatively late in life. Since about 6 years ago Guillermo has become her lifeline. As you know from your awarenessess of this, she become delusional, anxious and extremely dependent on him. He's become quite overwhelmed and saddened by this turn of events. They are quite poor, with relatively few social services. They live in public housing and have become increasingly isolated. In working with tGuillermo & Blanca (and others like them),

I sometimes experience a sense of sadness and fear as I see myself peering into the abyss of this condition. No doubt you are picking up on the sadness of this situation. In some ways, I think this photography project is my way of working through the many feelings (fear. love, panic, compassion, sadness, understanding, etc.) that this work brings up for me.Because I'm so close to this series of images, your feedback is really helpful in developing a deeper understanding of this project and where it's taking me. I sincerely hope you are well my friend. Thanks for sharing your own beautiful images on your photostream.

Blessings to you

Don Alfonso in Dreamland...........
Originally uploaded by DeLares (Eliud Martinez).

Subject: Thanks for helping me to deepen in this meditative process through your fine comments......

Hi Carol,

You said:
I don't want to be old and helpless. Beautifully taken photo.

Thanks for your new comment. You have once again gotten me thinking about how I see Don Alfonso and how he copes with his situation. Of course this varies, but I have gotten an ongoing sense of this over the six plus years I've known him.Yes, he is 97 years old and relatively helpless and, yes, it's also hard for me to visualize myself in his place. It's humanly scary, but at the same time, when I've been with him, I've often sensed acceptance and transcendant surrender to his situation. In his case, it seems to flow from a deeply held faith in God, his own unextinguishable inner light of kindness and a sense of trust in his world. I admire and envy this when I'm able to keep my own fears at bay. Hopefully the work we've done together have also been helpful.As I wrote on another occasion, when I’ve seen Don Alfonso clearly, as I sometimes have, I haven't just seen an old man. I've seen the wholeness of his nature... a young man whose future had come to pass... all in the blink of an eye... and I was there to take his picture as the blinking eye opened in the future.Again, thanks for helping me to deepen in this meditative process through your fine comments. The latest version of www.flickr.com/photos/artedelares/396077557/ represents an aspect of Don Alfonso that hint at parts of him that are unkowable but somehow inferrable if only in my friendship, love and respect for him. All the best, Eliud