Christ dying, Christ rising in the Peruvian Andes

Holy Week “La Semana Santa” is the most important time of the year for Christians. Pope Francis reminds of this when he writes, "In the heart of the Gospel, what shines forth is the beauty of the saving love of God made manifest in Jesus Christ who died and rose from the dead."

Christ dying, Christ rising in the Peruvian Andes

For this reason the three main days of Holy Week, called the Easter Triduum, is a particularly sacred time across the whole Catholic world. Amongst the indigenous Quechua peoples of the Andes Mountains of Peru, the Easter Triduum is celebrated with widespread community participation, with spectacular dramatization and bright colours and with deep personal devotion.

A typical parish in the Andes, such as Combapata, where I was formerly the parish priest, consists of a main town with a lot of outlying farming communities. Cars are very rare in these villages and public transport is minimal. Therefore, so that the communities can participate in the Holy Thursday Liturgy, the parish arranges for trucks to bring the people in to the main parish church. To highlight the Liturgical Celebration each community is asked to select a representative for the foot washing. These representatives wear their traditional dress and often women are chosen because of their colourful costumes.

After Jesus had washed the feet of his disciples he said, "I have set an example for you so that you should do just what I have done" (Jn 13:15). Participating in the same gesture is a powerful lesson teaching all of us that our union with Jesus in the Eucharist is a call to serve our brothers and sisters with the same humility. This gesture is not lost on the people of Combapata.

Christ dying, Christ rising in the Peruvian Andes

The majority of people in Latin America still struggle against poverty and different types of oppression. The indigenous Quechua people, descendents of the Incas, are a conquered people. Discrimination against these small farmers continues today. Low prices for the small scale agricultural products of these farmers makes survival on two hectares of land very precarious.

Perhaps this is one of the reasons that move many of these people to identify more with the Suffering Christ than with the Risen Lord. This means that there is often a much greater participation on Good Friday than on Easter Sunday.

Good Friday is a day full of powerfully dramatized liturgies. The day begins in Combapata at 5:00am with “the Way of the Cross” acted out around the town plaza in a dramatic manner by the parish youth group. A striking moment occurs when the "soldiers" seize a man in the crowd to carry the cross. He is just as surprised as Simon from Cyrene would have been.

Each of the parish’s many communities also dramatize their own “Way of the Cross” around the hills and fields of their village. In the afternoon the official parish liturgy of the Veneration of the Cross is held. It is an emotional experience to witness hundreds and hundreds of people in traditional dress approaching the Cross on their knees for at least the last 10 metres of the church aisle.

When the Veneration of the Cross finishes the church is full to overflowing for what the people consider is the main event of the day. This is a double procession - a men’s procession and a women’s procession.

First the men of Combapata lift a glass sided coffin containing a life-size image of “Cristo Muerto" - the "Dead Christ" which they carry on their shoulders around the streets of the town accompanied by sorrowful hymns. At each corner the coffin is placed on a specially decorated table provided by the residents of that street. Here prayers are said, Holy Water is sprinkled and Incense is offered.

Meanwhile the women of Combapata have their own procession carrying a large statue of “Maria que sufre”- "The Suffering Mary." The culminating moment occurs at the entrance to the plaza when Mary and Jesus meet and are carried together around the plaza to finally arrive back at the church where they will await the coming Resurrection.

As the people of the Andes Mountains are early risers, we begin the Easter Vigil outside the church at 4:00am, when we light the Easter fire. During the Easter Mass the rising sun lights up the church which of course reminds us of Christ rising from the dead.

It reminds us also of the ancient Inca practice in the famous Temple of the Sun in nearby Cuzco, long destroyed by the invaders to plunder the golden and silver treasures. On the day of the Winter Solstice in June, the sun shone directly through a small hole accurately placed in the eastern wall so that it completely dazzled a giant golden mirror set on the opposite wall.

What a wonderful image to for us to recall the Light of the Risen Lord, much more powerful than the light of the sun of course.

The light of the Risen Christ illuminates the lives of the Quechua speaking agricultural families - the campesinos - of Combapata, inviting them to a better life in this world and in the world to come.

Columban Fr Donald Hornsey first went to Latin America in 1975.

From the Director - Written with a shaky hand  LISTEN TO: Christ dying, Christ rising in the Peruvian Andes
(Duration: 6:08mins. MP3, 2.88MB) 


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Christ dying, Christ rising in the Peruvian Andes