Last evening, I thought I had fallen asleep in Oz and had awakened in Kansas.
The streets were filled with costumed children larded down with bags filled with sugar loot while mothers futilely attempted to steer their charges into something vaguely resembling safe behavior. It could have been a 31 October evening in the Midwest during the 1950s.
I am not one of those immigrants who goes all weak-kneed when I see another culture's tradition being absorbed into another culture. Probably because I grew up in the United States which is one big pottage of the world's cultures. Immigrants bring their culture with them. America absorbs it -- constantly changing and re-newing.Mexico shares the "cultural sponge" trait. People bring other traditions here, and Mexicans pick what they like and make it their own.
The appearance of Halloween in Mexico is fraught with irony. The purists bemoan the appearance of jack-o-lanterns (just as they hated the absorption of Santa Claus and the Easter bunny), fearing that it will somehow hamper the great Indian tradition of Day of the Dead.
The only problem with that position is its premise. It is true that some pre-Columbian tribes in Mexico had an annual tradition of sitting and visiting with their dead. But it was regional, not throughout all of Mesoamerica. And not all the tribes celebrated on the same day.
Then, the Spanish showed up. The priests, who were an integral component of the conquest, decided to put an end to the pagan practice -- but in a very Roman Catholic way.
The church had already winked at the resurrection of the Aztec goddess Tonantzin as Our Lady of Guadalupe, so, the solution was simple and elegant.
The Purépecha around Lake Pátzcuaro were one of the tribes that regularly practiced the annual dead veneration. Rather than attempt to outlaw the practice, the church squeezed the custom through the Catholic sausage grinder by conducting a hostile takeover requiring all the tribes to celebrate on a day of the church's choosing.
The date was easy. Because the tribes were honoring the dead, the church would slip it into another day honoring the dead -- All Saints' Day (1 November). And, to sweeten the deal, the church threw in All Souls' Day (2 November).
Over time 1 November became Day of the Innocents to honor dead children. 2 November became Day of the Dead.
Not being content with that bit of cultural appropriation, the church also required that all altars honoring the spirits of the dead must contain at least one Catholic religious symbol. The rest could be made up of as many pagan pieces as the tribes cared to use. If a Purépecha warrior from 1520 were to wander into the cemetery at Tzurumutaro this year during the celebration, he would certainly recognize what was happening, even though the date and Christian iconography might confuse him.
It was not until the 1960s that the Mexican Minister of Education declared Day of the Dead would be an all-Mexico tradition, and that it would be taught in the schools to perpetuate its celebration. That is why school children, while I am writing, are building altars in the San Patricio square. And, as happens every year, there is one guy and two girls who are doing most of the work while their classmates socialize in the shade.
Like most top-down edicts in Mexico, this one set its deepest roots where the tradition was traditionally celebrated in pre-Columbian times. There are plenty of places in Mexico -- especially the north -- where any celebration of the day is so low key as to be almost invisible. Someone looking for a Coco experience in Monterrey would be sorely disappointed.
My advice to the people who are standing in the road of the hobgoblin of history and yelling "stop" is to step aside before you are run down. Day of the Dead has survived the nips and tucks of the Roman Catholic church. I would not be surprised if Mexicans incorporated trick-or-treat on 31 October and then rolled right into the multi-day Day of the Dead celebrations. Why waste a good time? When the school kids build their altars in the San Patricio square, they almost always manage to work in some sort of Halloween item.
And they are not wrong in doing that. Remember the pagan Celtic holiday of Samhain? For some of us, that is our ancestral heritage, and the Catholic church did to it what it did to the Day of the Dead. It turned the day into All Hallow's Eve (thus, Halloween) -- or, as we know it in this context: All Saint's Eve.
That is why Halloween and Day of the Dead are celebrated at the same time of the year. The Celtic and Mexican tribes both lost their tradition to the Catholic church -- and, each in their own way, has retained it.
And if that bothers some people, we may just have to stop calling our little village San Patricio. I am certain that the missionary to the Celtics, who adopted him as their patron saint, would appreciate the irony.
For those of you who are in Mexico, I hope you enjoy Day of the Dead. If you are not here, you can celebrate it wherever you are. It is obviously a very plastic event.
The date was easy. Because the tribes were honoring the dead, the church would slip it into another day honoring the dead -- All Saints' Day (1 November). And, to sweeten the deal, the church threw in All Souls' Day (2 November).
Over time 1 November became Day of the Innocents to honor dead children. 2 November became Day of the Dead.
Not being content with that bit of cultural appropriation, the church also required that all altars honoring the spirits of the dead must contain at least one Catholic religious symbol. The rest could be made up of as many pagan pieces as the tribes cared to use. If a Purépecha warrior from 1520 were to wander into the cemetery at Tzurumutaro this year during the celebration, he would certainly recognize what was happening, even though the date and Christian iconography might confuse him.
It was not until the 1960s that the Mexican Minister of Education declared Day of the Dead would be an all-Mexico tradition, and that it would be taught in the schools to perpetuate its celebration. That is why school children, while I am writing, are building altars in the San Patricio square. And, as happens every year, there is one guy and two girls who are doing most of the work while their classmates socialize in the shade.
Like most top-down edicts in Mexico, this one set its deepest roots where the tradition was traditionally celebrated in pre-Columbian times. There are plenty of places in Mexico -- especially the north -- where any celebration of the day is so low key as to be almost invisible. Someone looking for a Coco experience in Monterrey would be sorely disappointed.
My advice to the people who are standing in the road of the hobgoblin of history and yelling "stop" is to step aside before you are run down. Day of the Dead has survived the nips and tucks of the Roman Catholic church. I would not be surprised if Mexicans incorporated trick-or-treat on 31 October and then rolled right into the multi-day Day of the Dead celebrations. Why waste a good time? When the school kids build their altars in the San Patricio square, they almost always manage to work in some sort of Halloween item.
And they are not wrong in doing that. Remember the pagan Celtic holiday of Samhain? For some of us, that is our ancestral heritage, and the Catholic church did to it what it did to the Day of the Dead. It turned the day into All Hallow's Eve (thus, Halloween) -- or, as we know it in this context: All Saint's Eve.
That is why Halloween and Day of the Dead are celebrated at the same time of the year. The Celtic and Mexican tribes both lost their tradition to the Catholic church -- and, each in their own way, has retained it.
And if that bothers some people, we may just have to stop calling our little village San Patricio. I am certain that the missionary to the Celtics, who adopted him as their patron saint, would appreciate the irony.
For those of you who are in Mexico, I hope you enjoy Day of the Dead. If you are not here, you can celebrate it wherever you are. It is obviously a very plastic event.
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